An open letter to
the people of Puna
Puna people: A crash on Highway 130 (on Monday, April 28) resulted in a major traffic pile-up along the highway and all the feeder streets down the line.
In a standstill on Maku‘u Drive at approximately 30th Avenue, I ultimately decided to turn my vehicle around and head down to Beach Road. It took me 17 minutes to get to the Billy Kenoi Park in Pahoa from that spot where I turned around, headed down Maku‘u, then Beach Road, then Kahakai Boulevard.
I was thinking a lot of our late mayor Billy the whole time I was making this detour. On Maku‘u, I actually passed Railroad Avenue and recalled how Billy had paved that section of Railroad between Maku‘u and Hawaiian Beaches, and yet on April 28 I couldn’t detour that way because it’s gated and only to be open for major emergencies! This would have been a good day!
Nevertheless, I went 19 blocks down to the coastal road and I bounced my way along the Beach Road to Kahakai Boulevard in the Beaches. The road’s not great but doable.
The whole way I was expressing appreciation for Billy having improved that gravel road about 10 years ago, and then I was expressing concern that it’s become more of a dumping site for those large and bulky items that the desperate dispose of in lieu of making the drive to the Kona landfill.
It’s time to have a conversation about opening up Railroad Avenue between the Beaches and Hawaiian Paradise Park. We have such heavy congestion on Highway 130, why are we not utilizing this connector route?
Sure, people will grumble, and the county can ensure that the roads are maintained like they do for Kahakai Boulevard in the Beaches! Grumble pau.
Also, we should pave Beach Road. The more traffic that is down that way with a paved road between HPP and the Beaches, the less likely we will see nefarious things going on in the bushes down there.
What do you think, Councilwoman Ashley Kierkiewicz and Mayor Kimo Alameda?
Tiffany Edwards Hunt
Pahoa
The ‘big, beautiful bill’
is fiscally irresponsible
So, let me get this straight: FEMA administrator tells us cutbacks mean states should expect to cover 50% of disaster relief.
If Congress passes the “big, beautiful bill,” states will lose $600 billion for Medicaid.
The national debt will climb so that interest on it will cost us more per year than the U.S. military budget. All this so the wealthiest in our country get a tax cut.
Think there might be a problem with the Citizens United decision of our U.S. Supreme Court?
A. Rosanoff
Pahoa
