About time!
Tropical reef fish belong in the ocean, and not in anyone’s personal fish tank!
Years ago, public beaches were great for snorkeling. No more. Even state “protected” reefs are being affected by overharvesting poachers, while the state Department of Land and Natural Resources does nothing.
To make matters worse, this “business” often gets around the law by hiring Native Hawaiians because they have native fishing rights. How disgusting. For every one fish that survives to “live” in a fish tank (often shipped out of state), many dozens die.
What subversive, careless, destructive and underhanded dirty work.
The Jan. 6 Tribune-Herald article (“Leeward fish get reprieve”) quoted Jay Lovell, an “aquarium fisherman” from Kona, crying the blues about “paying his bills.” How many hundreds of thousands of reef fish have died during his 35-year career so he can “pay his mortgage and bills?!
Public records show that he was caught on video and charged in 2014 for terroristic threatening after ripping the breathing regulator out of the mouth of an underwater photographer.
Personal friends of mine who were also alarmed at the decimation of native reef fish also reported to me that they were assaulted while trying to photograph reef damage, overharvesting and poaching.
Greedy people who continue to ruin Hawaii by selling reef fish to the highest bidders must be stopped!
This ban on aquarium fishing must be statewide and not just on the west side of the Big Island.
John Paul Wright
Hawaii Volcanoes National Park
Sessions doesn’t care
The statements made by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions regarding marijuana are not only incorrect but dangerous.
There are many sick people who use cannabis because it is the only thing that works for them. It seems to me that Sessions doesn’t care about the medical science behind cannabis, but rather is allowing his personal beliefs to dictate what is best for the rest of us.
This seems to be a way to allow the pharmaceutical companies to keep putting dangerous chemicals into our bodies, while lining their (and his?) financial pockets.
At what point do we just allow this dangerous regime to continue?
If Sessions and the Trump administration care about us, they would make decisions based on research and facts, then work on solutions. Instead they perpetuate hate, fear, distrust and a blatant disregard for the truth and reality.
I hope our Sens. Mazie Hirono and Brian Schatz, as well as Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, are doing all they can to protect all American citizens.
All of us.
Jamie Hectus
Kalaheo, Kauai
