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that its financial situation improves shortly so that composting can proceed in the future to provide a
<br />market for your products and others.
<br />19. Glen Hisashima, former State worker.
<br />"I like your program but there's one major component that's missing, that's the enforcement
<br />part. In order to get a program to work, its gotta have teeth, if you don't have teeth, it won't
<br />work, and the enforcement should come from the top down. The Department's gotta
<br />enforce the rules they make. I have sub - chapter 20 I presume, and it clearly states things that
<br />the department's supposed to do, they're not doing it. How you gonna expect the lower
<br />people to abide by the laws if they don't follow their own rules? That's why I'm more of an
<br />enforcement kind of person. I like what you folks said, but where is the enforcement part,
<br />the component? If you're not going to enforce, you're going to get people doing what they
<br />want.
<br />"Number two I'm looking at is the credibility of the departments in the County gotta be
<br />addressed. I'm gonna ask for an audit of all the departments for wasting money; you need
<br />money, they're wasting money, and I can tell you that. I come from the State of Hawaii as a
<br />former employee, and I looked at what's happening today. State employees getting laid off
<br />to balance the budget. Now to budget the County budget, and this is going to be part of it,
<br />are they going to lay off County workers? I would say yes to that. I've watched the news, 44
<br />million dollars next year, where they gonna get that from? Enforcement, there's money in it.
<br />It says, any violation is a thousand dollars. Piecemeal, a thousand dollars here and there; I
<br />grew up personally through the tipping fee. How many people are not paying it? I got the
<br />numbers. The last time I saw it was about... it was a year ago, I counted over three million
<br />dollars not collected; who do I blame as a tax payer? The County, why? Just like I blame the
<br />State of Hawaii for not collecting on any fines and money that is owed, that's all revenue.
<br />"Why is it the lower people are going to have to pay more? Just came from a meeting last
<br />night, very upsetting proposal, fifty thousand dollars per person to put up a sewage plant;
<br />not at this time, it's a good idea, not at this time; your plan, not at this time. Our people are
<br />suffering, period. How you'd gonna recoup the revenue, 44 million plus what's happening
<br />now. Everybody says recession is over, people gotta understand, recession may be over for
<br />the east coast, by the time it reaches Hawai i, how long more is it going to be? How... more
<br />are we gonna lose? A lot of people here cannot afford the kind of money. I'm looking at,
<br />since I'm retired, one set income, how I'm I going to do this? I might have to go back to my
<br />old traditional way of doing things, find a 55 gallon drum, make sure I don't burn over 25
<br />pounds of paper, use the ashes as fertilizer, bury my cans in my property, that's how we
<br />used to before. Is that what you guys want us to do? I think that every meeting I came to,
<br />there's no majority of the local people, or people here are real interested in this, look at the
<br />room, how many you have, what's the numbers? It's not enough numbers. I don't know if
<br />they don't care, I don't know if they don't want to participate, but I've been to a lot of
<br />meetings saying what I gotta say, but it's only me against you folks. I've come to the term
<br />that I agree with what you guys are saying but I think it's the wrong time. Thank you."
<br />Response: The County recognizes that these are difficult economic times and the speed of
<br />implementation of various programs will depend on available funds. The County also recently
<br />conducted an audit of all of its departments and is aggressively pursuing collection of any bills
<br />outstanding.
<br />PUBLIC COMMENTS AND RESPONSES APPENDIX IDOC
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