HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0436.005 1998-2000 ~i~
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Judith Hara
P. O. Box 195
Kurtistown, HI 96760
County Council Members ~
Hawaii County Building `
Hilo, HI 96720
Dear Council Member,
.
c.
I am writing to you as a concerned citizen of this county and as one
involved our creative and educational community. It saddens me to
hear and see our community so upset by the proposal to take away the
home of the East Hawaii Cultural Center.
When the Hawaii Tribune-Herald displayed a photograph of the former JC
Penney building that all of you inspected, it struck me as a reminder
to our community that many years ago when the East Hawaii Cultural
Center first leased the old police station, those in charge must have
seen a similar display of neglect and disrepair. From those early
years of hard work, many volunteer hours and donations and writing for
grants, there gradually resurrected from the old hull of the police
station a wonderful gallery space, open, graceful, full of light, and
providing lots of wall space, floor space, and ceiling space to
accommodate all the variety of art exhibits that have since been shown
there.
This building provided office space, storage space and eventually a
marvelous floor on the second level for dancers to practice and
perform on. There was space for plays to be performed, meetings to be
held, even for a library to be started. With this building the East
Hawaii Cultural Center was able to reach out into the community and
touch many lives, from the little children to the mature adult.
As an educator, now retired, I appreciated the efforts of the Cultural
Center to provide our children with creative classes and a facility to
display their efforts. Every year for the past 11 years, the East
Hawaii Cultural Center has in conjunction with the Department of
Education, sponsored the Young At Art show during the Youth Art Month
of March. For the last 3 years since the school budget has eliminated
the fob of the DOE person who used to coordinate the show, the East
Hawaii Cultural Center has provided the volunteers and space for the
show to be organized and displayed. Many students and parents
throughout the Big Island have walked through the EHCC doors and seen
the wonderful, creative efforts of our children.
There is no other facility that has the same space, the same light,
the same feeling of this first class gallery. If you take this away
from the EHCC, you will condemn the staff, the volunteex5, the donors
to go through the same labors, the same hard effort, the same blood,
sweat and tears that they went through many years ago to get to where.
they are now. I feel this is very unfair to all of us who had any 1-
connection with supporting and helping and volunteering at this
center. Comm. No. '+/36. OOS'
File No. F ~ N
2 7 19J9 Hef. To: Presented f ~
Whether it's the visual arts or the performing arts, music, dance,
drama, or ,just being there for our community to use, this building
means a lot to those involved in its inception and its continued use.
Please think carefully about this proposal, please listen to the
people in the community who will be affected by this proposal. Do not
close your ears to our pleas.
Please talk to those who can feel the pulse of your island. Talk to
your family, your spouse, your relatives, those with children, those
who have seen the building and all that it has become. 'Ask them if
it's fair to take this home away from the East Hawaii Cultural Center.
Then listen to your own heart, be guided by your spirit of aloha.
What harm can it do our community to let the Center stay where it is?
What good will the Center continue to do if you let it stay there?
With much concern and aloha,
222?~ f~i~2l~../
Judith Hara