2011-04-08 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

Home

MS. POMEROY: Yes, that’s one of the priorities that the community put forth and the Ag Advisory Commission supports it also. I can read it to you if you want but there’s not enough staff for really accomplishing as much as we would like to accomplish for agriculture and that’s one of the main reasons the Ag Advisory Commission was set up, volunteers that will help advance the needs of the agricultural sector. MS. WONG: How many people are you suggesting or recommending? MS. POMEROY: Ican’t really say that because the commission has not come up with a number but I would say as much as possible. I mean at least two but I can’t speak for my own opinion as the Chair so that’s a real specific question that we never came up with a number but I can read what it says in the plan, it’s just a paragraph. MS. WONG: Okay. While you’re looking, might it be adequate to have still just one person and contract consultants to bring in resources to assist or do you think it would be necessary to hire another person in the county? MS. POMEROY: I think I can say without just speaking for my opinion on behalf of the commission that another staff person would be great. There’s also other kinds of staff that well I think is more state level for inspectors and things like that that got cut back. But here’s the short paragraph about that, this was the number one priority on the action items from the community: increase or reallocate existing resources for the County of Hawai‘i Department of Research and Development agricultural program so the county can be an active and more effective leader in implementing or facilitating the actions deemed important by the stakeholders consulted during the planning process and which are embodied in this plan. MS. O’HARA: Do you see the additional staffing being needed more on a geographical basis like I mean somebody in West Hawai‘i versus somebody in East Hawai‘i or is it more of a commodity focus? I’m just curious how you see that. MS. POMEROY: Again I am speaking off the top of my head rather than what the commission has discussed but I think often having a west and east is good for convenience but they would work together as one. MS. NICHOLSON: Do you see grant opportunities that are available for the county to apply to support agriculture that you are unable to take advantage of because there’s just no one to work on those? MS. POMEROY: Yes. MS. WONG: Isanything like that in the plan? MS. POMEROY: About grants? MS. WONG: Yes. MS. POMEROY: I don’t recall that that’s addressed directly. I think it might be kind of across the board that there could be more grants utilized by the county. 10