Campaign needed
Recent letters addressing East Hawaii’s ongoing battle with litter and roadside trash created by improper transport practices and illegal dumping only scratch the surface of what seems to be a systemic societal problem that requires immediate attention and that was driven home to this taxpayer in numerous events during just several hours on a single day last week in an area stretching from Hilo to the upper-middle Puna District.
Walking the length of both sides of Banyan Drive, I was surprised at the amount of discarded rubbish creating an eyesore, along what should be one of our town’s most beautiful walks — soda cans, bits of clothing, plastic straws, bento containers and more.
I returned to my home in Kurtistown behind a truck on Highway 11 hauling fiberglass and air ducts to Shipman Industrial Park and spreading a trail of fluffy pink “cotton candy” all along the highway.
I entered my neighborhood to find commercial spoilage illegally disposed of in the brush along my road — 20 industrial-sized clear garbage bags containing hundreds of various sized containers of smelly, melted ice cream of all flavors and brands imaginable (seems that a nearby vendor had a refrigeration failure early in the week).
To remedy this? An education campaign is called for … as are efforts to address lax enforcement (addressed more fully by previous writers) and better management of restrictions on the disposal of commercial trash, construction waste, tires and other large and toxic items that — under current regulations — are more conveniently and cheaply dumped roadside for taxpaying residents to clean up using their own time and money.
John Atwell
Kurtistown
It’s win-win
Rochelle delaCruz’s column of March 22 reveals her strong attachment to the perfection of nature and her draconian attitude toward art in public places. Her apparent love of natural beauty is heartwarming.
I await her opinion on the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope atop Maunakea.
The sculpture donated by a master artist as a gift of appreciation (Tribune-Herald, March 17) celebrates the magic of nature through art, with a reverence toward the host culture — Hawaiian.
The problem here is more in the procedure, protocol and location of the gift, certainly not the sculpture itself.
An old Chinese adage comes to mind: “He who knows not how to receive a gift, has nothing to give.”
Let us not rue this day.
Archaeology’s proper home is the museum. Art is of, by and for the people. Seen clearly, this is a win-win situation.
Tomas Belsky
Hilo
