2011-01-14 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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improvement in morale. I’m not quite certain how that works but the idea of a consolidation of functions across the county may also be something to think about. I just wanted to mention that before I lost that train of thought again. MS. O’HARA: Thank you. I have some specific questions for you. You had brought up property tax. Of course it’s never the case that as an elected official you want to raise property taxes. But we have some situations that leave us with glaring holes in terms of collections. One is the homeowner exemption and how it is applied. As you are aware the Real Property Tax Office applies homeowner exemption to unpermitted structures. Changing that could make a great deal of difference in tax collections. And in fact, we might even be able to lower our tax rates if we were to move in that direction. Another is the use of ag exemptions and how they are documented. We aren’t requesting any financial information to show that people who are taking ag exemptions are actually earning some money from their agricultural endeavors or subsistence farming. We’re taking no financial information. So these are some things that we are looking at in terms of suggestions, and I’m curious to know, as a legislator, how you would respond to making those types of changes. MR. HOFFMANN: Well, specifically, to the two areas that you mentioned, and then I’ll respond on a much broader basis. The idea of going back to unpermitted buildings and things like that, we should do a much better job at tightening up on that. And I see no reason that we shouldn’t pursue that. I don’t know how much. Somebody used to tell me, is it worth the strain and the effort in order to see those changes made, and how much you think we will estimate to receive as a result of that. The ag issue is one that’s froth with all types problems. What we need to do in agriculture is a crime. I don’t mean that quite like that. We have a potential for an industry here on this island that we haven’t even begun to tap. I’ve got farmers in my district, Kohala and Waimea, who are very willing to expand the amount of land that they have in production but they are not ready to try to do any of that at the moment because of the cost of making that happen and the inability to establish or secure even to hold them, a good market somewhere on this island for their products. There’s a whole number of things regarding this. I’m less supportive of changes in the agricultural situation until we go back to the one important question that’s been pending in this state for the last 34 years, and that’s the resolution of the important ag land issues. Since the 1978 State constitution, we’ve had the authority and the mandate to do this. And we as well as other counties have set on our thumbs and not done this. Let me also go back, I think, to the heart of the problem. We’ve come up with an ag plan about a year ago and we’re just, and an ag advisory commission which is there. By the way our office did that so I’m a little bit familiar with some of that aspect. We need to move along on this. We still have only one person in the county government for the past 30 years, 28 years, I’ve forgotten how long DayDay has been around, doing agricultural issues. We can’t support an expansion of this most critical area with just one person. It’s impossible. We need a group of people to do that job. The Agricultural Advisory Commission is just one. We could expand expedientially I think, our revenues as well as our tax base. And we haven’t. We would be well along the way for food self-sufficiency. I’ve often made the comment, we can be food self-sufficient in my lifetime. I believe that folks. I believe that. We have some good ideas. The administration has some good ideas. We aren’t going to get it done with only one person or with an advisory commission. We need a hell of a lot more legislation. And finally, you’re right. Tinkering with the property tax rates, particularly in 10