CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM
The 42-story Ililani condominium tower in Kakaako is under construction. Similar housing projects may require fewer regulatory hurdles under an emergency order recently issued by Gov. Josh Green.
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Many bold, out-of-the-box solutions could provide direct housing relief to Hawaii residents who truly need it: End Section 8 discrimination, strengthen tenant protections and prohibit no-cause evictions, tax empty luxury homes and condos and reduce taxes on long-term residential units, prohibit vacation rentals that use residential housing, invest in wastewater reuse and watershed restoration so we have more water for housing, demand that the military clean up the aquifers it has contaminated and stop using water we need for housing to irrigate golf courses — the list goes on and on.
Stripping away environmental and good government protections to build houses for recent arrivals with cash in hand is not bold — it is a developer’s fantasy come true, and the beginning of the end to what makes Hawaii, Hawaii (“Gov. Green’s emergency order is under scrutiny,” Star-Advertiser, July 26).
Joel Mark
Kakaako
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