• What is the council afraid of? • Keep the 90-year Kukui‘ula buy-back clause What is the council afraid of? It has been a little more than a year ago after months of struggle and public outcry that the Kaua‘i
• What is the council afraid of? • Keep the 90-year Kukui‘ula buy-back clause
What is the council afraid of?
It has been a little more than a year ago after months of struggle and public outcry that the Kaua‘i County Council started to post council and committee minutes on the county’s website.
This made it much more convenient for citizens to see what is going on with government and especially assisted those who could not go to the county building in the middle of the day. It looked like the County Council was finally starting to move into the digital age. A good start — but how have we progressed since then? We haven’t.
Wednesday’s County Council meeting helped to clearly show how motivated each council member is towards creating easy access to public documents for Kaua‘i residents. Proposed Resolution 2010-39 was trying to facilitate better adherence to the Sunshine Law by making the action of “… government agencies … be conducted as openly as possible” with an informed public.
The resolution was also trying to make sure that the taxpaying citizens of Kaua‘i are getting their “money’s worth” for services that have already been paid for. Kaua‘i County Council has already subscribed to Internet services provided by an independent company that will link public documents to the electronic copy of the agenda and will archive past meetings in a more comprehensive and user friendly manner than anything currently being used.
Resolution 2010-39 was trying to assure that agendas with the related attachments, committee reports, full text of introduced and draft bills and resolutions are readily available to all of Kaua‘i over the Internet. The final version of bills once they pass would also be posted. All that needs to happen is for the documents, which are already prepared a week before the meeting and available to the public per the Sunshine Law, to be sent to the Internet service that we are already paying for — they would do the rest.
This resolution has been deferred until December for some pretty weak reasons/excuses, in my mind, by a vote of 5 to 2. They seemed to be worried that providing sunshine might some how violate the Sunshine Law? While all of the five dissenting council members said they want to see this happen it obviously is not very important for them to provide convenient public access to their work or why would they have voted to defer for 6 months to revisit this — I tend to judge people by their actions and not their words. Thank you, Tim Bynum and Lani Kawahara, for continuing to fight for open and transparent government.
If you would like to see the full copy of the resolution or other public documents you are entitled to you can drive down to the County Council offices, ask a clerk to stop the work they are doing so they can retrieve a copy of the document, they will then walk back to the copy machine to make your copy, after which they will walk back to the front of the office to hand you your copy (and charge you $.25 per page if it is more than a few pages), then they can file away the original and get back to work. After receiving the document you can hop back in your car and head home. Not a very convenient or efficient process especially for those who live outside of Lihu‘e.
Does this feel like “government serving the people”? Not to me.
Please urge our five dissenting council members to reconsider and move this issue forward sooner than the six-month deferral. It almost seems like they don’t want it to happen prior to the elections — may be coincidence but sometimes I am a skeptic.
Pat Gegen, Kalaheo
Keep the 90-year Kukui‘ula buy-back clause
The 90-year affordable 75-unit housing agreement that was made when A&B and Kukui‘ula Development were granted changes in density to their project in Po‘ipu five years ago should be retained.
When A&B first was granted rezoning from Agricultural to Resort/Residential back in the ‘80s, (reference their attorney at the time, Walton Hong) they proposed that approximately 3,400 units would be constructed for sale. These were to be marketed to local residents, not wealthy mainlanders and retirees.
True, the homes were not to be truly “affordable,” but they were aimed at middle-class locals, like, perhaps, a firefighter and office worker, or construction worker and teacher. This was to be “gap group” housing.
The idea was that the former housing that these people vacated would become available to other residents who might not yet afford Kukui‘ula. This would thereby relieve the housing crunch.
Then about five years ago, A&B partnered with luxury developers from Arizona and formed Kukui‘ula Development. They proposed a much less dense project of approximately 1,500 units. It sounded good. Nobody wanted beautiful Po‘ipu turned into an over-crowded, traffic-choked nightmare. The disadvantage was that now the housing created would be mostly for the very wealthy. Many are to be fancy, view-oriented estate homes, costing millions of dollars.
To offset the impact of this massive project, and to provide an increment of affordable housing for workers and for other local residents, Kukui‘ula development agreed to construct housing near Port Allen. This was to be housing in the $250,000 to $400,000 range, not cheap, but perhaps manageable.
To assure that this housing be kept in the “affordable” category, the developers and the council agreed to the 90-year buy-back clause. This would prevent speculation that would occur if the units were allowed to go to market.
The additional benefit was that this housing was going to minimize traffic by keeping commuting workers closer to the project than they might otherwise be if they had to drive in from Hanama‘ulu or Kapa‘a. The council worked out a formula as to income and worker priorities. Again, this was all agreed to by the developers.
Now, with a downturn in the real estate market, the developers want to renege on the deal, and allow the affordable housing to go to market after 20 years. That’s not a good idea. We would lose the pool of affordable housing, and be right back where we started. Yes, the market may be slow now, but these things go up and down. As the economy recovers, housing again will become scarce and expensive.
Do we remember what it was like after Iniki? There was plenty of empty housing for sale in a down market. The market recovered, and prices soared.
I admire A&B and their commitment to the Hawaiian community and its young people. I appreciate their underwriting of Hawaii Public Television. If Kukui‘ula Development is facing an economic hiccup due to previous business decisions and a slowed economy, perhaps adjustments can be made to the affordable housing development timeline requirement. But please, do not throw out the agreement that would keep the housing affordable for ninety years. We need that to be retained for the continuing health of our community.
Jack Lundgren, Lihu‘e
