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The Honorable Chairman Holeka Goro Inaba and Members of the County Council County of Hawaii December 24, 2024 Page 4 Development and with other non-profit organizations and for -profit contractors and developers to provide affordable housing units. The County shall provide more opportunities for low-income housing and transitional shelters. ■ Construct more Self-help Housing. While this action plan is specific to affordable housing needs in Waimea, the provision of more self-help housing is needed all over the district. Policies and Actions Based on the preceding, the approval of the reclassification of the project area to Urban, which would facilitate the development of the proposed affordable housing project is consistent with the SKCDP. Finally, the reclassification action would be consistent with the following goals, objectives, and policies of the Hawaii State Plan: 1) Convert marginal or non -essential agricultural lands for appropriate urban uses while maintaining agricultural lands of importance in the agricultural district; 2) Stimulate and promote feasible approaches that increase affordable rental and for sale housing choices for extremely low-, very low-, lower-, moderate-, and above moderate -income households; 3) Seek to use marginal or non -essential agricultural land, urban land, and public land to meet housing needs of extremely low-, very low-, lower-, moderate-, and above moderate -income households; and 4) Give higher priority to the provision of quality housing that is affordable for Hawai`i's residents and less priority to development of housing intended primarily for individuals outside of Hawaii. The following discussion includes how the proposed project will meet the standards for determining urban district boundaries under State Land Use Commission (LUC) Rules: Urban Districts shall include lands characterized by "city -like" concentrations of people, structures, streets, urban level of services and other related land uses. The project area is unique in that much of the surrounding area would be characterized as more rural in nature with larger lot, rural residential subdivisions and vacant agricultural land surrounding it. However, LUC Rules provide an allowance to reclassify lands to the urban district that do not conform exactly to this "city -like" concentration standard if the lands are surrounded by or adjacent to existing urban development, and only when those lands represent a minor portion of the urban district. Based on the following discussion, the proposed boundary amendment to the urban district qualifies for this exception.