MIN CHARTER 2019-03-29 (2018-2020) - Public Hearing

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Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 29, 2019 retired public health service officer and while I was working for the United States Government I spent four years at the Environmental Protection Agency and that is all you need to know right now. So when I hear what is going on here with the PONC which I have been following closely in the newspapers and it only today I found out about this... what was... you know this meeting here... hearing. So I am going to put out an idea and what I think would be best to benefit the future generations in terms of protecting natural and cultural resources for the future, is if the PONC person was a separate independent agency if you will, like the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) is separate from the United States Government, and you really need to let... it needs to have at least one and probably more than one because you are going to have the need to manage grants, so grant manager, plus some sort of, perhaps you could have a committee that approves the applications, right? So, but the point being is that if you had an independent agency, that agency is free from influence from Mayoral or County politics see, because the overall goal is to protect and preserve the cultural and natural resources for future generations and you don't want any politics involved in that. And so, the main thing is to give the power to the people at the community level because they are the ones who are best able to determine in their community, what the most important `aina is. What is the most important resources or sacred sites to protect, so if you had an independent organization that was part of the government but independent, and you had the people there that were set up to serve as grant managers and take in the applications, provide consultation, they have their own money. They have their own budget. And the budget is what the 2%, plus the maintenance right? But you have a system in place so that this group is not touched by politics okay? That is my suggestion because I worked for the United States Government for 20 years and I have seen what does and what doesn't work. So the other thing is, I am opposed to the CA -8. I think that we need to keep our term limits at two years. They can run up to... for eight years. You can have them in there for eight years so if they are doing a good job then you know, they need to continue talking with the community. One of the great things about Hawai`i that is different from the rest of the United States is there is still a democracy here. Look at us here today. We are here. We are testifying. This doesn't happen everywhere else, so one of the wonderful things about Hawai`i is we still have an opportunity to communicate and share our feelings and thoughts and have people listen to us and the government listen. And you are here as volunteers you know. You are taking in what we are saying. This is wonderful. This is a democracy. This is the way that it should be. So I am opposed to the... trying to you know, stretch out those terms longer than the current two years. I am definitely for the PONC one hire but like I say, I would highly recommend an independent agency and they you know, they handle everything and what we need to keep in mind is the mission which is to protect, preserve, natural and cultural resources for... and so communities in the communities... which they identify, they submit their grant proposals. So it is just you know, an idea. Page 9