As a longtime resident of Waikiki who chooses not to own a car, I welcome the city’s plan to implement and expand fees for street parking in my neighborhood (“City plan could worsen Waikiki parking,” Star-Advertiser, Oct. 31). I specifically chose to make Waikiki my home because of its walkability and options to get around without being chained to a car.

Those of us who choose to use transit, walk, bike or car-share should not have to subsidize those who choose to drive and park their personal vehicles on public streets. Since raising gas and registration fees to actually cover the cost of construction and maintenance of our roadways has become the “third rail” of politics, the city is left with no other choice but to impose a user fee on drivers to cover the real cost of driving.

Taxpayers are tired of subsidizing drivers. Enough is enough.

Jeff Merz

Waikiki

Don’t confuse us with other firm

It was reported recently that Shellie A. Grace, operator of Elite Property Management Services, LLC, was indicted for allegedly not paying taxes and not making proper payments to owners of properties being managed.

I am director of property management for Elite Pacific Properties, the largest luxury real estate brokerage in Hawaii — and we have no connection to Grace or her company, despite the similar name. People who heard the news of Grace’s company might mistakenly have thought our firms to be the same or related, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Our Elite Pacific Properties has an impeccable reputation, backed by our A+ rating by the Better Business Bureau, among other accolades.

Property management firms must be held to a high standard of honesty and ethics and have a fiduciary responsibility to their clients. Most Hawaii property management firms and real estate agents meet this high standard, and I am proud to say that Elite Pacific Properties is an industry leader in this regard.

Charlotte Sherwood

Director of property management, Elite Pacific Properties

Protect work life of Hawaii doctors

Hawaii Medical Service Association’s new “payment transformation” program sets up a new system of incentives under which Hawaii’s physicians must earn their pay.

Don Berwick, president of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, wrote in “The Toxicity of Pay for Performance” that such incentive systems are “destructive of what we need most” in health care.

I believe the program misjudges what motivates our physicians to serve. Its pay-for-performance design will likely stress physicians as attention and resources are redirected from providing personalized health care to meeting numeric goals.

What needs more discussion is how this program addresses physician product- ivity and cost control. Physicians could end up having to take care of more patients or having to work longer hours to get the same pay.

These factors do not make the life of a primary care physician inviting. Hawaii physicians should be shown how their quality of work life will be protected before an agreement with HMSA is finalized.

John C. Post

Kakaako

Seniors struggle with health costs

The cost of hospitalization is taking its toll. A person goes to the emergency room and a scanner band is put around the wrist, which itemizes every item issued: medication, tissues and probably even a cotton swab.

Yes, we senior citizens have Medicare and are lucky if we have some medical retirement benefits from the company we worked for.

People may think retirees get a large sum from our retirement income. But no one looks back to think that we who were born during the Depression years went to work after serving in the military when the minimum wage was $1.25 an hour or $50 a week.

Our Social Security income is based upon how much we had invested while we were working. How much money could we put aside for savings for our future back then?

It is not the new president who will help with our medical issue for all hospital patients. It is the members in Congress who make the law and must stop these outrageous hospital costs.

Philip K. Ho

Waialae

Singing anthem an outdated ritual

The national anthem ritual before sporting events is anachronistic and silly. What is the purpose of pretending the game, whether high school football or a multibillion-dollar business, is patriotic? Or is it really to ensure conformity and stifle dissent repeatedly among large captive audiences? Isn’t it a sneaky oath of allegiance?

There was a time when the ritual was also performed in movie theaters before each showing of the main feature. Some day we will look back on how today’s habit is just as absurd.

Thank you, Colin Kaepernick.

Kurt Butler

Wailuku, Maui