2010-02-26 TPARKERSCHOOL - Laserfiche WebLink

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here in HawaiÒi where there is an emphasis on community associations and the value of citizen input. A key to my process of achieving consensus is, of course, Margar a lengthy collaboration a couple of months ago when we went back to the community, and I really appreciated MargaretÓs desire to come up with a positive document that would allow Parker School to move forward and allow the community to feel good about it. And Margaret has been tireless in serving as a conduit for a variety of types of input from different stakeholders in the community; sheÓs been a great collaborator and a tough negotiator. And I feel that the document that we, the school on one hand and Margaret on the oth and I want to make a very direct statement that the school stands behind this document. As I go through some of the salient points, that youÓll see that many of them are contained in conditions from the County. But I do want to stress the fact that the school stands behind the entire document, and we feel that it will serve as a blueprint of what we will do now and what we will do as we go through the building process that comes as a result of approval by this Commission. I also want to thank the neighbors of Parker School. One of the things I heard even from the people who are very nervous about some of our plans, especially for the gymnasium for instance, the neighbors all said, look, we want Parker School to succeed, we recognize you have an important role to play in the community, but here are our concerns. And I felt that the neighbors were constructive, listened to us, gave us good suggestions, and I hope that the great majority of people who live in Waimea will feel good about the result that has finally occurred here. Ron Thiel of the Traffic Division of Public Works was very, very helpful in getting us to understand the ins and outs of the traffic situation in the heart of Waimea, which is of course where the school is located. And also Captain Sanborn of the Police was very useful in his observations about what we can do and what we are not to do relative to the parking lot that opens onto Kawaihae Road. So theyÓre involved in this and it was also very useful. As part of our process to go through this, we met with the South Kohala Traffic Safety Committee twice, and at the second meeting we did receive approval from that body, their endorsement of our application. We presented to the entire Waimea Community Association, and now you have a letter from them endorsing our application. And of course, the Design Review Committee of the Waimea Community Association, we met with them twice Î Margaret was a chair of that committee Î and I think that body in many ways was sort of the fulcrum of our negotiation process and, again, Margaret for spending a lot of quality time with me over the course of the last couple of months. We also met with County officials, the Police, you know, and the Planning Department. And I would also want to recognize particularly the role played by the PuÒuk Street neighbors who have, of course, the most immediate concerns because theyÓre the most immediately affected by any changes in the school. But PuÒuk Road was a key question. WeÓve always tried to maintain our role as a special relationship with those neighbors in particular, and their advice is very useful. We also held a general meeting for the Parker School ohana to get our own people more aware of what our plans were, what issues were, what the concerns of the community were and why we needed to make some changes to our application. I think a lot of people from Parker School are here today, and I want to acknowledge and appreciate their becoming involved in the process. 6 EXHIBIT A