HATES BIG PROJECTS THAT COULD KILL REEFS
Maui has the best politicians money can buy and most were bought long ago. Graft is, after all, a sacred Maui county government tradition.
I watched the reefs at Kaanapali finish dying off after six hotels were built in 1980. I am still seeing development rotting the reefs of Wailea, Kihei and Makena. The reefs at Ulua, Mokapu and Keawakapu and many more? Already dead.
Years ago after a sudden heavy cloudburst upcountry, I watched a flash flood of runoff violently rip out 20 feet of the “Old Kings Highway” just south of Makena landing. Pesticides, phosphates, nitrates, filth and hundreds of golf balls vomited into the sea. All along the shoreline was a thick, smelly, brown-black poisonous muck. For months visibility was zip. No light means suffocation.
A 1,500 home development at Olowalu (“Reef At Risk,” May 3, 2012)? This incredibly unique Hawaiian reef is to be smothered. One good storm, it’s done.
Testifying does little good when the fix is already in. Why would we want to save Olowalu’s one-of-a-kind reefs and bountiful marine life? How will that slip money into a politician’s pocket?
There’s a terrible thing about being honest and elected on Maui. To get anything done, you have to constantly compromise in order to get others in county government to vote with you to get what’s obviously best for Maui. You have to agree to vote for those developments the majority of our leaders traditionally receive bribes and kickbacks for. Tit for tat. It’s gonna take a surgeon to fix it. Don’t let Olowalu perish at the claws of county government. Amputation at the voting booth is the only solution. Bring your friends!
-Robert Baker, via email
*****
LOVES CASE, HATES PIGNATARO
Don Young clarified that his endorsement is limited to the primary election. This should come as no surprise (Coconut Wireless, Aug. 9, 2012). I’m pretty sure every single Republican in the country is “endorsing” Mazie [Hirono] in this primary because poll after poll has shown that Ed does much better than Mazie in a head to head against [Linda] Lingle. In any case (pun intended), luckily this election is near an end, since Mr. [Anthony] Pignataro has apparently been unable to write about anything other than how Ed Case is a non-entity in the race. Unfortunately, his near obsession with doing so suggests exactly the opposite.
-Caleb Rowe, Ed Case campaign functionary, via MauiTime.com
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