Moving suggestion seems out of touch
I realize I may be misjudging Pat Hall from his/her letter regarding the idea that people should move elsewhere when basic housing needs where they live become unaffordable.
Given the fact that Mr/Ms grew up in Newport Beach, California, and was able to afford a “small 36 foot sailboat” and the leisure time to sail to Hawaii soon after marriage, might indicate that Mr/Ms Hall is not all that familiar with not being able to afford luxury items that most Hawaiians cannot.
The fact that he/she also has the resources and time to motorhome around the US where he/she found cheap housing, seemingly, everywhere he/she looked makes me think that he/she is not hurting for basic needs now either.
But the key to my disagreement with his/her assessment of what people should do when they are poor was in his/her statement that people should move “somewhere they could live the way they wanted to live.” Mr/Ms Hall seems to be saying that there is a three-bedroom, two-bath home in Natchez, Mississippi, for sale for $50,000 so anyone priced out of the housing market in Kailua-Kona should leave family and everything they know behind and move there.
Mr/Ms Hall seems to have had some advantages in life that many others don’t have and his/her statement regarding a solution to a very serious problem does not help. I suggest he/she give a little more thought to what he/she feels about this and maybe develop a little compassion for those less fortunate.
P.S., in April I made my 25th trip to Hawaii.
Jim O’Toole
Anchorage, Alaska
Seat belt violations are serious
I have seen nothing reported about charging the driver of the SUV with failure to have all passengers secured by seat belts. It seems to me that the injuries would be far less had they all been wearing seat belts and maybe even minor even though it was a head on crash.
Front seat passengers especially can be seriously injured in a frontal crash when not wearing the seat belt as the airbag is designed to work in conjunction with the seat belt. I personally refuse to put my car into drive until all passengers have their seat belts fastened. Besides the injuries that will occur in a crash to persons not wearing seat belts, they can also become “missiles” and seriously injure other passengers in the vehicle when they hit them.
I am hoping that WHT can investigate this and report on it in the newspaper.
Colin Luck
Waikoloa Village