FIREWORKS

AN UNNECESSARY AND UNHEALTHY TRADITION

It's that time of year again, when, being unable to afford an air conditioner or a hotel room, thousands of citizens will suffer the results of the New Year's fireworks.

Since the City and County of Honolulu authorizes, approves and makes money from fireworks (via permits), I think it's past time for the city to also set up various neighborhood "closed" environments for those of us who are made ill by the twice-yearly blanket of smoke created by fireworks on New Year's and the Fourth of July.

With the new ban on public smoking showing that the government is thinking of the public's health, it is time to also re-think the firecracker idea. I understand the traditions. Some traditions need to be altered or abandoned.

We no longer sacrifice virgins to the gods. We don't set our clocks to the sun.

Lincoln's birthday was moved to a "convenient" Monday.

I do not want to be sacrificed to tradition. I just want to be able to breathe, and believe I have that right.

UH PROGRAM

GROUPS SHOULD UNITE TO TACKLE HOMELESS ISSUE

Regarding the needs of the Wai'anae Civic Center Homeless Shelter (Dec. 25): Why doesn't the School of Social Work and the School of Public Health (wherever it is now) team up to develop and administer a program to run the shelter?

The university system, a public institution, funded by the taxpayers and tuition, has the knowledge and expertise that is needed to help this cause. Shouldn't the community rely on these experts to put theory and knowledge of "best practice" to practical use in the community?

Wouldn't it also be wise to have the schools of public health, social work, and business come together to develop a comprehensive (and culturally appropriate) degree program to research, develop and implement solutions to the homeless crisis of today and tomorrow?

EDUCATION

BOE AND DOE SHOULD BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE

Miracles really do happen at Christmas. The Advertiser Editorial Board endorses the proposition that schools should be state funded but locally controlled (Dec. 26, 2006).

This sounds exactly like what Governor Lingle proposed in 2004 — equitable state funding; state education standards; local control of schools and the delivery of education services.

Perhaps now The Advertiser will hold the Board of Education and Department of Education to task for failing to deliver on their promise of local control. Despite their "commitment" to give schools control over education choices and budgets, the central bureaucracy still controls the positions a school may hire and about 95 cents on every education dollar.

While the DOE/BOE will claim this is because they can't "trust" the schools, they can't explain away the fact that public charter schools manage their funds effectively and produce equal or higher student achievement for fewer dollars. Besides, some of us have doubts about whether we can trust the central bureaucracy with more than $2 billion per year.

Given that we spend well over $11,000 per student each year in Hawai'i, it's hard to understand why our schools still have classes with more than 30 students in them. That certainly would not be the case if we had local control.

Maybe now we can support a real change from the central bureaucracy.

LOCAL CONTROL MERITS SERIOUS QUESTIONING

Schools should be controlled locally? Really? Are you guys in the Legislature listening? Wake up and smell the coffee, folks.

SMALLER SCHOOLS LEAD TO BETTER RESULTS FOR KIDS

The Advertiser is misguided in its support for school consolidation, which would merge schools having low enrollments with those containing unused classrooms (Editorial, Dec. 21). The Advertiser cites cost savings as the reason for consolidation, but without any thought as to how the quality of education would be affected.

From an educational perspective, substantial research shows that the quality of education is strongly related to school size. When all other factors are equalized, smaller schools have been found to be more effective than larger schools.

Smaller schools intrinsically foster closer relationships that help students feel connected to the school community, resulting in improved student learning.

If we are truly in favor of improving the quality of public education, we should try to divide large schools into smaller ones instead of consolidate small schools.

The Advertiser itself has some experience with consolidation, although of a different sort. For nearly 40 years, many of The Advertiser's functions were consolidated with those of the other Honolulu daily newspaper as a cost-saving strategy.

However, both newspapers became independent in 2001. Two years later, a UH journalism professor said that both newspapers showed an improvement in their coverage of national and local issues.

Perhaps The Advertiser's costs are higher now compared with the period of consolidation, but surely its customers benefit from the improved quality.

