COM 0193.003 2006-2008 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Good evening council members; Well its nice to see some new faces on the counsel. I feel hopeful that this new configuration will have more sense when it comes to the issue of green harvest then all the councils before you since the advent of green harvest. For some of you who don't know me, my name is Cynthia Linet and I am an attorney here in Hilo in private practice for the past 13 years and I am also a teen court judge. I have had that position for about 10 years and until recently when it became more difficult to get a space, I had a booth at the Makuu market giving legal advice for a miniimal fee. I have spoken many times before on the issue of green harvest and so have people in the audience. We have all approached the issue from many different ways, as a first amendment problem, a privacy problem, a health problem, and as a financial burden to the community and the healthcare system, but all our comments and concerns have gone on deaf ears and the enormous problems we are having here as a result of your failure to act properly in this matter continue. So I am here again, I think for the fourth or fifth time, to tell most of you what you already know. Green Harvest has been directly responsible for many of the ills that have befallen this community since it began. It is the main cause of the rapid rise in methamphetamines, crack and ice, the huge growth in special needs students in our schools, born addicted to ice, the higher costs of health care due to drug infestation, the rise in crime, the loss of jobs, the slowing of our economy, and all the peripheral problems resulting from the problems just mentioned. Before green harvest a reputable grower could grow a crop that would feed and clothe and house his family, buy his land, build his house and in general contribute economically to his community. All the money that was generated from its production, and I don't have to tell you how substantial that was, stayed in the community and all businesses prospered. People who did not drink or use heavy drugs could rely on a steady and relatively inexpensive source of marijuana to relieve their stress or just make them a little happier. A plant that didn't rot their livers, ruin their lungs, mess up their minds, bodies, and children or cause them to commit violent crimes. Then came green harvest. Growers stopped growing. People who could no longer get marijuana resorted to heavier drugs like ice. I'm not telling you anything new here. These drugs as you now know have been the scourge of this county and the country as well. Child Protective Services cases are up drastically since green harvest, fueled in lazge part by the rapid growth of ice addicted parents. As one social worker candidly told me one day "Give me the good old days when the issue was marijuana. At least we knew that the refrigerator was full." Our schools have been overwhelmed with special needs children, the result of being born addicted to these hard drugs. That never happened with marijuana.