2019-06-26 Meeting Minutes (EMC)

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3. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC Two people had signed up to testify. Jerome Warren: The wastewater treatment plant being planned for Nāālehu is an ʻ expensive facility. The Council’s Finance Committee approved it on June 3, and it was not sent to the EMC for review and comment. Instead it went to the full County Council and was approved at the first reading. All the debt will be an unnecessary burden on Nāālehu. ʻ The lagoons will breed mosquitos and attract feral pigs. It will be the residents who are affected, not the commissioners. The debt will affect all property owners who live at moderate levels, and it will not affect the commissioners. The EPA enforcement division called him yesterday, and he told them the same thing. He asked them about Mayor Kim’s deadline and the EPA fines, and he gave them examples on the veracity of Director Kucharski’s and Dora Beck’s statements made to the Council and to the EMC. The enforcement staff at EPA District 9 will look at the videos from the June 3 and June 19 meetings, and they can look at the EMC minutes. They are to call him again next week. Director Kucharski has been out of compliance with his federal administrative order of consent, and his excuses to the EPA have avoided fines so far. The EPA took him at his word, but now the EPA’s integrity is at stake if they continue to believe Dora Beck and Director Kucharski. If the EPA loses integrity, Trump gains more votes. Sandra Demoruelle: She appreciates the opportunity to speak on the sewer systems in Kaū. She is very upset, because going back to the original plan of septic conversioʻn is not ever considered. They are looking at millions of dollars in SRF loans. The written testimony she provided shows how the cost has increased over the years. The original plan was accepted by everyone. There was a variance to use the well. Then the big lie came. The Fujioka report does not say the well is failing, but that it is in good condition. It is a big lie to say that the well is failing. Every PER has this lie, and there have been three since the original FEA. They all point to the fact that the well is failing, and that is the only excuse basically given for not doing the original septic conversion. There is no need to go through an EA, and there is nothing to stop the county from spending a few hundred thousand dollars to just put in the septic conversion or a package plant, if it is really decided the septic is not enough. The package plant would cost $4 million of taxpayer money rather than $108 million. 4. UNFINISHED BUSINESS a. Continued discussion and brainstorming of ideas related to the functions of the Department of Environmental Management to share with Councilmember Tim Richards in response to his request for a dialog. Chair Bennett said a tentative meeting is scheduled with Councilmember Richards on July 23, 2019, at 8:00 a.m. here at the West Hawaiʻi Civic Center. The purpose is to have a dialog about what the commission and department can do in this day and age relative to the challenges they are confronted with. One of Councilmember Richard’s concerns was how to have a more equitable distribution of the costs of wastewater management, rather