From Marti:
Big Mahalos to the people of Molokai for making the journey to Honolulu to raise awareness about Molokai Ranch’s new ploy to exploit cash for water. I was shocked to hear that Gov. Lingle allowed Molokai Ranch to raise residents’ water rates 178% or risk losing all water services. HEWA! Access to clean water is a basic human right. Molokai Ranch took on the responsibility of providing water to people (for a profit) all these years and now that profits are down they just want to close up shop. That’s just wrong.
Rep. Carroll (D-Molokai) said it herself, “Molokai Ranch should not simply walk away from legal and moral obligations” to provide water service to the residents of Molokai.
There is word for what Molokai Ranch is doing, it’s called: extortion. Good for Molokaiians for sticking up for themselves. If this ridiculous rate increase is allowed to stand, then it sets a bad precedent for all of us in Hawaii who pay to have water pumped into our homes. Someday soon they are going to come knocking on all of our doors threatening to cut off our water if we don’t pay them a hundred times more.
A statement from the residents of Molokai:
In May, Molokai Ranch, citing financial impossibility but providing no financial evidence, suddenly announced the company would terminate its water and sewage utility services at the end of August. In July, The Department Of Health said: “The lack of a sustained and reliable source of safe drinking water in West Molokai will create a substantial danger…an imminent peril to the public health and safety.” By threatening to cut off an essential lifeline to the Molokai community, Molokai Ranch created a manmade and calculated crisis in order to avoid financial responsibility.
Without conducting a physical or financial audit of the utilities, the PUC bought into the Ranch’s threats, sided against the ratepayer, and claimed it “had no choice” but to raise the rates of Waiola O Molokai, Inc water utility by an unprecedented 178%. The people of Molokai cannot afford to pay such exorbitant rate increases, and should not be forced to subsidize mismanaged utilities.
Not only was the rate increase unprecedented and unjustified, but the rate review and approval process was fundamentally flawed. The PUC, which should be acting as a regulatory agency for the utilities, assumed an unprecedented role and filed for the rate increase on behalf of the utilities, as the Ranch claimed poverty (while still refusing to disclose financial records) and refused to file its own proceedings for a rate increase. The PUC also disallowed Molokai ratepayers to intervene as a formal party to the proceedings.
Compounding the PUC’s procedural errors, the DCCA then failed to advocate on behalf of the affected ratepayers. A 25% increase is normally the cap for a rate increase; instead of upholding this policy on behalf of the local consumer, the government agencies appeased the demands of a foreign-owned business and arbitrarily approved a 178% increase knowing that Molokai ratepayers cannot afford to pay such an egregious rate increase.
The Molokai community has filed a formal complaint with the Office of the Ombudsman to investigate the PUC for breaching a duty to ensure that all rates, fares, and charges are “just and reasonable” and to investigate the DCCA for breaching a duty to “represent, protect, and advance the interests of all consumers, including small businesses, of utility services”. The Molokai community asks that the August 14, 2008 rate increase approval be considered null and void.
The Molokai community asks that Governor Lingle, who oversees both the PUC and the DCCA, overturn the PUC’s rate approval and demand a fair and just rate review process. Molokai Ranch should be asking for a rate increase instead of the PUC, and the people of Molokai should be granted legal standing as a participant in the rate review process.
(photo by Trevor Atkins)
Molokai Ranch has been subsidizing the residents of Molokai for many years with water bills that haven’t covered the cost of bringing that water to their homes. So now, Molokai Ranch who has not been permitted by these very same water users to develop their property to the extent that they can make a reasonable revenue stream, says OK, we’re out of here and now you have to pay the full and true cost of bringing that water to your home and all the whining want-it-for-free losers cry foul! What hypocrites! These are merely people who what someone other than themselves to pay for the services they enjoy. Well, you can’t have it both ways. You stop Molokai Ranch for trying to make their enterprise profitable. Well you lost! They called your bluff and now you’re paying the price of your own obstinacy. So like petty little whining losers you cry for someone else to pay the cost of delivering your water. Well, you can damn well pay for your own service, I’m certainly not going to subsidize your lifestyle and the county of Maui is saying the same thing. Suck it up and live the consequences of your own actions!
Aloha “Manawai,”
Mahalo for yet another in-cite-ful comment on our blog. We appreciate this opportunity to simplify these complicated issues for you.
Here’s the breakdown: Water is a fundamental basic human right. Molokai Ranch took on the kuleana of providing water to the people of Molokai. Nobody forced them to take on the responsibility and nobody guaranteed them a profit. Molokai Ranch – the private, for-profit corporation – took a gamble by investing in Molokai and creating these very serious obligations for itself. And it is Molokai Ranch, not the people of Molokai, who bares the burden of losing that gamble.
In your words, “Manawai,” Molokai Ranch is the loser that has to just suck it up and stop whining. Water is a basic human right and they promised to provide it to the people of Molokai. Poho the Ranch isn’t raking in the cash anymore, that was never part of the deal. Molokai Ranch has no right to hold the people hostage for more money. If a gangster tried the same thing, it would be illegal, not just immoral.
Maybe it works that way in your simplified universe, but not in the real world. You’re simply paying the actual cost of bringing that water to you. Just because your lifestyle has been subsisdized by Molokai Ranch in the past, it doesn’t mean it must in the future. Witness what’s happening now. You’re paying the true cost of your lifestyle. No more welfare. So where, Marti, does it say that Molokai Ranch is obligated to subsidize you? Show me where they promised it! You said it, now back it up. No one’s being held hostage. If you don’t like living on, or surrounded by, their land…move! But you just want to keep your subsidy going. You want someone else to pay for the convenience you’re enjoying. Well guess what? I ain’t going to happen anymore. I won’t argue that some people may have a right of some sort to water, but not necessarily to have it delivered to your doorstep. If you did, you wouldn’t have paid anything for it in the past. But you did and thereby established that water delivery is something to be paid for. So this isn’t about being deprived of water or a “right” to water, it’s all about how much you have to pay for the convenience of having it delivered to your house. Maybe you should exercise your “right” and go get buckets of it from the stream or drill your own well. The law and the courts don’t back what you’re saying. Sorry, Marti! You lose!