For several years, we have participated in the "Heavy Metal" clean-up of Apa‘a St. and Ka‘ohe Homestead Rd. (Pahoa dump road) teaming up with Ka‘ohe Neighborhood Watch. We focus our attention on the large appliances, roofing tin and car parts lining these two County roads.

This year seems to be a record-breaker. Knowledgeable estimates calculated that three Matson containers would be needed in order to remove all the refrigerators, washers and dryers, stoves, mattresses, sofas and assorted other trash. And, of course, many more volunteers than in the past. So Malama O Puna, which is the prime organizer of this annual event, suggested to the Friends of Pahoa Library that if they joined the effort they could raise $1,000 for the new library building fund with one day’s work. Such a deal! And MOP would be getting the same benefit for its own building fund. In other words, two worthy community projects could be partially funded through one community workday.

I wish to thank all the volunteers who turned out to malama our ‘aina, Howard Shapiro and KWXX who did a “shoot” of the project to heighten public awareness, and Matson Navigation Co., which every year supports these cleanup activities by providing the containers and supports our island’s nonprofits by creating a fundraising opportunity for them. I definitely DO NOT thank the dumpers who have created the need for such programs – there are other things we would all rather do with our weekends that pick up after supposed “grownups”.
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