• Only half the picture • It’s nitwit time on Kaua‘i • ‘Leave’ is not the answer Only half the picture To Trey Burns (“Acting in interest of popultaion,” Letters, Feb. 18): Please reconsider your “kudos” for our councilmembers, whom
• Only half the picture
• It’s nitwit time on Kaua‘i
• ‘Leave’ is not the answer
Only half the picture
To Trey Burns (“Acting in interest of popultaion,” Letters, Feb. 18):
Please reconsider your “kudos” for our councilmembers, whom you feel “found the courage to stand against the moneyed interests.”
Courage? I don’t think so. It took little courage to stand up to unknown interests who might have opened future vacation rentals; they will never be affected and will simply find other investments.
Halting new vacation rentals is only one part of the solution to the vacation rental problem — the easy part.
I see no courage in rewarding the “moneyed interests” that we can identify — those who brazenly opened “horizontal hotels” in areas not zoned for them. Now “non-conforming use certificates” will grandfather hundreds of them all over the island, operated by people who violated zoning laws and perverted the concept of “residential neighborhoods.”
Courage would have meant requiring that all such existing un-permitted buildings revert to their proper residential use, in strict adherence to the Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance.
Our CZO never listed vacation rentals, nightclubs or hog farms as “permitted uses” in residential zones. Following council’s logic, people could have built nightclubs and hog farms in every neighborhood — and if questions ever arose later about their legality, they could be “grandfathered” in.
Grandfathering would have been appropriate only if existing units had been legal all along — and they were not.
Halting only future hog farms wouldn’t help much after neighborhoods were already saturated with them, would it? We would need to uproot all the existing ones to restore neighborhoods, right?
Council’s action is similar to having a jury find that a person’s past murders are forgiven, so long as he commits no new ones — and then congratulating themselves for “compromising” and “taking a step in the right direction.”
Please take time to read the residential section of the CZO directly, not as filtered by me or any others. Anyone wanting a use not listed as an automatic “Permitted Use” is required to apply for a special use permit. Not one of these vacation rentals ever applied for such a use permit; they just arrogantly opened for business. Had they applied, they might have had to go public, before the Planning Commission, and their neighbors might have had an early voice in what was happening to their neighborhoods. It is sad that local residents had no say whatsoever as their family neighborhoods quietly turned into resort areas without even a ripple in the usual public process. And now the council has given its blessings.
Council did indeed “sell the heart of Kaua‘i” — its historic family neighborhoods. Just look around your own neighborhood. You may find that you have actually been living in a de facto resort area — with no recourse, thanks to this new law.
Council has now handed over a monopoly on a silver platter — the exclusive right for this group, their heirs and anyone they ever sell to in the future, to operate such businesses wherever they are now located.
This law is a textbook example of special-interest legislation. Nothing could have made these existing “moneyed interests” any happier.
Barbara Elmore
Lihu‘e
It’s nitwit time on Kaua‘i
Some would argue that it’s always that time. This time the nitwits have not only banned dogs from the Eastside Bikepath; but, they are pushing to enforce the ban. They might as well have put the pavement in vertically because they have erected a barrier dog owners cannot legally cross. This was done by declaring the path a 2-mile long, 8-foot wide “County Park” instead of a path the county owns. Those dog owners reportedly are being advised by county personnel to drive north to Kealia Beach where they and their dogs can cross (within a vehicle). This barrier will grow longer, and the ban will increase, over time. Since dogs and their owners have been walking this same ground since forever, this is an enormous takeaway directed at a large group of citizens.
It’s nitwit time on Kaua‘i.
Research reveals no advance publicity on this ban, only discussions about banning horses. After reading about this on Saturday, I walked my dog on the path, and on the path to be, as far as Donkey Beach. I saw two dozen whale breachings; but no nitwits. They must have all gone to a local store’s garden department to direct people to the line with the longer wait. Where are the protectors of our rural lifestyle? What has banning all dogs from all parks say about our rural lifestyle? Shouldn’t our laws be against those irresponsible owners who permit bad dog behaviors rather than an outright ban? This overprotective approach is more Californication of Kaua‘i. Pretty soon in California, they’ll be wearing hard hats in markets to protect against falling cans. C’mon, leaders one and all, this is no-cost, stroke-of-the-pen correction time.
Let’s end nitwit time on Kaua‘i.
Pete Antonson
Wailua
‘Leave’ is not the answer
This is in response to Robert Smith’s letter (“Well within your right,” Letters, Feb. 16):
I find it interesting that any time there is a complaint about something unpleasant occuring on Kaua‘i the automatic response is “leave.”
Believe me, I would be happy to sell my home and move to a quieter location. Several years ago I put my house on the market and it was in escrow twice. Both times the sale fell through when the prospective buyers decided they could not tolerate the noise from the rooster farm next door. Perhaps Mr. Smith would like to purchase my home?
In the meantime, I continue to hope that consideration for one’s neighbors is not strictly a Mainland attitude.
Trudy Bauman
Kilauea
