Do not resume ‘Furlough Fridays’
Our teachers are already severely underpaid. Many of our youth are being taught by undereducated people, meaning they lack a teaching credential. We have a hard time keeping teachers here, especially in rural areas.
Now, the Department of Education is telling our teachers that they are going to have a 19.5% pay reduction next fall. This will be done by furloughing them every Friday. So, our teachers are expected to teach our children and youth everything they should know with 20% less class time. Our teachers already are challenged to support themselves and now this … again?
Cindy Whitehawk
South Kona
It is a wonder
Kudos to reporter Nancy Cook Lauer for her recent article on the outrageous administrative costs siphoned from the CARES ACT grant by the Hawaii County civil service.
Did anyone do the arithmetic? Two contractors will be paid $250,000 for contract accounting plus monitoring for six months. That works out to $1,000 per day for each contractor.
The four nonprofit recipients — all worthy and well-respected organizations — distribute the grant funds as broadly as possible to needy families and limit the distributions to $1,000 per family.
But — the contractors are getting $1,000 per day each.
Our County Council approved this “administrative cost” unanimously without comment, question or challenge. Should anyone be surprised to learn that every councilmember receives campaign contributions from the Hawaii public service employees union?
It is a wonder how Hawaii’s citizens can stand the stink of our elected representatives.
Ken Beilstein
Kailua-Kona
Go away, Mr. Kim
The latest proposal of raising the property tax for the “rich” just confirms what I have been saying all along: we live in the People’s Republic of Hawaii. Go away Mayor Harry Kim, and take your administration with you. The property owners targeted by this proposal are already paying the most tax and use the least of the services our tax is supposed to provide for.
Taxing people because they have money is the Communist way of addressing issues that should be addressed differently, and if the administration of Mr. Kim has no clue how to manage the budget then they should just go away. I keep wondering how do we keep electing these kind of people to run the county?
John S. Rabi
Kailua-Kona
Print replica not for me
WHT you have robbed me of one of my life’s pleasures the ability to rustle a newspaper. My entire life, I’ve always looked forward to the daily ritual of reading my newspaper, that was my time to relax and unwind. By the way, since my subscription is for my paper to be delivered to my doorstep on a daily basis do I now get a refund or lower subscription rate?
Steve Tartaglia
Kalaoa
Letters policy
Letters to the editor should be 300 words or less and will be edited for style and grammar. Longer viewpoint guest columns may not exceed 800 words. Submit online at www.westhawaiitoday.com/?p=118321, via email to letters@westhawaiitoday.com or address them to:
Editor | West Hawaii Today
PO Box 789
Kailua-Kona, HI 96745
