LIHUE — A budget proposal by Kauai Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. to shift nearly $1 million in future tax revenues for public access and open space initiatives to an emergency fund is causing a stir among some county officials.
Public Access, Open Space and Natural Resources Preservation Fund Commissioners opposed the bill on Thursday, saying that lower funding could hurt ongoing and future projects.
That fund currently receives 1.5 percent of all certified real property taxes collected each year, amounting to nearly $1.4 million last year.
Those funds, according to the Kauai County Charter, are used to acquire lands or property for specific conservation efforts recommended by the commission and approved by the County Council.
But Bill 2541, some say, would lower that by establishing a funding range that could be as low as 0.5 percent.
“This change is being proposed so that we can mandate contributions for another critical need: our committed reserve fund that will be used in cases of emergency or disaster,” Carvalho wrote in his 2015 fiscal year budget proposal. “This by no means signals non-support for the important work of the Public Access, Open Space Committee.”
The shift, Carvalho said, will allow his administration to build the county’s reserve fund to an amount equal to the county’s average operating costs for a two-month period.
For next year, that means a proposed increase of $1.1 million to the committed reserve and a $849,805 reduction to the open space fund — a 62 percent decrease in funding from the year before.
The open space fund, Carvalho said, currently has a $3.3 million balance and has not been touched since October 2010.
But that money may not be enough to cover future property acquisition costs or obtaining land entitlements, Open Space Commissioner Dorothea Hayashi said.
“I’ve been thinking about this and my thing is, do we have to concede to the mayor’s request?” Hayashi said.
The flexible funding model, Committee Chair Joseph Figaroa said, also creates some uncertainty, since future County Council boards may opt to continually decrease, rather than increase, allocations over time.
“It’s already setting us up for whether or not we want to take that risk or not and I’m not willing to do that,” Figaroa said.
A hearing before the County Council is scheduled for their April 23 public meeting in the Historic County Building’s Council Chambers in Lihue.
• Darin Moriki, county government reporter, can be reached at 245-0428 or dmoriki@thegardenisland.com. Follow him on Twitter at @darinmoriki.
