PRICE SWING

GAS CAP LAW CRITICS HAVE FORGOTTEN PAST

I have read so many letters from people who say the gas cap law is idiotic and does not work. Is it possible that critics of the law just started buying gasoline in the last six months?

My family and I have been purchasing gasoline for more than five decades in Hawai'i, and the supporters of the law are correct — gasoline prices have always gone up with Mainland prices, but our prices rarely come down when the nationwide prices are lowered.

During the week starting Oct. 14, when the gas cap law lowered wholesale prices by 45 cents, it was independent dealers who lowered their prices first. It seems that the refinery-operated stations such as Tesoro and Chevron have chosen to price their gasoline 40 to 50 cents higher than independents for many days in an attempt to keep gas prices high.

Credit for this gas cap law's success should go to the state Legislature and a few independent individuals who had the concern for the people and guts to have the gas cap law enacted.

STADIUM

DON'T FORGET THE DANGER OF DRIVING HOME DRUNK

Kudos to reporter Brandon Masuoka for his excellent and balanced report of Nov. 13 on the thorny Aloha Stadium alcohol sales and consumption issue.

In future reports, however, please remember that the reasons for any new rules go beyond "curbing underage drinking and alcohol-related misbehavior at the stadium." There's also lethal danger from alcohol-impaired drivers heading home.

EAST HONOLULU

HOW WILL SCHOOLS DEAL WITH HUGE BUDGET CUTS?

I was pleased to read Rep. Lyla Berg's Nov. 6 letter about the impact of the weighted student formula on Hawai'i public schools. By highlighting sporadic success stories of schools continuing programs despite funding cuts, Berg provides all of us with the hope that the weighted student formula will not result in the disastrous loss of teachers and programs.

However, I am concerned that she ignored the larger issue: How will East Honolulu schools (which lost more than $2 million under the weighted student formula) deal with huge budget cuts?

Sporadic success stories make for lively commentary, but there are not enough innovative and creative solutions to replace millions of dollars of lost funding. I am concerned about the lack of community interest in this problem. The most recent Kaiser High School meeting on the impact of the weighted student formula had very sparse attendance.

In fact, other than the school council, I was the only person in the room.

CARS, PEDESTRIANS

IT'S DANGEROUS OUT THERE ON OUR ROADS

Leaving your house and venturing onto the streets is a risk. Recent articles in The Advertiser have focused on a cell phone-caused accident in the Sandy Beach area and the perils of the pedestrian.

Drivers have to be constantly vigilant of their surroundings. Throw into the mix a pedestrian clad in black at night crossing the street, a jogger or bicyclist using the stretch of road from Hanauma Bay to Sandy Beach as a training route and then an inattentive driver, it is no wonder accident statistics are climbing.

Sharing the road was a budget-driven concept; the road was designed for cars and trucks. There is a big enough battle going on among the vehicles. The only real protection for pedestrians are overpasses, and for bicyclists and joggers, a path that does not interfere with vehicular activity on the road.

KAKA'AKO

RESIDENTIAL TOWERS ARE PROLIFERATING

No residential towers on the state's waterfront land in Ka-ka'ako, please!

In the Kaka'ako area, there are already plans for 14 new residential towers with about 4,000 units (Honolulu Advertiser, 10/30/05: "Kaka'ako on the rise: Bumper crop of condos sparks concern about overcrowding, potential for bust").

Also, city planners predict an increase in the Kaka'ako neighborhood of 25,000 people over the next 25 years. In or adjacent to the Kaka'ako area, we have Ala Moana Center, Ward Warehouse, Ward Centre, the Ward theater complex and more Ward development being built as we speak.

Why, then, has Alexander & Baldwin in its proposal for the Kaka'ako waterfront area come up with more residential towers and commercial development that are clearly not needed? This is, instead, a rare opportunity to save open space in this increasingly overcrowded urban area. This is state land and should be used for green space, for the recreational and cultural uses of Hawai'i residents and visitors, and for preservation of the ocean shoreline.

KIDS IN CARS

THAT WOULD BE MISTAKE

I really enjoyed Mr. Tom MacDonald's idea about preventing anyone from taking your car with your children. He says to just lock the car with the kids still inside. Did he even consider that this could end up with a child accidentally releasing the parking brakes or shifting the gear lever into reverse or drive mode with the engine on? Let's always think safety first.

