A follow up letter to my 3/29/2020 letter to Hawaii Government Leaders
Dear government leaders of Hawaii:
On the 29th of March I wrote you a letter, saying that by and large the people of Hawaii were adhering to your proclamations. These proclamations have kept hundreds of thousands of people at home, making a go of the whole “telework” idea.
But unfortunately, over 200,000 of those residents are home trying to figure out how to make ends meet with no job and no income. But that’s another discussion, at another time.
When you came up with your proclamations to have us stay at home, one thing that was said by Governor Ige was: “We’re taking this action to buy time. It will make a tremendous difference.”
So, considering that the precious item of time has been given to you by the people of Hawaii, I think it’s only fitting to ask for an update on this investment. After all, in your statement, it sounded like if we gave you this time, that you would honor it and actually come up with plans and actions that would make this whole thing worth it.
Although you are not in any position to give a investment update (God knows you can’t even get the phones to work at the Unemployment Office to give updates on people’s filings) I think it’s important that you tell the people anyway whether the investment is paying off or not.
If it is, great! And if you can, tell us what you did with the investment to be a success. After all, after a couple of notable political missteps leadership in Hawaii has been making, you might want to take a victory lap (figuratively).
However, if the news is not good, that our investment did not yield the dividends that were first expected, then don’t wait, please tell us. Then be sure to tell the people the truth about why this time investment failed.
Because your next move is to ask the people to invest even more time.
And just like with the bailouts of the Honolulu Rail project, asking the people to give you more time will elicit the question “well, what did you do with our investment in the first place?”
And if you come up with the same sorry reasons used to explain why the rail project budget ballooned to obnoxious amounts, the people ain’t going to buy it, I will guarantee it. To boot, the next agreement of time the people will give you will probably come with strings attached.
So, hopefully you take all this to heart, tell us how the time investment we are making to you is going, and tell us the truth about our potential returns on this.
The people of Hawaii has already invested sacrificially to this cause, so be sure to honor that.
Thank you,
Stanford J. Fichtman
Resident, Taxpayer and Voter in the State of Hawaii.