Posted on: Wednesday, March 2, 2005
Many 'willing to pay' to improve services
| • | Big increases sought for sewer fees, car tax |
By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Staff Writer
Waimanalo construction worker Mark Wilkinson sat with a plate lunch at Manoa Marketplace yesterday afternoon and took the news of impending sewer fee and vehicle weight tax increases in stride.
"You gotta do what you gotta do," he said. "We neglected some things for a long time. Now we've got to pay the bills."
Like a lot of other folks around O'ahu yesterday, Wilkinson wasn't really looking forward to having more money taken out of his pocket to pay for improved basic city services.
But he wasn't outraged, either.
"If you've got to do it, it's better to do it while the economy is good," he said. "I'd rather they spend the money on things like fixing the existing roads than build more of those big signs in Nu'uanu."
At the unveiling of his operating and capital improvement budgets for the city's next fiscal year, Mayor Mufi Hannemann yesterday promised only things we "need to have," not those that would be "nice to have."
And that note seemed to strike a chord with residents around the island, perhaps accustomed for years to maintaining their own budgets by something of the same creed.
Hannemann said increased sewer fees would help pay for more than $240 million in sewer system repairs. Also, much of the money from a proposed penny-per-pound increase in the vehicle weight tax would be dedicated to repairing roads or used to offset an expected $11 million increase in fuel costs for city buses.
Other taxes were considered, but "this seemed the best option to help us wage a successful war on potholes," Hannemann said. "This was the best way to spread out the pain."
Car owners parking along Punchbowl Street across from City Hall yesterday afternoon seemed to agree.
"If they really come out to fix the roads in Wai'anae, then I'll go along with it," said police officer Eddie Kealoha, who was waiting in a 2000 Chevy Tahoe to pick up his son, who was taking a college entrance test down the street. "Even if it's 60 bucks a year for me, I'm willing to pay. I spend that much money every weekend anyway."
Garrett Martin, 48, a Waikiki bookbinder, thought the increases might even have a good side-effect.
"Maybe it will push more people toward driving smaller, more gas-efficient vehicles," said Martini, adding that he and his wife traded in their Cadillac last year for a couple of mopeds that zip them around town.
Mopeds are not subject to the vehicle weight tax, he added.
Wayne Lee of Kahala seemed more upset by losing 50 cents he had just put into a broken parking meter than the proposed increase in fees.
"It's reasonable, I guess. At least it goes along with the user-fee idea, making the people who use the roads pay for them," he said.
Not everybody was happy, though.
"What a bummer," said Suilana Chin, a retired physician who had just parked her Volvo station wagon and was headed into the state library. "They never seem to have enough money, do they? Still, what else can you do?"
Reach Mike Leidemann at 525-5460 or mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com.
