21-04-28 EMC minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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Commissioner Fulton o Support public-private comprehensive sewage management for the Keauhou area. o Recommend Council allow DEM to evaluate laterals to WWTP for Kailua Bay. o DEM to identify priorities for moving its infrastructure at risk of sea level rise in the Kona area (indeed all areas) as part of county sustainability/climate planning efforts. Council Member Villegas, Director Mansour, and Commissioner Fulton met via Zoom and spoke about the priorities in Council District 7. Priorities that Commissioner Fulton identified included the cleanup of the leakage of sewage and the infiltration of ocean water into the sewer system on Ali‘i Drive; the development of a sewer district from Kahalu‘u to Keauhou. She had a follow- up meeting with Vice Chair Gaffney, Cindi Punihaole, and Council Member Villegas, and they strategized about how to make these things come to fruition. Chair Adams encouraged Commissioner Fulton, when she is ready to move on something, to put it on a future Commission agenda and have background information ready for action, if EMC is the proper venue to make that happen. Vice Chair Gaffney o Support public-private sustainability planning in the Keahole area, particularly to achieve sustainable water treatment for reuse. o Refocus efforts at Kealakehe WWTP to recover and use R-1 water locally. Since the last meeting Vice Chair Gaffney said he had been working on the ongoing issue of having a sewer plumbing connected to nothing, which makes no sense to him. When the Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway was widened, a sewer pipe and a return line were installed between Kohanaiki and the Kealakehe Parkway, which is the entrance to Honokhau Small Boat Harbor. There has been no movement toward an actual connection of those two pipes for the last 0.6 mile to the Kealakehe Wastewater Treatment Plant. He had a meeting with Director Mansour and also meetings with Rep. Nicole Lowen, who represents the district, because clearly funding is required to make those connections and have complete sewer system which not only delivers sewage from as far north as Kohanaiki and all of the mauka properties that can be connected, particularly Hina Lani Drive, where there are new developments are coming in. Their sewage goes to the plant and the recycled water comes back because at least in years past Kohanaiki was interested in buying recycled water once it became available. harbor has always been one of the target destinations for recycled water because they have lots of landscaping take care of. The North Kona Sewer Pump Station project is moving forward and that will include at least the sewer line to connect Kealakehe Parkway to the wastewater treatment plant. He did not know whether that is also going to include the return line. If it is not, the Vice Chair would come back to the Commission and suggest we write a letter to the Council. There is no sense digging a trench for one pipe when you can dig a trench and put two pipes in it. That would be the sewage line and the return line. So that’s issue number one. The other thing he has been working on since the March meeting is getting the Department of Land and Natural Resources to commit to the sewering of all of harbor. Sewage is 7