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A recent writer opined that the U.S. government can’t eliminate waste, fraud and abuse because of the labor unions (“Trump, Musk full steam ahead on national debt,” Star-Advertiser, Letters, March 13). Nothing could be further from the truth. There are many examples in Hawaii when a strong labor union presence in government helped.
For example, the labor unions in the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard worked with the Navy to correct such problems. Most recently, and most compelling, I believe the Red Hill fuel spill occurred in part because the Navy did not have a labor union presence at the site. Had the labor unions known about the earlier spills and the lack of an adequate response, they would have exposed the wrongdoing.
In 2010, a labor union-led program saved the Navy millions of dollars and helped Pearl Harbor win the Mason Award, given to the best-performing depot-level military maintenance unit in the Department of Defense.
Benjamin Toyama
Ewa Beach
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