For more than two months, Kevin Reiss and his wife have been bathing with water hauled in buckets, pouring it over their heads with a Tupperware cup. They can’t flush their toilets, and pay $200 a month to use a portable toilet outside their home.
It’s how they’ve been living since Hurricane Lala struck Hawaii Island in mid-August, knocking out water and sewer service to about 100 properties in the rural southeastern community of Punaluu, an area known widely for its black sand beach.
“Everybody’s at wit’s end right now,” Reiss told SFGATE, describing the possibility that restoring water could take up to two years. “That’s completely unacceptable.”…