HMC signage
If you are driving into Hilo and need to get to the hospital quick, good luck.
There are no signs pointing to the medical center. None on Highway 11 from the south, none on Highway 19 from the north. Nowhere in the city proper. If you are unfamiliar with the area, either have a GPS to direct you to the medical center, or ask for help. That takes time when you need it most.
Why have signs on roads leading to the hospital, when you can have five of them pointing the way less than a mile from the building itself? There is one near the intersection of Komohana Street and Waianuenue Avenue, and four on Waianuenue Avenue itself, all a short distance from each other.
Maybe the city could take one of the signs, to save money, and place them somewhere on the highways leading to Hilo. Or, put new signs up directing those in need to find Hilo Medical Center quickly.
David Lewis
Kurtistown
TMT delays
It is disappointing and troubling that Mayor Harry Kim wants the Thirty Meter Telescope to wait at least two more months to start construction (Tribune-Herald, Feb. 18).
What will two more months of delays accomplish that the prior two months — or the two months before that, or the two months before that, or the two months before that, or the two months before that — couldn’t fix?
A. Yamamoto
Hilo
Grow Hawaiian
As president of Friends of Amy B. H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden in Captain Cook in South Kona, I want to alert the residents of East Hawaii that our wonderful garden wants to invite everyone to attend our upcoming Grow Hawaiian Festival on Saturday, Feb. 29.
Four years ago, garden manager Peter Van Dyke had to cancel all plans for the 2016 Grow Hawaiian Festival because Bishop Museum had suddenly decided to close the garden in January. This was a giant shock to cultural practitioners, such as Puna resident Jerry Konanui, an inspirational devotee of all things kalo — plant, poi, myth and ohana.
Although Jerry is no longer with us, his taro plants flourish in Kona and will be harvested, cooked, pounded and eaten at the festival.
The garden now belongs to all of us, for not only is it an oasis of Hawaiian plants and trees, it is now a federally protected community forest.
Please come celebrate with the Friends in Kona, meet Bishop Museum’s CEO Melanie Ide, taste some of Jerry’s poi, and enjoy one of our island’s special treasures — Amy Greenwell’s legacy that has survived and will always do what she envisioned: Grow Hawaiian!
Maile B. Melrose
Kealakekua
