2010-01-08 TCOUNTY - Laserfiche WebLink

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BISEL: Right. I would think that you probably wouldn’t want people doing standup in the bay there. But as a place to launch I don’t think it would be any different than launching a kayak. WOODWARD: All right. Does anybody else want to add to the testimony? Ron, give us your name and address, and then take it off. TERRY: My name is Ron Terry, 10 Hina Street, Hilo. I haven’t been working on this project for about a year and a half so I’m a little rusty on some details. But anticipating some of the testimony that may come here I want to address a couple of issues.And first of them is the trees. And as a biologist I just want to note that a banyan is a non-native species, it’s highly invasive. It has its place as a landscape element, but it escapes that place quite often. Banyans are not appropriate on coastlines. They shade out native vegetation, they create poor habitat, they contribute organics to the water that are unnecessary, they’re not found in nature. Our plan includes planting with native and Polynesian species, and these Polynesian species are adapted to islands that are highly similar to Hawaii. So they’re essentially native species – kou, milo, coconut, hala. These are the appropriate coastal plants, naupaka and kamani. These plants belong on the shoreline. They enhance the shoreline, they reflect the beauty and the culture of Hawaii, whereas banyans do not. And I think dedicating trees like these to those individuals, rededicating, is the completely appropriate way to blend the spirit of this dedication which was done back in the 1930’s with our modern needs and in a more enlightened environment. I’m a kayaker. I’ve used that place many, many times for kayaking and, also, frequently observe standup paddling there. It’s a very good place to do it. I don’t see any conflicts whatsoever. It’s, as much as I like driving on the beach to launch my kayak cause it was easy, I completely supported Mayor Kim’s idea when he explained it to me, because I don’t like to see, I always thought there was a big conflict with people driving around. Sometimes people are tearing up on that beach. Oils and other fluids leak onto the beach. It’s just, it’s simply not a good idea to have that. Also one thing that may not be clear from the Planning Department submittal which was good was the extent of public participation that went on in here. If anyone tells you that we did not consult the public, I’d like to, you know, beg to differ. We had one large public meeting back in 2006 or 2005, I can’t remember the exact date. We had meetings in the Mayor’s office, we had meetings on site. And in response to the concerns that people brought up, we had a very well advertised public meeting in May of 2008. And we had, I think, almost 200 people attend in this very room. And they were given ballots; and they could choose between keeping it the way it was or going with our first alternate that we presented in the EA and a second alternate. And we had 140 people choose the second alternate, which is essentially what you see up there with some tweaks that we got at the meeting. People said why don’t you add this, why don’t you take away that. We tweaked it and we have the alternative, alternative that you see there. We had only eight people express a desire to leave it the way it was, and we had a few people vote for Alternate one, and a few people just declined to vote. It’s difficult for people to come out to Planning Commission hearings and hang around and testify. I saw two people walk away that were here, just couldn’t hang around long enough to testify. One of them I know supported the proposed alternative but he had to go back to work. We have had an extensive public process 9 EXHIBIT C