2023-06-15 Leeward Planning Commission Minutes

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mess. There was light standards and asphalt and concrete and sidewalks and it was a mess and so I really respect what he did to clean that up. The second point I want to make, or I think is a good thing for what's happening with the commercial zoning up there, is that if Mr. Metzler was a greedy developer, he probably would have made it one lot. That would reduce his cost for all the infrastructure, all the subdivision and all the improvements that need to go in if it was just one big lot. They would sell it to who knows who from somewhere in the mainland and we may end up with a Big Box store there which Waimea doesn't need another Big Box store. I'm excited about the fact that it's 3 lots. It gives 3 different owners opportunities and hopefully local businesses have a chance to establish something and hang out their shingle and provide a service to the local community. With regards to the traffic. I think everyone here understands that commercial properties by themselves do not create cars. Okay, cars may go there, cars leave there but they don't create cars. I don't think they necessarily create any additional traffic going up and down Mamalahoa Highway and there may actually be some benefit to it in that as everyone here whose testified. That there it's a 30 mile an hour zone but as soon as you get past HPM heading east it's like people are speeding up. So perhaps having a couple extra driveways going onto the highway at that point. Like I said, the improvements, the center lane is already there. Perhaps a couple extra driveways on there may actually slow the traffic down a bit, at least get it down to below the speed limit at or below the speed limit. So, that would be my comments on the commercial property and so now if I can switch over onto the back 3 acres, I guess you could call it. So, yeah that was historically everyone's pretty aware of the history of that. So right now for me I will probably be either myself and the neighbor to the front of me will probably be the most directly impacted people in that it's my driveway. Okay. So, it's my, I own that parcel and so when I look at the highest and best use of the land and I think that's what we're all trying to do. As developments are going to happen here, how do we do it right and what is the highest and best use of that land. It's only 3 acres, you can't do a large local commercial farm. There's already 2 homes on it so that reduces the arable land size as well. There's a flood zone on it that reduces the developable area and I do a lot of gardening myself. I've probably got an acre that I grow a lot of different stuff on, and I would that a lot of a half an acre that's zoned Ag there's enough room for a house. There's enough room to park your car and there's enough room to get maybe a half dozen raised beds and a few fruit trees in there and you can actually do something on a scale that is manageable. And for most of us that live here in Hawaii, we work, we work full-time and so to be able to do a little bit farming on the side which a lot of folks really enjoy doing maybe they support themselves, support their neighbors. You can do that on a small scale. You can't do that on a large scale unless you do it full-time and full-time, I mean as previously mentioned most of the good arable land and Waimea — ROY: Thirty (30) seconds. LANGEVIN: 30 seconds, okay, thank you. So, most of the good arable land in Waimea, I think there's a shortage, there's a bigger shortage of farmers than there is farmland per 11 EXHIBIT A