In some areas, teens are not allowed to carry backpacks or purses into a store. Some stores do not even allow them to come in if there are more than two people. They can only come inside in pairs.

Why should the law-abiding teens have to pay for other teens' mistakes? Why can't the store owners spend a little money and buy a security camera?

I have had my own experiences with discrimination. One day I walked into a pizza place on my lunch break. I wanted to have the salad bar, but the manager said I could not. I asked why and the manager said they have a problem with teenagers sharing one plate with multiple people. Just because I was a teenager, I was not allowed to eat a salad. Eating salads is not illegal.

Sure, security cameras cost money, but why should you take away privileges from everyone else?

Kawika Hunter

Inmate phone rates just price-gouging

In the ongoing debate about the high cost of making phone calls from prison (Letters, May 10 and 17), one key question remains unanswered:

Why are inmates' calls so expensive?

There is no mystery here. The companies that sell phone services to prisoners are doing what corporations always do: trying to maximize profits. Why do they charge up to 25 times the normal rate? Because they can. They have (literally) a captive market made up of persons who (1) need to make calls, and (2) do not have a lower-cost alternative.

This is a classic case of price-gouging. When markets fail, the state can and should intervene to prevent the resulting exploitation. How many legislators are there who have the integrity to do the right thing: protect the interests of Hawai'i's least-liked residents?

David T. Johnson

Mayor Harris' actions becoming overbearing

I used to support Mayor Harris. He's done some good things and deserves credit for revitalizing Waikiki.

However, it seems he's not content with merely serving the public — now he wants the public to serve him. Through his vision teams and other programs, he's been doling out money left and right the same way he handed out free slices of watermelon before UH football games when he campaigned for office. And now it's payback time.

That's what those scare letters sent out at taxpayer expense are really about. For Managing Director Ben Lee and Councilman Steve Holmes to suggest that Councilwoman Ann Kobayashi is "playing politics" with the budget is not only an insult to the finance chairwoman, it epitomizes the arrogance of city officials who act as if the budget were their money.

If anyone has been playing politics, it's Harris and cronies like Lee himself, who helped orchestrate that letter-writing campaign and other mailings as well. Every time a city project is completed at taxpayer expense, Mayor Harris sends out fancy invitations to some sort of official ceremony geared to the media. He has taken a page right out of former Mayor Frank Fasi's playbook. The only things missing are the big signs with Harris' name on it and a shaka logo.

I believe Harris means to do well. But whether it's his own paranoia or need for self-aggrandizement, or perhaps lousy political advice, he has managed to shoot himself in the foot time and again. Then he puts that foot in his mouth by attacking anyone who criticizes him.

He would be better off if he let his actions speak for themselves, instead of trumpeting his accomplishments through media events, self-serving ceremonies and manipulative letter-writing campaigns.

Rich Figel
Kailua

Multiple listing site a boon to homebuyers

In the May 19 Advertiser, Prudential Locations introduced its brokersmls.com, a real estate site for prospective buyers and sellers. As a recent homebuyer, I am all too aware of the possible frustrations involved in the buying process.

Up until now, only brokers had access to the multiple listing service (MLS), a property database rich with consumer information. However, Prudential has made available this information for the first time.

Not only is this launch great for consumers, but also for Prudential Locations. I must commend Prudential Locations for a spectacular advertising campaign. The launch of brokersmls.com incorporates two very specific persuasive theories: the power of "reciprocity" and "commitment and consistency."

By "giving" the consumer this valued information, consumers in return will feel a need to reciprocate. In addition, because we generally have a tendency to be consistent with what we have already done, we will more than likely use the services from those who provided them to us. This spells a formula for success.

Laura Ko

New measures target exploitation of minors

Gov. Cayetano's administration and the Legislature made great strides this year in the fight against the commercial sexual exploitation of Hawai'i's minors.

For three years, Sisters Offering Support and Hawai'i Family Forum fought for a comprehensive law prohibiting the use of minors in strip clubs and nude massage parlors. This conduct is gateway activity for prostitution, and the pimps and other exploiters of children have been getting away with it for far too long — and everyone who works in this area knows it.

Not any longer, however, if the governor signs SB 2234. This bill makes it a class-B felony to use a minor in a strip club or nude massage parlor. We will finally have the legal tools to stop this activity before the minors are lured into prostitution and to hold the perpetrators accountable for exploiting these young people.

In another measure, HB 2426, the Cayetano administration proposed several ways to better protect minors from adult sexual predators who use the Internet to prey on children and to tighten up Hawai'i's child pornography laws.

