|
YEH: I do.
<br />SUILLIVAN: I do.
<br />WATANABE: And I don’t know which one of you would like to start, Mr. Yeh, but,
<br />obviously, before you start your testimony, please full name and address for the record.
<br />YEH: Yeah, I’ll go ahead and start first. My name is Thomas Yeh, attorney
<br />representing the applicant, Katherine Sullivan, who is present here today. My business address
<br />is 85 West Lanikaula Street, Hilo, Hawaii. And, first of all, I wanted to thank you all for taking
<br />another day out of your busy schedule to show up, because it’s not easy attending one day, full
<br />day, let alone two. So thank you for that.
<br />It is kind of hard sitting there listening cause it’s not like a point, counter point situation. But I
<br />did try to take some notes. And, first of all, just for the record today, those points that were
<br />measured I think it was 29 feet and 43 feet from the front property line that we looked at.
<br />Second of all, with respect to the first question, were improvements approved prior to November
<br />of 2006 by the Planning Department in absence of the certified shoreline in the Kapoho area, the
<br />answer clearly yes. And what we did is we submitted first of all with our May 2008 submittal
<br />several letters. There’s one Attachment B which is dated March 8, 2005. Now this is in the
<br />Kapoho Beach Lots area which is just north of the Vacationland area. And similar issue there,
<br />this happened to be my client at the time, John and Sandy Barsell, and basically they were asking
<br />for a request for approval of a dwelling on property which abutted the shoreline. And if you take
<br />a look at the second page of this exhibit, it’s interesting because we’ve been talking about a 2.8
<br />foot tide and in this letter Planning Department agreed to accept the topo survey that showed
<br />elevations referencing the appropriate low tide datum. It had nothing to do with a high tide.
<br />WATANABE: I’m sorry, Mr. Yeh. I saw a 4-d.
<br />YEH: Well, this would be our Attachment B in our May 5, 2008 submittal. And
<br />if you take a look at, it’s a March 8, 2005 letter from the Planning Department agreeing, and this
<br />is page 2 at the top of the page, agreeing to accept the topo, well, “by our letter dated August 30,
<br />2004, agreed to accept a topographical survey map that shows elevations referenced to the
<br />appropriate low tide datum of the subject area in lieu of a Certified Shoreline Survey.” So it’s
<br />pretty clear that that was done in that particular case.
<br />We represented another client who had been cited for certain violations for renovations of an
<br />existing dwelling that happened to be next to the Mayor’s house in Vacationland on the makai
<br />side of Wai Opae Road. And in that one there, that’s our Exhibit D to the same transmittal,
<br />second page, the 20-foot shoreline setback and the 20-foot shoreline, which we’ll get into a little
<br />bit later, applies when you have a lot that was created prior to the shoreline setback law. And as
<br />we know, and part of the submittals that we provided you today, was that the Kapoho
<br />Vacationland Subdivision was created in 1962, well prior to the shoreline setback law. The rule
<br />that we provided to you, which is the Planning Department rule, says that when you have less
<br />than 50 percent buildable area remaining after application of shoreline setbacks, building
<br />setbacks, then you’re dealing with a 20-foot setback. So we look at page 2 of this letter to me,
<br />June 29, 2006, now this is when the Sullivans submitted or had their first survey done, page 2
<br />says “The 20-foot shoreline setback will be measured from the innermost inland projection of the
<br />11
<br />
<br />
|