State must live up to public housing safety goals

Among the responsibilities of state government is to help provide basic needs for citizens' whose own means fall short. Where shelter is concerned, the state acknowledges this through its public housing projects.

While it's a practical impossibility for the state to meet completely the housing demand for the needy, it's certainly duty-bound to keep what it does provide in safe, livable condition.

It's beyond dispute that the state has welched on that duty for decades.

Recent lawsuits filed on behalf of Kuhio Park Terrace and Kuhio Homes tenants brought this shameful failing back into the headlines, but the tales of woe about public housing have predated those court actions by many years.