Letters to the Editor

Car booster seat bill essential to save lives

Not signing the car booster seat bill is insane. It would save lives.

Let the state set up a car seat lending pool for a small fee to help large families. If you have that many children, then it still behooves you to be responsible for their young lives in all ways. This is outrageous.

I am really horrified that the governor would even considering not signing the child booster seat bill.

Edwyna Fong

Taxpayers should get Digital Island profit

Regarding the May 15 Business story "Internet firm's wild ride ends": Digital Island was founded in Honolulu with an initial offering price of $12 per share on June 29, 1999. "The state, through its Strategic Development Corp., bought more than 300,000 Digital Island shares in 1997 for an average price of $1.43 per share."

Let's look over Gov. Cayetano's shoulder for just a moment. My wife, Lucille, carefully pointed out that there was a phrase missing in the above quotation about buying more than 300,000 shares. The state invested money that was obtained through taxes from little folks like you and me.

In other words, we, the taxpayers, invested in Digital Island. There was a profit made by buying low and selling higher. We, the taxpayers, made a profit, and no way can the state pocket that for whatever it chooses. No, each family gets a return, or each taxpayer gets a return.

The line forms at the right.

Ted Gibson
Kailua

There's no free lunch with government bonds

In the article headlined "Council fattens city budget," reporter Robbie Dingeman writes, "The construction budget does not rely on taxes or fees and uses money from government bonds to pay for its projects."

This suggests there is indeed a gigantic Tooth Fairy who will put free money under the council members' pillows.

Unfortunately, the construction budget will be financed, as it always has been over the years, by taxpayer dollars. The initial outflow, of course, will be only 10 years' worth of interest payment. Even with that "light hit" up front, there is still no free lunch. Every dollar borrowed and funded by these "government" bonds will eventually have to be redeemed by — you guessed it — the same taxpayers who paid the interest charges on them over the years.

No, Robbie, there is no Santa Claus on the City Council Budget Committee. These wonderful projects will be bought and paid for by all of us one way or another. Sadly, the source of that "government funding" is us.

Bruce J. Matheson
Kailua

Mother reunion story didn't deserve play

On Mother's Day, your front-page article showed a mother reuniting with the three children she gave up for adoption in 1963.

I am sure there are far more mothers on O'ahu who deserve a front-page article, such as mothers who faced hard times and kept their families together without giving them up for adoption. The article also said the mother gave the children up to pursue a better life.

My mother had seven children in the 1950s and 1960s during hard times, but she would never have dreamed of giving up any of us.

Brigitte Pierce
Kailua

Don't blame the crisis on environmentalists

Morning drive-time radio celeb Michael W. Perry has repeatedly voiced his opinion that environmentalists are responsible for California's energy crisis. Perry couldn't be more wrong.

Among other things, deregulation of California's electric power utilities, which allowed Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric to set their own production and distribution policies, is a major source of California's energy problems. The companies — looking only to their short-term bottom line — deferred construction of "expensive" new plants and failed to aggressively pursue alternative energy sources.

Instead, they favored the purchase of "cheap" power from other sources outside the state.

Perry's beef? Environmentalists have consistently opposed new nuclear power plants in California. But given the problems with existing plants, and the disastrous potential of contamination from a single earthquake of the magnitude of Northridge or Loma Prieta, that opposition is not unreasonable, especially when safer (but less profitable) alternatives abound.

Now Perry wants us to give a charitable eye to the Bush administration's new energy policies. Given the administration's track record thus far, which has heavily favored Bush's friends in Big Oil over both short- and long-term environmental concerns, it would appear that Perry's advice is not just unwise but dangerous.

If we want to avoid the problems California is going through, we must take a long view that will almost certainly not be popular with Big Oil and the power companies, whose shareholders are concerned primarily with immediate profits. Our Legislature, surprisingly, has taken some good first steps in that direction.

Ken Armstrong