Just like the looming demographic train wreck that will affect Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, so too the City & County of Honolulu is faced with an analogous situation. That fact is the city is taking on far more than it can afford to accomplish.

Some of these responsibilities are due to literally decades of neglect, such as the colossal sewage spill last year into the Ala Wai canal due to the failure of the sewage force main. The connection that no one has made yet is that the recent drop in tourism is likely at least partially a result of that unfavorable publicity.

Now the Environmental Protection Agency has told the City & County administration that it must upgrade the Honouliuli Wastewater Treatment Plant and may require the same for the Sand Island Wastewater Treatment Plant. This understandably upset mayor Mufi Hannemann who responded the required upgrade is, “unreasonable, untimely, unfair and unnecessary.”

Whether that is an accurate depiction or not, the real source of the problem is the fact Hannemann’s administration is working so hard to sell a prohibitively expense rail transit project. If taxes and sewer fees have to be raised to fund Wastewater Treatment Plant upgrades this is going to put an additional strain on an already overtaxed populace.

To upgrade both plants Hannemann estimated it would take another $1.2 billion, on top of the estimated $3.7 billion for the rail transit project. As the cliché attributed to Senator Everett Dirkson (although no one has been able to verify he actually said it) “a billion here, a billion there and pretty soon your talking about real money.” Honolulu is looking at spending real money.

The sewer collection system, not the treatment plants but the sewer pipes, are also in the process of a badly needed upgrade but the mayor indicated the city cannot afford to upgrade both the wastewater treatment plants and the sewage collection system at the same time. But could the city afford it if it wasn’t going to spend billions on a rail transit system, especially when there are other, superior, options available, such as high occupancy toll (HOT) lanes.

The recent Scoping meeting to gather public input on the rail project revealed that no matter what the final rail transit route will be, a lot of people will be dissatisfied. This will no doubt generate a great deal of resentment as the bills required to pay for rail start coming due. Most of the rail transit projects around the country average about 40 percent over budget. This has been documented by rail transit critics any number of times. This is going to come as a shock to Oahu taxpayers.

The question isn’t which is the most politically acceptable solution but what is the most efficient, the most effective solution. This is the problem with rail, it is not a very cost effective solution. For the price of rail Honolulu could build a HOT flyover twice over. It is all a matter of where the city is willing to spend your money.

The choice is to spend Honolulu City & County money on sewage system upgrades or on rail transit. It is pretty clear that the City & County of Honolulu cannot afford to do both. The difference is the EPA will fine Honolulu if it doesn’t come into compliance. It may take a while but the Clean Water Act will take precedence and the taxpayers of Oahu will have to foot the bill and be fleeced one more time for an ill-conceived rail transit project.

Don Newman is the senior policy advisor at the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii.