FISCAL CRISIS

BUDGET CUTS SHOULD BE STRATEGIC AND SURGICAL

Difficult economic times require difficult economic decisions. With a potentially huge budget deficit looming, it's perhaps predictable that Gov. Linda Lingle's first response would be to ask all state agencies to come up with 10 percent, 15 percent and 20 percent budget cut scenarios for their 2009-11 discretionary budget.

Any budget-cut decision that requires all agencies to suffer equally will not be equitable. Some agencies will suffer more than others. A more strategic, surgical approach would mitigate the overall impact on these agencies and help ensure that cost-cutting decisions don't do irreparable harm.

The proposed cuts for the Department of Education are a good example. Among the $46 million in proposed cuts is $3 million for teacher recruitment and retention programs. Hawai'i already suffers from a teacher shortage. Our cost of living makes it difficult to recruit teachers and retain them.

With retirement and attrition, the state faces about 1,300 to 1,700 teaching positions that must be filled every year at an annual cost of roughly $26 million.

Ironically, the $46 million that the Department of Education has been asked to cut is just a few million more than the potential cost of the Constitutional Convention that the governor seems to favor.

The notion that a ConCon, which most people feel is unnecessary, is preferable to recruiting and retaining highly qualified teachers is questionable decision-making at best.

MILITARY SPENDING

WORK WOULD STILL COME HERE WITHOUT STRYKERS

Regarding William Cole's Oct. 20 story, "Resumed Stryker work creating jobs:" Hawai'i does not have to pay the high price of Stryker training — which the Army concedes threatens the destruction of irreplaceable cultural sites, loss of endangered species and disruption of neighboring communities — to receive the economic benefit of military construction projects.

In its court-ordered environmental review, the Army identified only seven "Stryker brigade specific" projects. The Army said the remaining 19 projects noted in Cole's article — valued at hundreds of millions of dollars — would still go forward if the Stryker brigade went elsewhere and a second infantry brigade (whose training would have far fewer impacts) took its place. The Army also conceded it could accomplish its national defense mission without stationing Strykers in Hawai'i.

Thus, even if the Stryker brigade were stationed elsewhere, the lion's share of the construction projects and associated jobs mentioned in the story would still come to Hawai'i, with far less harm to our host culture, communities and environment.

UH-MANOA

ASSIGN DEPUTY SHERIFFS TO HELP WITH SECURITY

The recent news story reporting a University of Hawai'i uniformed security guard was robbed at knifepoint while working on campus shows that the present security system does not work. Thefts, burglaries and assaults still occur, even with more security patrols and the closing off of campus roads at night.

Most of the culprits are either on foot or on bikes. On the Mainland, universities the size of UH have their own armed and uniformed police departments, with arrest and investigatory powers.

UH's fiscal situation prohibits this. However, because UH is a state entity, state deputy sheriffs could be assigned to the UH campus to help supplement the unarmed security guards.

MAYORAL RACE

KOBAYASHI BACKED WAIMEA PRESERVATION

Recent ads that discredit City Council member Ann Kobayashi's involvement in the Waimea Valley settlement are half-truths. Here are the facts: