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WATANABE:Okay. Mr. von Platen, have you had a chance to review the
<br />recommendations by the Planning Director and are you comfortable with the conditions as
<br />proposed?
<br />VON PLATEN LUDER: Yes, I am. We are asking for a condi-, just, all we’re really asking
<br />for is just to have a time extension of SMA Permit that was then granted already. It was time
<br />that we obviously, we were supposed to be starting construction this past April, last September
<br />we halted all, all construction plans, and in November of this year is when our Permit will expire.
<br />So we are really kind of under the gun and that’s why we are asking for a time extension on this,
<br />because economically it just wasn’t feasible for us to go ahead with our construction plans as
<br />planned.
<br />WATANABE:Okay, thank you. Now, we had some Commissioners -. Lani, you
<br />had a question for the applicant?
<br />BOWMAN: No, I think it was answered; I had forgotten that the two stories
<br />will be independent of the, of your original building, right?
<br />VON PLATEN LUDER: Yes, the building as it stands there will not support the, you know,
<br />the new construction. And so even though it will appear that it does, it’s been designed so that
<br />it’s not structurally part of, you know, holding up the rest of the building.
<br />BOWMAN: I did have just a question. Historically looking back, I know you
<br />had applied quite a while ago to put on the second and third stories back in ’99 and again in
<br />2004, and then you mentioned that just you were planning to do it in April. Were there reasons
<br />why you didn’t -?
<br />VON PLATEN LUDER: Well, there was a, kind of the reasons are we were, the real reasons
<br />were there wasn’t, you know, I was waiting for business to really warrant doing the expansion.
<br />And so I had two things that were playing: one, when is business going to warrant it, when will
<br />we have enough funds available to be able to take on the expansion, and at the last possible time
<br />before our Permit runs out, of course, because I, you know, we couldn’t, we had to perform
<br />within a specified amount of time. So I really was waiting until the end of the Permit so that we
<br />would be in the best financial position to do it. And unfortunately, the end of the Permit came.
<br />There was time with, you know, the economic situation that doesn’t allow us to, doesn’t make
<br />sense for us to do it right now. So I guess, to answer your, I don’t know if I’ve answered you
<br />question, but I was kind of waiting, I was waiting until the last probable, possible moment to
<br />make the investment. One thing is that, you know, with making investment, of course, then we
<br />have to start paying for the investment, and I didn’t want to take that kind of financial
<br />responsibility on until I really had all of our ducks in a row. And for a small company like ours,
<br />ten years to prepare for a $5,000,000 project was, was a long time, but I really didn’t start
<br />preparing for it until about three years ago when we started all the serious planning and finalizing
<br />with all of our, all the negotiations that we had to do with the State and the Department of Land
<br />and Natural Resources with regard to the area of easement, also with engineers, and we, we’d
<br />even selected contractors and they had been having weekly meetings with our contractors, we
<br />had all of our bids in, our subcontractors had been selected; and all of this was being done last
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