• Housing: Plan carefully • Troubled times • Solar response Housing: Plan carefully The people of Kaua‘i face a true dilemma. At the same time that we are losing the character of our island to the influx of Mainland property
• Housing: Plan carefully
• Troubled times
• Solar response
Housing: Plan carefully
The people of Kaua‘i face a true dilemma. At the same time that we are losing the character of our island to the influx of Mainland property owners and construction of new houses everywhere you look, we are facing a shortage of affordable housing for our local people.
I have seen over and over how new construction is changing our environment, changing our social structure and culture, destroying our open spaces, and eliminating our beautiful view planes, impeding the beautiful views that residents value and tourists pay big bucks to see.
JoAnn Yukimura wants affordable housing for Princeville, yet she also espouses the protection of agricultural lands. Where does she think Princeville will put this housing, except to lose more of the beautiful greenbelt that one sees driving into the North Shore area? They want to build a “mauka village,” taking up much of the prime ranching pasture lands.
More construction along this corridor will kill the goose that laid the golden egg. Tourists will lose interest in this area when it looks like every other overdeveloped destination (like Maui) or even reminds them too much of the Mainland. The current visitor destinations in Princeville should be concerned about this influx of construction. It is bound to adversely affect them. Housing for their employees should be built, but not on ag lands, not at the expense of our open space.
We need to find places for affordable housing without sacrificing our precious open lands. We need to keep ag land in agriculture. In our sense of emergency let us not rush into poor decisions that will bring yet another set of problems in the future. Developers want to make money. Let’s not let them play the affordable housing panic card to their advantage and end up with a lot more not-too-affordable housing on our island.
Martin Richardson
Princeville
Troubled times
When all our decisions reflect the insecurities of the past we some times forget the real purpose of our existence on planet earth. Be it that it may, we have grown to require so much that our attitudes of needing more and more has grown into a compulsion of forgetting about all that we have. Great people have turned just little things into great things by just giving them away. The concept of Aloha is that way. I grew up here and have noticed the decline of the values that I grew up under. My description of grand parents is security. My description of parenthood is sacrifice. My description of family is compassion and love. When Troubled Times came we all came together and became each other’s keeper. There were times that there was nowhere else to turn but to our Family. I am not alone in this for I know many families that have the same concept as I do. We have come a long way and we need to continue our journey together. Welcome the visitors, “Hui, Come inside.” Whatever happen to that? Or remember this one? “Come, Come inside, come eat.” Our lives reflect our generosities, and our generosities reflect our caring for others. Even strangers were welcome. I hope that we can return to that life style again. So in Trouble Times turn to the fianily.
Sam Chandler
Kekaha
Solar response
Through creative reading, Mr. and Mrs. Glass completely failed to grasp the point of my letter. I did not address either the efficiency or desirability of solar heating. My intent was to point out that government force and coercion that compels people into buying something they may or may not want is contradictory to the goals of a free society. This applies no matter what price level of housing is in question and to all matters. As such, my discussion was about American principles — life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — and the threat posed to them by socialist policy, not the technical or economic merits of solar heating — the red herring argument offered by Mr. and Mrs. Glass notwithstanding.
The economic costs and benefits of solar heating are obvious without help from the Glasses, and anyone who wants can examine them and then should be FREE to make up his or her own mind whether or NOT to make the purchase. Just because Gary Hooser, the Senate and the Glasses, et al, think that something is a grand idea does not give them cause to employ the overwhelming power of government to strip us of our right to make our own decisions. They, of course, see things differently; that is, we should all live by their enlightened dictates.
The next thing you know someone might think that mandated retrofitting of solar systems is another “great” idea; or, maybe the installation of tile or copper roofing. Or euthanasia for old people. Where does it stop? With the abundance of busybodies and do-gooders parading around like mad hatters, it never will. What is it about some people that they just cannot leave others alone?
I directed “euphemistically”, by the way, at the language of the bill, not the efficiency of solar systems per se. The use of “energy efficient water heaters” hid the real meaning of the bill — to dictate the use of solar heaters and possibly on demand heaters exclusively. Hooser chose to conceal his intent by using vague language — as all politicians are prone to do — leaving maximum wiggle room for the bureaucrats to later “interpret” and administer the law.
R.S. Weir
Kapa‘a
