A strategy for Coco Palms I am astonished by the discourse about the Coco Palms. It seems misdirected. Even in the unlikely event that a historical redevelopment occurs in the current depressed real estate environment, this derelict eyesore and health
A strategy for Coco Palms
I am astonished by the discourse about the Coco Palms. It seems misdirected.
Even in the unlikely event that a historical redevelopment occurs in the current depressed real estate environment, this derelict eyesore and health hazard will still need to be taken down and removed.
Therefore, the strategy with the owner should not only be about permitting, but about condemning the property. The county will need to step up and do this, and then send the owner the bill for the clean up. If not paid, this will be liened against the property.
Keep the permits active for a drop-dead period, say, of two years. This creates the incentives for the Coco Palms owner to either develop the property or sell the permitted and liened property to someone else who will.
Russ Winter, Kalaheo
Rescind ethanol mandate
John Love’s Letter to the Editor on Friday about ethanol was good. I totally agree that the mandate on ethanol should be rescinded. Ethanol is an ineffective form of fuel with a nasty affinity for water.
Personally, I have had my older motorcycles and weed eaters require some expensive repairs due to the ethanol eating up the rubber seals within the fuel system.
And because ethanol is fairly lousy as a fuel, it has a detrimental effect on the fuel economy. I can remember when ethanol (E10) was introduced into our system. I had many customers that were driving hybrids call me and say that they experienced a significant, measurable drop in their average miles per gallon. It was right at the exact time when E10 was mandated by law.
If efficiency drops across the board by using ethanol, how in the world is that saving anything?
So let’s see. Pay more to get less, to wind up using more in the end. Hmm. Who did the math on this one?
Stephen Shioi, Kapa‘a
Lihu‘e Airport curbside security ‘rude and nasty’
We enjoyed Vanessa Van Voorhis’ column on the curbside Lihu‘e Airport security people. Unfortunately, her unpleasant experience and that of her mother seem to be the rule rather than the exception.
I want to make it clear I am only speaking about the curbside staff, not the rest of the Lihu‘e Airport security people, who are usually very helpful and pleasant.
My wife and I are Kaua‘i residents and have had several less-than-enjoyable encounters with the Lihu‘e curbside security people, the last incident being just a few months ago.
My 61-year-old wife had broken both bones in her lower leg while we were in New Orleans visiting our daughter and granddaughter. The injuries were so severe that it was necessary for a rod to be surgically implanted and secured with pins from her knee to her ankle and she was confined to a wheelchair.
The airline misplaced her walker during the flight, which we needed in order to transfer her to and from her wheelchair.
We left the airport and were about a mile away when Hawaiian Airlines baggage office called and told us they had located the walker. We returned to the baggage claim area and I ran in to get the walker. When I returned to the car, my wife was getting the same “you are not loading or unloading routine” from security, even though she had explained to them about her broken leg and her need for the walker.
She told airport security that she was really not a security risk as she could not even get out of the car unaided. The response from airport security was that “she could be a terrorist in a wheelchair or even a baby could be a terrorist ” and the car would have to be moved.
As a former Marine, I suggest it was more likely that the airport security personnel themselves were more the terrorists than we were. I know that they have a difficult job, but it takes no more time to be polite and pleasant than to be rude and nasty.
My wife and I travel extensively and we never receive the kind of terrible treatment that we get right here at home, curbside at the Lihu‘e Airport. I personally believe the unpleasant souls at Lihu‘e curbside airport security should be fired and their supervisors severely chastised.
William T. Ivison, Princeville
The bridge is not
the problem
Evelyn de Buhr’s recent Letter to the Editor, “North Shore one-lane bridge should be preserved,” needs to catch up to the current calendar year of 2012.
Evelyn seems to think it’s tranquil and a way to identify oneself as local by waiting in traffic on a one-lane bridge that floods almost every time it rains. Evelyn ends her letter with the prospect of “most of us appreciate the remnants that remain in our high-tech, speed-laced modern life. They are the touchstones upon which the pace and quality of life on the North Shore depend.”
OK, I get it, however, find it pure craziness to enjoy this quality of life from the past as we sit in our SUVs, talking on our cell phones, tweeting, texting, kids in the back downloading Netflix on their laptops and programming our GPS to get us to the airport to catch a 757 jet .
It’s not the one-lane bridge that’s the problem. It’s everyone with their motor vehicles causing congestion and traffic. If you really want to be nostalgic, how about leaving your car, cell phone, Ipod, laptop and GPS at home and saddling up your horse and buggy. Now that’s nostalgic!
James “Kimo” Rosen, Kapa‘a