Most people don't realize that current Hawai'i law outrageously allows pornographers to use 16-year-old minors in their pornography. Hawai'i Family Forum supported the administration measure but asked the Legislature to raise the minor definition age to at least 18, and the Cayetano administration and the Legislature agreed. That is progress.

These are terrific steps in the right direction that will finally provide additional legal tools in the fight against the commercial sexual exploitation of Hawai'i's minors.

Kelly M. Rosati
Executive director, Hawai'i Family Forum

Clinton should also be held accountable

Regarding your headline of May 17, "Bush defends himself": Why would President Bush need to defend himself any more than Bill Clinton did when he was in office?

Clinton had been provided with much of the same information since 1993 and, in addition, Sudan offered to turn over Osama bin Laden to the United States during Clinton's tenure — an offer that Clinton refused.

Please, let's have some balanced reporting.

Steve Rudolph

Family, neighbors help overcome disease

I read the May 11 article "Cancer just won't deter Kailua mom." When she was told about the disease, she was depressed and thought about her two young children.

When I was 6 years old, my mother was also diagnosed with a fibroid. When my mother was told about her disease, she thought she was the unhappiest person. However, she noticed that there were many other people who struggled with illness such as cancer in the hospital.

If people have cancer when they are single, they can think only about the disease, but, as in my mother's case, if she has a family, she can also think about family. Her family and her neighbors supported her. Because of their support, she could overcome her disease.

Chikako Nakayama

'Best bus service' doesn't always apply

"Voted the best bus service in America for 2001 to 2002" is proudly printed on many of the city buses. I often wonder, who voted them the "best bus service"? because they must not know about the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The act states that if a person asks the bus driver to announce a street, the driver must do so, even if the person requests for all the streets to be announced. On numerous occasions, I have asked a driver to announce a street, only for him to laugh later, saying, "It was about four or five traffic lights back, yea?"

"Yea?" If I could have known, I wouldn't have asked him to announce the street in the first place and I would have gotten off the bus four or five traffic lights ago.

Bus service between Waikiki and Ala Moana is outstanding, but to other parts of the island, it gives me the impression that those people who voted TheBus as the best bus service in the U.S. have never been to Seattle or San Francisco. Outside of Waikiki, the bus is usually 15 to 20 minutes late, sometimes even later, and when the bus finally does come, it too often doesn't stop for one person.

Both Seattle and San Francisco bus drivers usually treat all people pretty much the same. I'm not too sure if that is the case with most bus drivers for TheBus. So I wonder, who voted TheBus as the best bus service in the U.S.?

Chris J Torres

Handicapped passes should be redistributed

Please don't crucify me. Just read my words. We all know that some who park in handicapped parking, pass and all, are not entitled to do so.

My suggestion is to have the state collect all the handicapped passes. Then only give them to those who need help to walk. To the layman, this means those who use scooters or wheelchairs or depend on canes, walkers or crutches.

Judy Birt
'Ewa Beach

Compassion doesn't put people on payroll

The May 14 report "People in poverty increasing in Hawai'i," by Lynda Arakawa, quotes U.S. census figures showing growth of 38,000 people in poverty from 1990 to 2000.

The very next day, Dan Nakaso and Kevin Dayton reported that the governor was unhappy with a Forbes article under the heading, "Cayetano criticizes Forbes as 'far right.' " They quote the governor comparing John F. Kennedy to Steve Forbes: "The difference is that Kennedy got to understand what poor people go through. Kennedy developed compassion for that particular segment, and Forbes never got it, and that's why he's not president, and he'll never be president."

What a remarkable combination these two reports make. Gov. Cayetano, self-proclaimed compassionate leader, helps guide the state of Hawai'i to an increase in poverty over the past 10 years. This is compassion in action? Meantime, Forbes magazine points out that businesses (which hire and pay people) have difficulty getting started and staying viable in Hawai'i.

It seems apparent our governor just doesn't get it, or he somehow gets a charge out of having people in poverty begging scraps from a "compassionate" government that produces nothing without first taking from taxpayers.

One of the main differences between Cayetano and Forbes is the vision of each. Cayetano wants to study poverty and to alleviate it; Forbes wants to study prosperity and foster, enhance and develop it.

The plain fact is: Poverty is the natural condition of man if he sits and does nothing productive. Poverty neither needs nor deserves study. On the other hand, how people become inventive, productive and prosperous cries out for study. It is these people who create the abundance we all enjoy.

A state government that discourages achievement and productivity is an abysmal failure. Given wholesome incentives, virtually all people can become productive; reverse that, and you get the results Cayetano has "enjoyed" over his two terms as governor.