Hawaiian Style

[Giant Communist Robot]

How Honolulu saves money: I think there is only one lawnmower for all the public schools on the island. The grass at our neighborhood school grows about knee high, and then this guy shows up in his truck towing a trailer with the mower. Sometimes he gets about two thirds done and leaves. I'm guessing some rule makes him move along to the next school and leave the job unfinished. He comes back in a month or so and does the rest. Meanwhile, most of the grass is ~i inch high, but part of it is tall enough for kindergarteners to get lost in.

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Have they considered pet goats for the kindergarteners? The grass would get mowed and fertilized all at the same time and the kids could play with the kids. Of course the two-feeted kids would have to keep their slippers on, on account of the fertilizer...

[Shapley]

I had to look again to see if this was actually 'Cambodia Style'. I thought Tanja had hijacked GCR's moniker....

[Schmeelkie]

GCR, considering how high the cost of gas always is out there, I'm not that surprised. I like the goat suggestion!

All the spring sports around here have missed half their games due to soggy fields. Farmers can't plow or plant yet in many fields. And after a dry week, you can still see many standing puddles/ponds in the middle of fields (3 farming fields on my way to work) and under our desk it's still squishy. And we're about to embark on another week of rain. Blah! Any planting I'm going to do will be on the top of the hill... the sunflowers for the back by the woods will have to wait - probably until June.

[Giant Communist Robot]

The Hawaiian constitution says ~80% of the land must be set aside for agriculture; a vestige from the time when sugar barons ran the place. Agribusiness is still happy with that--ethanol is on their minds. Add another 50 or so military installations, a bunch of golf courses, and some mountainous terrain and there is not too much left for people to live on. Because of the scarcity of land, owners realized they had an eternal cash cow. The practice in Hawaii was to lease land, never to sell it. So if you bought a house you had a mortgage for it and a lease on the land.

A couple of years ago the lease under a condo development was expiring. Many owners were hoping to negotiate a new lease, others tried to sell. In the paper I saw one owner, who had paid 140 thousand for their place, offering to sell for 30 thousand. There were no takers. All those people lost their homes. They were bulldozed and replaced with a shopping mall.

Now 71 homes in Kahuku are not having their lease renewed. "Affordable housing" is moving from the private to the public sector.

[Giant Communist Robot]

According to a GMAC Insurance study Hawaiian drivers are the least knowledgeable amongst 50 states. Right turns from the far left lane is an example.

[DavidS]

According to a GMAC Insurance study Hawaiian drivers are the least knowledgeable amongst 50 states. Right turns from the far left lane is an example.

Do they at least signal & check their mirrors first?

[Giant Communist Robot]

Do they at least signal & check their mirrors first?

As horrifying as it sounds, they don't always. Some other good ones: driving 35 mph on the freeway, parking at bus stops and red zones, pedestrians crossing the freeway, failing to check for oncoming traffic before passing on two-lane roads.

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

Driving through Hali'ewa, near my sister-in-law's house, is a lot like driving through West Texas back roads. The dirt ones. The ones that don't have names, just numbers. Nobody signals, nobody looks, nobody acts like there's anybody else on the road except maybe a chicken and who cares about a chicken, after all. The air smells better than Goldsmith, though. Drivers on the freeway in Honolulu, all three freeways, all fifteen miles of them, seemed normal.

[Haggis@wk]

A couple of years ago the lease under a condo development was expiring. Many owners were hoping to negotiate a new lease, others tried to sell. In the paper I saw one owner, who had paid 140 thousand for their place, offering to sell for 30 thousand. There were no takers. All those people lost their homes. They were bulldozed and replaced with a shopping mall.

Now 71 homes in Kahuku are not having their lease renewed. "Affordable housing" is moving from the private to the public sector.

Do the owner have any recourse? Do they still have to pay mortgages?

My father told me as a kid that most of the land in Hawaii is owned by a few families? Is that still the case?

[Giant Communist Robot]

574 arrested in cockfight raid

[Giant Communist Robot]

Do the owner have any recourse? Do they still have to pay mortgages?

There was no follow-up in the papers, so I don't know any details. In the example I gave the landlord was Kualoa Ranch, and the condo development in Kailua.

My father told me as a kid that most of the land in Hawaii is owned by a few families? Is that still the case?

No. In order, the State of Hawaii, Federal Government, agribusiness, Kamehameha Schools, then some individuals like the Robinsons (owners of Ni'ihau island) and Steve Case.

[Giant Communist Robot]

Due to recent heavy rains, sewers overflowed and people have been advised to stay out of the water around half the island. This is routine. Every heavy rain (which will occur several times a year) the sewers overflow. Technology has not advanced to the point where adequate sewers are available. Once, after a rain, I was swimming at Kailua Beach. I saw a piece of something float past me, and I got out of the water.

[Giant Communist Robot]

Recently there was a horse on the freeway, now there are ram sightings in Aiea. It's getting really ba-aa-aa-aa-ad.

[DavidS]

Recently there was a horse on the freeway, now there are ram sightings in Aiea. It's getting really ba-aa-aa-aa-ad.

Here it's camels wandering onto the road in some areas.
In the New Forest in England there are road signs warning against wild horses and deer.

[Giant Communist Robot]

The goat is a problem. There are none allowed on Oahu as they eat until the hills are denuded. Then erosion sets in. I thought pigs were bad enough. On my last outing to Ho'omaluhia I couldn't walk without stepping in pig poop.