AND WHEN I WAS DONE HE PICKED IT UP AND PUT IT IN A BAG

AND WHEN I WAS DONE HE PICKED IT UP AND PUT IT IN A BAG: Despite the lack of any required official provisions designating the coastal bike path as a “county park” the County is apparently ignoring the law and, according to an article by Nathan Eagle in the local paper it “considered a linear park and as such falls under a county ordinance banning animals without permits.”

The article states that “(a)fter a verbal warning process ended in March, the Kaua`i Police Department started issuing citations to owners walking their dogs on the multi-use path.”

It does not say what the outcome of these cases were or even if anyone challenged the citations, as many dog owners promised to do when we detailed the actual law in this space on March 3. We further elicited a promise from councilman Mel Rapozo on March 20 to determine, through the County Attorney, what the law is and how it pertains to the bike path and report back to us, saying “(a)s far as the park question, I can only tell you what we are told by the County Attorney. I have asked for a clarification on this concern, and will post the answer when I receive it".

Our research showed, as we said over two months ago:
The Kaua`i County Charter provides that “(e)very legislative act of the council shall be by ordinance except as otherwise provided”. which is now done now by amending the CZO (unavailable on-line) where “parks” are designated.It also says “The Council also makes all decisions on acquiring land”. And 4.04 says “ No ordinance shall be amended, revised or repealed by the council except by ordinance. No resolution shall be amended, revised or repealed except by resolution, but a resolution may be superseded by a subsequent ordinance”There has never been an ordinance or resolution making even any part of the Bike-Path a county parkAdministratively, the Charter’s 23.09 say that “unless otherwise authorized by law, all rules and regulations ... must first be approved by the mayor prior to going into effect”. The County has not reported public action declaring the bike path a park.
We have not heard anything yet but now, not only have County’s mayor and Council ignored the apparent lack of any legal provisions designating the “bike path” in general a park (where it doesn’t cut through an already designated park such as the Lydgate area) but they are set to compound the blatant disregard of our laws they are sworn to uphold by basing new bills on the existing flaws the County has promulgated.

Though we have asked Eagle to identify who told him they “considered” the path a park or what that means we haven’t gotten an answer to that question.

As we detailed previously, this is most likely another one of those “because I say so” laws that are a remnant of plantation mentality that still has it’s grip on the psyches of Council Chair Kaipo Asing, Mayor Bryan Baptiste and his protégé Bernard Carvalho, the newly deigned head of the Department of Parks and Recreation which many claim was created just to give him a job.

The bike path itself is a bright shining symbol of what many have publicly characterized as the “Fire, Ready, Aim” way of doing things on Kaua`i, especially in the Department of Public Works where the orders of the day routinely include facilitating the gravy-train revolving-door of corruption that costs millions in inflated contracts, a corrupt nepotism-riddled team of inspectors and, many have publicly alleged, kickbacks.

Even though the money for the path required a still non-existent sign-off by the Secretary of the US Department of Transportation that it is indeed not just a bike path but a bike path to be used strictly for transportation and not for recreation, the county has designated it a “mutli-use” path and wants to allow not just every imaginable human and mechanical obstacle to bicycling now they’re adding non-human impediments.

Maybe pet turtles will be next- or pet cockroaches... after all, they need somewhere to exercise. Can we bring our pet llama? What if it’s on a leash? Maybe you goldfish will enjoy the ocean view- bring ‘em on down

Hey, don’t give me a ticket officer- that’s not my chicken... it lives here.”

It’s no wonder the rest of the state shakes it head and repeats the mantra “only on Kaua`i”, the phrase universally used to describe the abject paternalism, authoritarianism and lack rhyme or reason in decision-making that has yielded a top-to-bottom corrupt modus operandi in the executive and legislative branches of so-called democratic governance here at the very end of human occupation (take it either way) of the island chain.
A separate kingdom indeed.