2008-05-08 TPUNAcdp - Laserfiche WebLink

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BROWN: Thank you. Chairman Watanabe and Commissioners, I want to thank you on behalf of the Puna community for bringing this hearing to Puna. And tonight with us we have here John Whalen the planning consultant for the Puna CDP, he is the principal with PlanPacific Incorporated; Mr. Jon Olson, chairman of the Puna CPD Steering Committee; Steering Committee Member Kim Tavares. We also have Barbara Lively with the Steering Committee; Stephanie Bath with the Steering Committee; Mr. Greg Braun, he is the Vice-Chair of the Steering Committee. We’re also honored to have here tonight Mr. Ken Melrose with the Kona CDP Steering Committee. Ken, thank you. We also have Council Member Emily Naeole representing the fifth district in Puna. I hope I haven’t left anyone out. Oh, Representative Fay Hanohano. Thank you very much for attending. If I could direct your attention to the screen, the Puna CDP basically we’ve kind of divided it up into four phases. The first one being the Preliminary Phase, which ran from basically June of 2005 to June 2006, included hiring a consultant, holding kick-off community meetings, soliciting and appointing the steering committee members, and conducting agency interviews and plan materials. The Outreach Phase, which was the next part, we held over 130 small group meetings throughout the Puna community mostly in home-type settings. And this generated participation by over 1,062 individual participants who generated over 3,300 different comments. We convened, the first steering committee meetings during this period held two public workshops on issues and opportunities. And we held an open house with display booths to bring members of the community into contact with different agencies, landowners, developers, etc. in the Puna district. We formed working groups and focused on the ten major topic areas that basically followed the elements of the General Plan. The next phase was the Planned Development Phase. Working groups submitted their reports to the Steering Committee for review and comment by the Planning Consultant, Mr. Whalen. Consultant reviews and comments and working group reports were conducted during this phase. Consultant prepared theme-based working papers which were the predecessor to the actual CDP document itself. The consultant also prepared preliminary CDP proposals. And the Steering Committee reviewed and modified these proposals. This ran from basically January of 2007 to December of 2007. And the final phase is the Plan Approval Phase which began in January and brings to where we are here today. The Steering Committee reviewed the consultant’s predrafts on the CDP; and this actually was submitted to the County at the very end of December, so that review began in early January. The consultant submitted revised drafts of the CPD over the next month and a half or two, and the Planning Director met with the Steering Committee to work out some issues of concern that the Planning Department sought with the CDP with the Steering Committee. And the Steering Committee approved the draft CDP that we’re here to address tonight in early March of this year. And so here we are at the Planning Commission’s first public hearing. And with that I would like to have John Whalen present some of the ideas or the content of the CDP. 2