"I felt that it was just a little too expensive at the time," Reese said. "It was hard to save, so we felt that it was a better move back to Hilo side."

Reese is one of many East Hawai'i residents who struggle to find work near home, and must go across the island to find jobs.

It's a problem social-services groups in Hilo want to address, so east side residents can support themselves. Local government leaders have made it a priority to solve a problem that hurts the residents' welfare and quality of life. As the tourism industry improves, some employers in West Hawai'i also would like to see a solution to Big Island housing and transportation problems as they continue to seek more workers.

JOB DRAIN

The east side of the Big Island is still reeling from the closure this year of the Hilo offices of Penncro Associates Inc., a telemarketing and bill collection company, which left about 174 employees without jobs. Penncro was the fourth-largest employer in Hilo.

In May, the unemployment rate in East Hawai'i was 6.2 percent, much higher than the statewide rate of 3 percent, the lowest in the nation. West Hawai'i's unemployment rate was an even lower 2.4 percent.

Donovan Hanohano, 47, is one of those who had trouble finding a job. He had been arrested on drug charges and was in a correctional facility for more than two years. Now he's getting job training through the Hawaii County Economic Opportunity Council.

Hanohano used to be a mason, but is trying to expand his skills. There's lots of work in construction, he says, "but it's all in Kona side. You cannot be picky about what type job you have."

Jessica Ferracane, who moved to Mountain View, north of Hilo, in 2002, said she looked for a job on the east side for five months without luck.

"So I just started throwing my hat further afield." She soon found a job as public-relations director at the Fairmont Orchid hotel — a two-hour commute each way.

HOUSING LINK

It may be easier to find jobs in West Hawai'i, but the high cost of housing makes it difficult for the thousands of hotel workers to live there. Mayor Harry Kim has declared it a crisis. "A housing crisis has hit the entire spectrum of this community, from top to bottom," Kim said. Some people work two jobs to afford their mortgage or rent.

In West Hawai'i, many home sales are to "offshore buyers," for second homes and retirees moving to Hawai'i.

"They tend to be considerably more affluent than the average local workers, and they are out in the market buying the homes that are available, and the prices have been bid up very high in the last few years," said Chris Yuen, planning director for Hawai'i County.

One recent example is the plan by a local development partnership to build 102 homes at Mauna Kea Resort, a mix of single-family homes starting at around $3 million and condominiums from about $1 million.

Ferracane, who now works on the west side, still lives in Mountain View because it was the only place she and her boyfriend could afford to buy a significant piece of land: four acres for $15,000.

"I can bet you won't find prices like that on the west side," she said.

Yuen said his department wants to get affordable housing closer to the workplace. He's trying to encourage affordable housing in Kona, advise rezoning rules, change affordable housing requirements, loosen the building code to encourage faster building and change tax rates to encourage home ownership. He also wants to encourage the state to make state land available for affordable housing.

Kim said he has tried to work with developers including Stanford Carr to encourage them to build houses workers can afford. He said he told Carr working-class people find it nearly impossible to live where they work, and Carr asked the mayor what his vision was.

"I told him it was that developers make less money," Kim said.

Kim said he would like the focus to be on "making this a nice place to live, not making it a nice place to visit."

At the Hawai'i Tourism Authority, executive director Rex Johnson said affordable housing will be an issue "as long as the economy is hot."

"It's becoming more and more of a problem," Johnson said.

FAMILY TIES

Another piece of the puzzle is that many Hilo residents want or need to stay close to their families on the east side. Some prefer the slower pace and culture.

Reese, for example, says most of her family lives in Hilo. She wants to send her 4-year-old daughter to school in the area.

But working two hours from home isn't easy. Reese estimates she spends about $50 a week on gas. To minimize the wear and tear on her 2002 Civic, which has 75,000 miles on it, she gets oil changes every month.