CHRISTMAS TREES

WRITER UNINFORMED ABOUT ORIGIN OF TREES

I'm always somewhat amused by the yearly letter to the editor admonishing those of us who buy cut Christmas trees. I think the letter-writers are well-meaning, but I wonder if they realize that the Christmas trees we buy are not taken from forests but farms where they are grown expressly for the purpose of cutting down. More trees are then planted to replace the ones that have been harvested.

Maybe we if we all stop buying Christmas trees, the tree farms will go out of business and be replaced by concrete parking lots. If we're really lucky, maybe another mall! I know I could sure use another pair of shoes.

FOOTBALL

COLT'S RETURN WOULD BE SWEET REVENGE

Congratulations to Colt Brennan on a great year and a fantastic finish. A point to ponder: Wouldn't it be great if you stuck around for another year — just for some sweet revenge? You know, like beating Alabama, Boise State and Oregon State or their lookalikes. Maybe pick up a Heisman Trophy and get a leg up on a top draft pick. Sure would look good on your resume.

THERE'S NO EXCUSE FOR KARL BENSON'S NO-SHOW

Western Athletic Conference commissioner Karl Benson stated last week that he will not attend the MPC Computer Bowl in Boise, Idaho, on Sunday because his attendance at the BCS Fiesta Bowl in Glendale, Ariz., on Jan. 1 is too important.

With the money the WAC will receive from the BCS, the conference could charter a plane to get Benson to the Fiesta Bowl 24 hours later. The same money will be used to subsidize the MPC bowl for the expected low attendance at the game featuring Miami against Nevada.

In gratitude for still having a job with the WAC, Benson should be willing to crawl from Boise to Glendale. If he is as important as he thinks he is, Tostitos, the BCS and Fox will delay the game until he arrives — bloody knees and all.

RAIL

VOTE SHOULD HAVE BEEN LEFT TO THE PEOPLE

The voters in the state of Hawai'i should have been the ones to vote on this rail system, not city government. I have been living in this state a little more than three years. Just look at the highways and some of the streets. There are so many potholes. It is understandable they want a rail system. Up north like Kahuku and Wahiawa, others have to pay for this extra tax. This is very unfair.

BE PREPARED FOR TRAFFIC, NOISE AND HIGHER TAX

Now with mass transit heading down the tracks, so to speak, let's look ahead a little bit. I am sure that with all the votes going the right way, many people now think that they will be able to get on the train next year, or at least by 2008. Sorry. At least 10 to 15 years, and, if you can judge by the pace of other road construction projects, probably longer.

In the meantime, streets will be closed, adding to the traffic problems. There will be noise and dust and heavy trucks and equipment tearing up existing road surfaces that hopefully will be repaved. Is that in the budget?

Heavily loaded trucks actually depress the road surface and put stress on aging sewer lines, etc. Next, when it's all done, the overpasses will provide magnificent challenges to the taggers and graffiti artists.

At night, of course, the overpasses will become bedrooms for the homeless and the stations havens for muggers and rapists. Unfortunately, this is not fantasy but real life in cities where this transport has been installed. Luckily I will not have to put up with this, as I live on the Windward side. All I have to do is support this project with my ever-increasing taxes.

CELL PHONES

RINGTONES DISRUPTIVE AND IRRITATING ON BUS

Pablo Wegesend of Honolulu called cell phones ringing on the bus one of many "extremely minor issues." Mr. Wegesend should try commuting from Wai'anae or Kahuku or other outlying areas by bus, getting on as early as 4:30 a.m., and see how he likes being disturbed during the one-hour-plus ride by loud cell-phone ringtones.

Riders talking on cell phones are disruptive because a long ride on the bus commuting to and from work can be a private space for meditation, napping, reading a book or just looking out the window.

The obnoxious ringtones can wake up a whole bus, which I have seen happen on a long commute home after a hard day's work. I support the new ban, and I have a cell phone that is either off or on vibrate when I am on the bus commuting between Wai'anae and Honolulu.

As TheBus already requires headphones for listening to radios or CD players, etc., there is no reason to object to silencing cell phone ringtones.