Recently, the Hawaii Government passed a bill that will increase the state’s lodging tax, among the highest in the nation, by 0.75 percent.

The justification for this is that the $100 million raised annually will go exclusively toward mitigating climate change. Does anyone believe that?

This money will go into the general fund to support a bloated, unresponsive, inefficient and incompetent government.

The same government that can’t provide affordable housing for its citizens, a highway infrastructure that can carry the traffic and who brought us the Lahaina fire through incompetence and mismanagement.

There will never be any way to account for how this money is spent, or any follow-up by the government accounting for its use.

In the end, it will just be one more onerous tax on the poor, beleaguered tourist. What is interesting is that Hawaii residents were not taxed anything to address climate change.

I guess all those residents who drive don’t contribute anything to climate change, so should not have to pay anything to solve the problem.

What will next year’s Hawaii tourist tax scam be? Perhaps a tax to drive on the roads, since the tourists wear out the pavement and bridges. Residents would, of course, be exempt.

Soon, the state of Hawaii will be a tourist desert; except for the very rich who have the financial means to absorb the onerous Hawaii taxes and fees.

James Dorr

Wailea