Rats will always be a problem

Control of rats in Waikiki will prove as elusive as Hawaii’s long history of marginal rat control.

Hawaii’s war on rats began long before they brought us plague and ravaged agricultural crops. In 1925, my grandfather studied ways to control rats that were damaging the Hamakua Sugar crop on Hawaii island. Despite poisoning and trapping up to 141,000 rats a year, he found no appreciable decline of rat populations or sugar damage.

For Waikiki, we should get rid of as many rats as possible, but, unfortunately, there will always be legions of prolific new rodents to replace them.

Michael A. Lilly
Honolulu

Stiffen penalties for illegal hiking

I would like to say that I totally agree with Claire Yoshida’s comments ("Make rescued hikers pay for their rescue," Star-Advertiser, Letters, June 17).

I live by the Haiku Stairs, and there are signs posted everywhere that the stairs are closed. It seems to me that the hikers have total disregard for the signage and continue past the signs, which then makes them trespassers.

If this situation requires a rescue by the Honolulu Fire Department, then, they should be cited for the trespassing (the citations should be large enough for them to think twice about trespassing), made to pay for the rescue (including helicopter time) and given a warning. Second offense should be a higher citation and jail time.

If they are minors, their parents should be required to pay or serve whatever the adult would have been responsible for.

Last, anyone or any business posting Haiku Stairs information on the Internet should also be subject to citations for not disclosing on their website that the access is closed — and enforce it.

Rae Leong
Haiku Village

Drug laws need to be relaxed

There is a middle ground between drug prohibition and blanket legalization ("Leaders, but not Obama, see futility of war on drugs," Star-Advertiser, Jacob Sullum, July 14).

Switzerland’s heroin maintenance program has been shown to reduce disease, death and crime by providing addicts with standardized doses in a clinical setting. The success of the Swiss program has inspired heroin maintenance pilot projects in Canada, Germany, Spain, Denmark and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription heroin maintenance would deprive organized crime of a core client base. This would render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable and spare future generations addiction.

Marijuana should be taxed and regulated like alcohol, only without the ubiquitous advertising.

Separating the hard and soft drug markets is critical. As long as organized crime controls marijuana distribution, consumers will come into contact with sellers of addictive drugs like meth. This "gateway" is a direct result of marijuana prohibition. Drug policy reform may send the wrong message to children, but I like to think the children are more important than the message.

Robert Sharpe
Policy analyst, Common Sense for Drug Policy

Rail contractors test boundaries

As a former program manager for a number of airport projects, I know firsthand that the talent pool for qualified personnel to oversee design and construction projects with the scope and complexity such as our rail project is very shallow and not often found on local municipalities’ employment rolls.

It is common practice to embed experienced professionals alongside local government workers to, in effect, guard the public hen house from private sector foxes. However despite assurances of supervisory separation of InfraConsult from its parent HDR Engineering, as well as HDR’s commitment to not pursue any future rail-related project contract, Daniel Grabauskas of HART will be challenged convincing us this incestuous relationship is in our — the public’s — best interest.

Richard Broadhurst
Waikiki

Change orders might not end

Daniel Grabauskas says he wants more rail seats and to install fare gates.

Thus the march to major change orders begins: Redesign the cars. Add more cars to accommodate patrons. More maintenance needed or more cars. Need fare gates to ensure collection of fares.

When will it stop — when we hit the $10 billion mark, or beyond?

Bob Volkwein
Aiea

Bag ban has worked on Maui

I couldn’t agree more with Lisa Kennedy ("Don’t delay plastic bag ban," Star-Advertiser, Letters, July 14).

As a resident of Maui for more than 50 years, I can attest to the difference the Maui County ban on plastic has made. No more "opala birds" flying from trees and littering the land.

It would truly make a positive ecological difference for the other counties to follow Maui’s lead.

Cathy Rhodes
Kuliouou

Bus could assess fuel surcharge

Has anyone considered adding a"fuel surcharge" to the bus fare?

If that expense is driving TheBus into the ground,an extra quarter, collected from every rider (including seniors) might be enough to tip the scales in favor of restoring all unwelcome route cuts.

Of course, no one wants their bus service curtailed. What was once popular needs to be examined thoughtfully, in the public domain, before it is cut back.

Dennis Egge
Salt Lake

Bain Capital did nothing wrong

In the discussion of Bain Capital, many people miss the point.

BainCapital makes money by buying and selling companies. Once it owns a company, it can do with it what it wants: It can pay big fees to the directors. It can borrow money using the company assets as collateral. It can change the business in any way it wishes.

In exchange for the purchase price plus other investments, it can take out of the deal the final selling price plus other monies from the company in the form of fees, salaries and dividends. Naturally Bain tries to maximize its profit. Obviously it does this very well because for the first 10 years it returned a profit of 50 percent or more on their investments.

Republicans should defend this as being the way capitalism works at its best.

Harold Loomis
Kaimuki

‘Stimulus’ is not without its cost

Economic stimulus to create jobs and promote spending is a fig leaf for more government debt.

The government can hire people to do anything:Rebuild infrastructure, dig holes then fill them, fight wars.It also can raise salaries and pensions for teachers, firefighters and bureaucrats who, sure, will spend their extra money and stimulate something or other.

Meanwhile, we just have to raise taxes or borrow more from China to pay for the bogus stimulus.

Bob Foster
Kaimuki