Regarding Liquor Control
This is my follow-up to my letter to the editor, “Liquor process favors applicant,” printed in this newspaper on June 29.
If you thought Hawaii County helped the guy who wants to make 7,500 barrels of vodka and gin in my backyard was weird, you’re going to be amused how the county Department of Liquor Control used old rules.
We 21 protesters all signed the same petition to disallow the liquor license.
Some of these reasons were: safety of the children who play and people who use the road for exercise walks, risk of fire from the fermentation process, and there’s already inadequate parking on our small road.
We had 23 total protesters but were disqualified because we needed eight more owners to sign our petition to make majority. We should have awakened those people who didn’t sign. They unknowingly inflated the numbers so we couldn’t reach majority.
Hawaii County’s majority game for excluding us protesters is not a Hawaii state law. This county’s guidelines for protests are based on a 2001 law, not the 2018 one. The county Liquor Control website posts the 2018 law, but the 2001 guidelines were not public, not on the internet. These guidelines were emailed to us.
The 2018 law (HRS 281-58 Protests) does not state anything about protesters needing to be a majority of people. This 2018 law could have stopped the guy who wants to make hard liquor in our Captain Cook community.
That brings me back to the quote by the director of Liquor Control, “Change is always happening, and in a democratic society, majority rules. Under your scenario, nothing would change.”
Nothing would change if they keep on using Liquor Control’s 22-year-old guidelines instead of the law written five years ago.
Alyce Ma
Kealakekua
Sound pollution
The further I read your article about educating visitors on their behavior at Keaukaha’s beach parks, the madder I got.
How about educating the people who live here about their loud music?
I recently had a stretch of nine — count ’em, nine — times where I was enjoying the sound of the ocean, the sight of the palm trees, and was getting really happy.
But nine times in a row, I just had to get up and leave because some totally stupid, rude person started blasting — really blasting — their music.
It might be a time-honored ritual among some segments of our population, but it’s despicable.
Educate that!
Mary Lee Knapstad
Volcano