Only a little bit about the donkeys today
Kona Village has five donkeys in a pen! I saw them today as I took the long way around Kona Village to hike the shoreline of the south fork of the 1800 Kaupulehu flow.
Kona Village makes public access folks park far from the ocean, then hike a service road around the edge of the property. I'm sure there's no intent to make public access as difficult as possible; no doubt it's just a coincidence. Anyway, there were 5 donkeys, three grey and two dark brown, in a pretty darn large pen. The looked fatter than they used to be when running free. There's water and shade, things that are in short supply out on the lava flows. I called out a "Good Morning!" to them, and they followed me as I walked along the fence of their pen. [insert philosophical observation about freedom and security here]
After a walk along the beach, where I was careful not to alarm the rich people with the sight of a peasant not dressed in an aloha shirt uniform with a name tag, I reached the 1800 flow. As before, the trail over the rough a'a lava is a minor marvel, and the sea lapped gently against the cliffs and rocky beaches. 20 feet up, the black sand storm beaches stand in contrast to the aggressively sharp edges of the lava.
But now, 40 feet, more or less, from the shore are poles, and flags, and that red plastic mesh fencing, placed in the wonderful desolation of the lava, omens of the development that's coming, and soon. As the guard at the Kona Village entrance said, "They're gonna build some $20 million affordable housing." Wave good-bye to another wild area. Inevitable, probably, but still a loss, to all of us, whether we know it or not.
posted by John Powell @ 12:36 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Aloha John, I wrote quite a bit about the whole affordable housing joke earlier in the month with lovely pics of some charming places you can live in cheaply here in Hilo...(she says toungue in cheek)I am concerned about the loss of affordable housing but not sure in a free market economy how you manage to fix it. Sure you can set aside so many units but the folks here already living here, wont get them...cant afford them anyway. I think that its amazing that there are good paying jobs there on the West side and few workers, and 3 1 /2 hours away are the workers in "affordable housing" and no decent public transportation to get them there to the jobs. My husband was out of work for 13 months, interviewed like crazy, and finally got a job as a security guard in Kona, on his first foray looking for work in Kona...,12 bucks an hour but it takes 25% of his bring home to pay for hotel room and expenses while there...Did you know that a man with 30 years experience can only come up with min wage jobs on this side? Its a joke! So we are slowly starving to death... We arent alone and the housing thing is a huge issue over here. Keep writing about it. The county council people have NO business OKing another resort till they work out the traffic problems existant there and have workable public transportation from wet to dry side on this end. Get the wages up here in the east and more taxes will get paid and things will be more equitible for everyone. Its comming! Keep writing, your views are very important!
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