Dear lawmakers
I am writing to express my horror and amazement that the Trojan Horse bill known as House Bill 2024 is under serious consideration for passage. This bill directly threatens the economic future and food security of Hawaii Island in a way that cannot be over emphasized.
The food security of Hawaii is on a par with food-insecure countries of the Third World. Plague and war have unleashed inflationary forces on a global scale that are dramatically increasing the cost of imported food. Yet, the Hawaii Island economy remains based upon boom/bust tourism and entitlement checks from the U.S. government.
But the world is changing. If current trends continue, Hawaii Island will someday lack an economy sufficient to fund basic necessities of life here. The U.S. government is bankrupt, with its dollar-based entitlements evaporating into inflation.
“Big Astronomy” is a trans-global, trans-racial, trans-cultural, multibillion-dollar, zero emissions, environmentally clean enterprise. Big Astronomy represents the only chance Hawaii Island has to transition its economy away from tourism. Our only path forward is that of a high-tech research economy and its many economic spinoffs, with Big Astronomy being the primary driver and magnet. If Hawaii Island does not make this transition, our economy will falter. HB 2024 is a direct threat to Big Astronomy in Hawaii.
The world has changed in too many profound ways since the 19th century for the past to be reestablished. The soil is not as fertile as it once was. The forests have been leveled. Foreign factory trawlers have emptied the ocean of fish. Our agricultural products can be produced elsewhere in greater quantity at less expense. If Hawaii brings nothing to the global table but a spoon and an attitude, we are unlikely to find a seat.
We have been gifted by nature with the premier site on the planet for Big Astronomy in the Northern Hemisphere. By what flight of madness do we toss away this unique resource like a mango skin?
Ancient Hawaiians were star-gazers and blue-water navigators. The last genuine Hawaiian royalty were vocal supporters of scientific knowledge and technology. Who silenced their voices? The recent political narrative that these honorable men and women of Hawaii’s past would block the road to discovery is not believable.
I read the proposal that HB 2024 is based upon. It is openly unconstitutional in its obsessive deference to a single race, to a single religion and recently invented, politically expedient, quasi-religious sensitivities of a political clique. It cannot be lawfully imposed upon the general population. Yet, you propose to write this thing into law? On what legal grounds? Secession from the constitutional republic of the United States, which explicitly prohibits such legislation?
HB 2024 is a Trojan Horse. It is the Legislature’s way of abdicating responsibility and taking the rear fire escape rather than address a tough issue for the long-term benefit of everyone — because there may be push-back from extremists.
HB 2024 is not the path forward, nor is it the path back to an idyllic past. It is the path to economic suicide.
John Powers
Pahoa
‘Mountain of garbage’
Among the primary responsibilities of local governments — such as police/fire, clean water, road maintenance, etc. — is the responsibility to accommodate the disposal of trash.
It’s been over two years since our mayor closed the transfer stations by about 90%. A lack of operating personnel during the pandemic was the reason that Mayor Mitch Roth gave for the shutdown.
More than two years have passed. Personnel has returned to normal. There is a small mountain of garbage lying in the road in front of the locked Kalapana transfer station. It’s a 22-mile round-trip to the Pahoa station, resulting in thousands of Big Islanders storing garbage in their homes.
The authorities that issue the safety criteria have reversed their (COVID-19) mandates, and most of our county has returned to normal. Not the garbage pick-up. IT STINKS!
Please, Mr. Roth, please meet your responsibility and accommodate the disposal of garbage.
William Newman
Pahoa