What can we do? The price of gas has been steadily dropping on the Mainland for the last 75 days. Oil has dropped from more than $120 per barrel to prices in the $90s. Yet we are not only paying the same, if not higher, rate than we were when Mainland gas was at its highs, but today's prices on Maui are at their highest and even exceed prices on the Big Island as well as Oahu by almost 50 cents per gallon.
Talk about price gouging and unscrupulous business practices, we don't have far to go.
Yes, we have all heard the excuses of being held captive to prices for oil from Asia and Indonesia for our sourcing. And working off old inventory or this or that.
The truth is that folks in charge of where the gas comes from and the way they run their business just don't care and have no motivation to alter the way they do things. They just pass it on.
So, how do we tell them that they are corporate pirates and profiteers living off of the not-so-well-off citizens of Maui? Appeal to their pono side? Act like they do and attempt an expose and class-action suit?
Suggestions for action are certainly welcomed. Or are we just perpetually rolling over?
Ray Phillips
Kihei
