As part of its attempt to close chronic deficits and achieve a balanced budget by 2020, the University of Hawaii athletic department is struggling to balance fees paid by its students. UH-Manoa students now pay a $50 student-athletic fee each semester, which gives them admission to athletic events. Plans to increase that are now on hold, pending further discussion with student groups.

One intersting tidbit that came out of a Wednesday Board of Regents meeting was that some Kapiolani Community College students were open to paying an athletic fee to get game admittance.

Surely, a way can be figured out to give any community college kid who wants to support and attend games an opt-in on the semester athletic fee, perhaps at a reduced cost.

A respected Hawaiian voice speaks for TMT

For supporters of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Mauna Kea, the testimony of respected Hawaiian navigator Chad Kalepa Baybayan must have been heartening.

At the TMT hearing Wednesday, Baybayan drew a link between his ancestors — “some of the best naked-eye astronomers the world has ever known” — and the scientific mission of the telescope.

His support of TMT, which opponents consider a desecration of Hawaiian land and culture, provided a welcome perspective from an unimpeachable representative of Hawaiian culture and education.