Your front-page article about cyclists being cited for riding on the sidewalk in front of the Frank F. Fasi Municipal Building calls for our comments (“Bicyclists’ citations show need to revisit lane links,” Star-Advertiser, Sept. 11).

As frequent cyclists, we commend the Honolulu Police Department for enforcing safe and legal cycling. However, this specific location is a very ambiguous place to cite sidewalk cyclists. What we see here is an example of police power run amok. Better signage is needed. HPD should crack the whip on sidewalk cyclists along the King Street cycle track.

Enforcement is one of the five “E’s” of transportation planning. Encouragement, engineering, education and evaluation are the other four.

We definitely need enforcement to discourage dangerous and illegal cycling behavior, such as high-speed riding on sidewalks, wrong-way street riding, running red lights and riding at night without proper lighting.

Scofflaw cyclists encourage motorists to disrespect all cyclists. Let’s have some reasonable enforcement by HPD.

Frank and Laura Smith
Downtown Honolulu

Estimated savings aren’t very much

Hawaii needs to reject the empty promises made by NextEra in its quest to buy Hawaiian Electric Industries.

NextEra estimates a savings of roughly $345 to $475 per residential customer over the five-year period. That comes out to a little over $6 a month.

With the typical Honolulu residential electric bill historically coming in about $200 a month (it’s somewhat lower currently because the price of oil has temporarily plunged), that’s savings of roughly 3 percent a month.

Endorsing this sale would be akin to having the fox offer a 3 percent discount on chicken feed to the farmer in return for allowing the fox into the chicken coop. Not a good deal for the farmer, and especially not for the chickens.

David S. Weiss
Kaimuki

Student trips are not teacher vacations

Mahalo to Lee Cataluna for the article on dedicated teachers and the state Ethics Commission ruling regarding “free trips” (“Trifling over field trips does disservice to teachers, kids,” Star-Advertiser, Sept. 4).

Two social studies teachers at Mililani Middle School have been coordinating a Washington Workshop for the eighth-grade students for 10-plus years. Because of the ethics commission decision, our children may have been deprived of this once-in-a-lifetime trip. They brought together three additional teachers/counselors at the school who were willing to pay their own way in order for 50 students to have this experience.

This is not a vacation for these teachers. This is an educational trip in which they will be responsible for our children 24 hours a day. They will also need to use their personal days and find substitutes while they are gone.

These trips are for the benefit of our children. I hope the ethics commission will recognize this.

Debora Lopes
Mililani

Arrogant humans ignore their impact

Dean Nagasako’s letter, “Overpopulation rarely discussed by media” was a flash of reality that seems to get little attention (Star-Advertiser, Sept. 13).

There are three times as many people on Earth since the day I was born, and it is impossible to ignore the impact this has had on our planet.

The Earth is not a bottomless well of infinite resources. Increasing scarcity of unpolluted drinking water and air are just two of the countless life-and-death issues we face because of the exponential proliferation of humankind.

Not addressing overpopulation is tantamount to treating the symptoms of a disease while ignoring the cause. Mother Earth and everything on it is interconnected.

The arrogant imagining that we are some sort of indispensable supreme species can only lead us to a great mass humbling.

Bruce Lee
Hawaii Kai

More investigative reporting needed

David Shapiro reveals some of the corruption of our politicians in bed with developers in our Honolulu, but barely scratches the surface (“Complaints reveal the grip developers have on Council,” Star-Advertiser, Volcanic Ash, Sept. 13).

Politicians have provided for their own protection from prosecution through legislation, handcuffing the ethics commissions and passing campaign contribution laws in their favor.

They are only caught when their arrogance exceeds their greed.

In June 2015, attempts were made to muzzle the city Ethics Commission Executive Director Chuck Totto, requiring that he not deal with the media without permission.

The only solution is for the Star-Advertiser to hire a full-time reporter to monitor city and state ethics and campaign- spending violations and accurately report the information so the voters can decide.

Pam Smith
Ewa Beach

Why does anyone listen to Cheney?

The cartoon showing former Vice President Dick Cheney surrounded by vultures was brilliant (Star-Advertiser, Sept. 14).

The Iraq war will cost our country between $2 trillion to $4 trillion.

About 4,500 of our warriors were killed, and more than 30,000 injured in combat.

Also, there are more than a half-million disability claims registered with Veterans Affairs, and this unfunded war still has huge interest payments due.

The cost of millions of refugees is incalculable.

Cheney had predicted on “Meet the Press” in 2003: “We should expect as Americans citizens that this (war) would cost at least $100 billion for a two-year involvement.”

Still, Fox News gives Cheney repeated air time to blame President Barack Obama.

I may disagree with some of our current president’s policies. However, using war as a last resort is not one of them.

Jim Wolfe
Nuuanu