MIN CHARTER 2019-04-25 (2018-2020)

Home

Hawai`i County Charter Commission -10 April 25, 2019 would agree with almost everything everybody has said so far regarding CA -18 and movement to the Department of Finance, we support that because of the delays in funding as the last two PONC Commissioner individuals have mentioned, the delays have been so significant that we were required to submit applications for the following year when we didn't receive the previous year's funding yet, so we were kind of submitting in the blind, which gives the perception and difficulty that PONC Commissioners mentioned and planning wise it is hard to kind of like plan when you are required to submit without having started the previous year. So the delays have been anywhere from a year and a half to the first application... to nine to ten months for the second application delay and to this one, so the 2018 PONC stewardship started in October 1st of 2018, so nearly when the year is over, so the delays are significant. And so, moving to the Department of Finance would be a lot probably better because their staff would be more committed to this and that is why we also support CA -9, which is the other Charter amendment to add that staff person, that PONC staff person to help streamline all of this, have more of a one-on-one person to interact with because even just getting a site visit from Parks and Rec has been difficult. Even just getting a response on situations have been difficult so as a significant example you know, matching funding is hard when you have delays in awards, you know, you can't plan to get matching funding for the staff person or anything else needed to support the program because the delays are significant. And that PONC staff person under the Department of Finance would help with that. Another big issue is that these are public access parcels but there are no rules and guidelines on how the public can utilize them. So like, like the Waipi`o Lookout parcel is different because it is a community space, people want to use it for gatherings, picnics, maybe like family... you know like you know, reunions and those kinds of things, but there are no rules and guidelines so Parks and Rec basically said nobody can use it until had rules and guidelines. Rules and guidelines haven't been implemented and I asked for that process to start in November of 2017 and nothing has started so far. So to this day, the community has no means to interact with the parcel except through the stewardship organizations like us, but we don't want to be the gate keepers because as mentioned and I am going to get to, is that we are volunteers, we can't always be there and we don't want to be that person. We always tell them to go to Parks and Rec but Parks and Rec has no process. So Parks and Rec basically says no in a general sense. So that brings me to my next point about the permissible uses of funding. We have started to do the stewardship in 2016 as required by the Charter has been all volunteer on our organizations part. Countless hours, I have done everything from cutting trees to grass maintenance, to coordination of groups, hosting of educational groups, preparation and breakdown, set up, all those different things. So, as everybody has mentioned you know, it has been burnt out. This is our third year and so we are kind of like pulling back, scaling back, and what we do individually as an organization and just doing the minimum because it is kind of Page 16