DEVELOPMENT

ABERCROMBIE OUTBURST IS JUST GRANDSTANDING

I am amazed at Congressman Neil Abercrombie's grandstanding performance about the HCDA and the Kaka'ako redevelopment plan. It's as if he just arrived on the scene and is shocked at the results. How long has this been going on? Almost 30 years!

The excuse for his outburst is that the HCDA did not include in the plan the proposed light rail transit. As we all know, it couldn't do that because there is no plan for this new mass transit.

If we follow his logic, we can kiss off Kaka'ako redevelopment for another few years and, let's be honest, when a new redevelopment plan is proposed, there would still be a bunch of people who will be unhappy.

UH FOOTBALL

'MANAGEMENT' MISTREATING US SEASON-TICKET HOLDERS

Mahalo to Lee Cataluna for pointing out the obvious: UH football isn't scoring a lot of points with us regular folks.

Forget the whole "alcohol is a huge problem except when we sell it" fiasco. As 20-year season-ticket holders (10 in our group), what bothers us the most is how they treat us long-time, loyal fans.

While we've been there through thick (Holiday Bowl victory) and thin (vonAppen years), here's a sampling of what "management" has done for us: annual increases in ticket prices combined with additional "premium game" charges and displacing folks from their long-held seats without any kind of goodwill gesture to help them relocate; higher parking fees and misguided "traffic control" inside the parking lot, including taking more and more parking stalls every year for the boosters; last-minute changes in game days and times; an inane "security ban" on what you can bring into the stadium while scores of stadiums around the country (that are much more probable terrorist targets because at least they are full of people) have fans with noise-makers cheering on their teams.

Add to that an arrogant coach with a huge salary and contract extensions who makes excuses every week, promises he hasn't kept ("we'll be a Top 25 Team in three to five years"), pays a Mainland consultant mega-bucks to change the uniforms and team name, bans "Hawaii 5-O" and replaces fan cheering with prerecorded chanting that sounds like the witch's soldiers from the "Wizard of Oz," and is it any wonder we have a university game without the college atmosphere?

It looks as if the powers that be are content to sit back and watch what happens as the fan base dwindles and the sponsorship moneys dry up as they did for the Aloha and Hawai'i bowls because they've alienated the regular folks who way outnumber the big-money sponsors and the brie-and-champagne boosters.

Thank goodness for Longs Drugs value book day!

SARCASM INAPPROPRIATE

REPORT CARD ISSUE A SERIOUS ONE

From the sarcastic tone in the Nov. 7 editorial "Finish up those new report cards," The Advertiser implies that the problem is not with the new report cards but with the teachers — we've had two years to pilot the new report cards, and only now we are complaining that they are too cumbersome and time-consuming.

You suggest that we are behind the "learning curve," that we need to apply ourselves, and that our complaints should be curbed by the union.

According to Roger Takabayashi, president of the Hawai'i State Teachers Association, teachers from some of the 10 schools where the report cards were tested have said that their recommendations were ignored (Advertiser, Nov. 3). Since the vast majority of teachers were not part of the pilot program, and our opinion was never asked for, this is the first time we have been able to voice our concerns.

You might have justification for your negative comments if we were just whining about how time-consuming completing the cards were, but that is not what this is about. The real problem with the new report cards is identified in your own editorial, as you first gave us a C-minus grade, then acknowledged that old-fashioned letter grades weren't given any more, then struggled with the new rating system, finally coming up with "well, whatever the code is that means 'has not quite met the standards,' that's the mark they get."

A little slow on your own learning curve, wouldn't you say? If you can't understand the new rating system, how can you expect the parents to understand it, and why would you expect the teachers to find it acceptable?

The change in the rating scale from the traditional five-point scale (A, B, C, D, F) to the new four-point scale (ME, MP, N, U) is confusing, but more importantly, it does away with the ability to generate a grade-point average for a student. If Hawai'i's high school students don't have a GPA when they graduate, they will be at a distinct disadvantage when applying to Mainland colleges.

Will I continue to complain about the new reporting system? You bet. I am fighting to assure that our students have the best opportunities available to them when they graduate high school, and that they are not penalized or limited because of an unwieldy, poorly-thought-out grading system.

The DOE needs to hear more complaints, not fewer, and not just from teachers. Parents have a responsibility not to passively accept the new grading system, but to find out as much about it as possible, and if they find it lacking, to voice their opinion loudly, clearly and repetitively before it negatively impacts our high school students.

The Advertiser has a responsibility to be thoroughly informed about all aspects of a controversy before it spouts off with sarcasm aimed at the wrong people. I'm giving you a "U" on the quality of your editorial. You go figure out what it means.