Feedback March 2013
 February issue |
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“Workplace Anonymous”
We spoke to Hawai‘i residents in a variety of professions, without publishing their names, to get honest accounts of what their jobs were really like. Among the interviewees was a state legislator who said, “Honestly, we’d probably be better off without neighborhood boards.”
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I am a former neighborhood board chair, a veteran of 16 years in the Legislature and now a neighborhood board member. I was shocked by the words of your “anonymous legislator.” During my 16 years in the Legislature, I missed only a handful of the twice-monthly Neighborhood Board meetings in my district. It wasn’t a burden or a waste of time to attend. In addition to the Honolulu Police Department, there are reports from the Fire Department, the Board of Water Supply, the Military, the City Council representative, mayor’s and governor’s representatives, and, most important, citizens with community concerns. There is important information to gather, and the fact that you attend personally means a lot to the members. Of course, there is repetition of ideas and issues, but the same is true of the Legislature, and at least the boards have a time limit for their meetings. Neighborhood boards play a meaningful role in our communities, and if a legislator wants to get rid of them, he should say so publicly.
—MARILYN B. LEE; MILILANI, HAWAII
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“After Inouye”
In our February cover feature, Neal Milner explored what Hawai‘i can expect, and what the state should do, in the wake of Sen. Daniel Inouye’s passing.
We were pleased to see mention of Chaminade in your recent article. The $23 million in funding the university has received through the U.S. Department of Education Title III has helped transform our once sleepy campus into a vibrant, cutting-edge learning community. We have been successful in attracting private funds to match these federal funds, ensuring a strong platform for future growth. On his last visit to Chaminade in 2010, the senator expressed pleasure with how the funding had been used, particularly in the establishment of a new school of nursing. Ironically, during a visit to one of the nursing labs in Henry Hall, Inouye said it was the very room where he had been given a physical to determine if he was fit to serve in the military. “In some ways,” he intoned seriously, “I wish they hadn’t found me fit.”
—DIANE PETERS-NGUYEN; VICE PRESIDENT OF INSTITUTIONAL ADVANCEMENT CHAMINADE UNIVERSITY, HONOLULU, HAWAII
( Ahana koko lele )
In our February Best Dentists listings, Farid Brian Shaikh’s contact information should have been listed as follows: Hawai‘i Endodontics, 30 Aulike St., Suite 404, Kailua, HI 96734, 235-3131.
