XPost: alt.travel.vacation-reports, alt.wildland.firefighting, hawaii.politics   
   XPost: talk.politics.guns, sac.politics   
   From: posted@bosley.biz   
      
   On 06 Jun 2023, "RKBA RKBA!"  posted some   
   news:u5ocl5$s7n5$1@dont-email.me:   
      
   > Typical Democrat run operation.  All fucked up and nobody knows what   
   > the hell is going on.   
      
   HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Following mixed messages about tourism to   
   Maui, the local economy is foundering — with layoffs mounting and   
   businesses struggling to stay open.   
      
   Proof of just how bad things are is visible as soon before you even land   
   at Kahului Airport: A sea of rental cars is visible from the air in a   
   grassy field on airport property.   
      
   That field, officials say, is usually empty.   
      
   Special Section: Maui Wildfires   
   Maui wedding photographer Tara Lee Murphy was in Lahaina on Aug. 8, and   
   snapped photos of a happy couple on Front Street just hours before   
   flames tore through the town.   
      
   “It wasn’t until I got home and then I started seeing everything   
   unfolding and then it’s just been unfolding ever since,” she said.   
      
   Murphy, like so many other small businesses owners, are now struggling   
   to remain afloat with few visitors coming to Maui — and the short- and   
   mid-term forecast bleak.   
      
   Shortly after the wildfire, “Maui is closed” messages spread on social   
   media and a flurry of cancellations came in. That’s even though tourism   
   officials said all but West Maui was open.   
      
   Jonathan Silva is the school counselor at King Kamehameha III   
   Elementary, which burned down. He also works at three hotels to make   
   ends meet, but he isn’t working at all right now.   
      
   After confusion with tourism message in wake of wildfires, Maui   
   struggles to woo visitors back “Who going help me? Who going help the   
   people in my canoe, yeah? I don’t want to say to the people that we’re   
   all in the same boat. No way. The people in Lahaina, they’re in a   
   completely different boat. Their boat burnt down. They don’t have a   
   boat,” he said.   
      
   “There’s another group of us who are in a different boat and we are   
   sinking.”   
      
   According to the Hawaii Tourism Authority, there were just under 3,500   
   visitors a day to the Valley Isle this month. That’s half the number   
   seen in August of last year.   
      
   “We have a crisis on top of a crisis now because not only is Lahaina   
   economically hit, but the rest of the island is economically hit,” said   
   business owner Maureen Bacon.   
      
   Business owners like Bacon want the world to know that while West Maui   
   is closed, the rest of the island is still open — and needs help more   
   than ever before.   
      
   https://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/2023/09/01/crisis-top-crisis-maui-residents   
   -struggle-stay-afloat-tourism-flouders/   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)