Make sustainability top public priority

It’s high time our elected officials made sustainability the central tenet of all future policy decisions.

Climate change, pollution, habitat loss, soil erosion and the decline of global fossil fuel resources are putting an ever-increasing strain on both our livelihoods and our quality of life. But sustainability is not just about the environment. It affects everything. It’s about being able to put food on the table, property values, affordable housing, cost of living and creating a resilient economy that sustains jobs. And yet, in many ways, sustainability remains more of a buzzword than a way of life.

Hawaiʻi can and should be a renewable-energy technology capital. The only barrier? Bad policy decisions and a lack of political will. When legislators kill bills aimed at furthering our path toward sustainability because of private-sector connections, political horse-trading and petty spite, they’re not doing their jobs.

We deserve better.