Still, the commute "is well worth it," Reese said. She urges her sister and friends to look into working on the west side; she cites one friend with a master's degree in political science who works as a car detailer.

"It's so hard for him on the east side to actually get a job," she said.

COMMUTE HASSLES

The commute of about two hours for east side residents working in West Hawai'i is much longer than the national average of 24.4 minutes, but it's not unusual for the Big Island.

Bryndel Kallejo, who lives in Papa'ikou, 10 miles of north of Hilo, took a job as tennis coordinator at the Fairmont Orchid because the pay was good and he wanted to advance his career.

In Hilo, "a lot of times you might get a job, but they'll pay you well below the $10 mark," he said. He gets about $15 an hour at the hotel, and he was able to get a four-day work week to cut down on his driving.

"The commute was one of the biggest things that was starting to get to me," Kallejo said. He tries to keep from falling asleep by eating sunflower seeds, chewing gum and stopping to drink coffee.

Ferracane commutes from Mountain View on weekends. During the week, she stays in a Waikoloa rental that costs her $775 a month.

Her commute takes her along the Hamakua Coast, a longer route across the island than Saddle Road, because she doesn't feel safe on Saddle Road. It's a rougher road, and she can't get cell-phone service or stop at a gas station to make a call in an emergency, she said.

Most East Hawai'i residents who commute to West Hawai'i travel by car, county bus, car pool or van pool.

Tom Brown, transit administrator for Hawai'i County, said the bus leaving at 3:30 a.m. is surprisingly popular, because many workers start their jobs at 6 or 6:30 a.m. Other buses also are filling up, and his department is considering adding another morning bus to accommodate riders who need to get to work across the island.

"It's tough for these folks in East Hawai'i, because it's pretty much 75 to 80 miles one way just to get to work," Brown said.

HIRING SHORTAGE

At the Hilton Waikoloa Village, about 18 percent to 20 percent of the 1,200 employees commute from the east side, said marketing manager Leanne Pletcher.

Yuen, planning director for Hawai'i County, said it has become a problem for employers to find workers in West Hawai'i.

One employer with a big demand for workers is the Sheraton Keauhou Resort & Spa, the former Kona Surf Hotel, which expects to begin hiring about 400 employees in August, after a renovation.

At the Fairmont Orchid, human-resources assistant director Kaiulani Damaso said housing and transportation are issues for their workers. About 13 percent of the 750 employees come from East or South Hawai'i, commuting as long as 2&Mac253; hours. About 10 percent commute from Honoka'a, about an hour, and 11 percent from Kohala, about 45 minutes, Damaso said.

"I know they all do wish they could work closer to home. For our working parents, that's a big sacrifice" to work so far away from their families, Damaso said. "We celebrate the fact that they show up every day and do an excellent job when they are here."

NEW INDUSTRY NEEDED

George Yokoyama, executive director of the Hawai'i County Economic Opportunity Council, said Hilo began to have problems after the demise of the sugar industry 20 years ago.

"There's no industry in the magnitude of sugar to take the place of sugar. ... So the consequence of this is East Hawai'i has the highest percentage of welfare clients in the state," he said.

He said many of the jobs in the area pay minimum wage or close to it. Wages are better in West Hawai'i, but many don't want to move.

"Economically, we're really distressed," Yokoyama said. "With the economy so bad, you know what happens? The social ills come out — ice, substance abuse."

He said Hilo needs industries to take the place of sugar. Many on the Big Island "have worked on the big plantations — mac nut farms and things like that — and made a change into the hospitality industry over the last 10 to 15 years."

Some say East and West Hawai'i are now like two different islands, one where a strong, tourism-based economy supports homes going for a million dollars or more, and the other where a faltering economy has people struggling to survive.

"We need to focus on bringing developers here to help enhance the community of this island, instead of building a playland for the very wealthy," Kim said. "If we don't as a community address this, then we're going to develop Hawai'i island into a lifestyle that I don't think any of us would like."