2006-05-04 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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(A recess was taken from 11:25 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., at which time the Chair called the meeting back to order) Mr. Joseph said he had exhausted his questions. The Chair asked whether the five treatment systems were at or close to capacity, and Ms. Beck explained that the Hilo plant is at a little more than half capacity. The Kealakehe plant is at less than half. She does not believe the other three are near capacity, although she does not have the exact figures. The Chair asked if the amount of employees at the plants versus how much is being processed is efficient, or should there be more customers. Ms. Beck said there are only certain pockets on the island that are sewered. There are some properties which are accessible to connect, but the County is unable to find or identify them, partly because the data base is neglected. They could attempt sending out letters, but a lot of the owners do not speak English or are elderly and cannot afford to pay the $3,000 to $4,000 to make the connection. In addition, hard ground drives the cost up even more. Mr. Sakaguchi suggested that a fee be imposed when the property is sold, to provide for connecting. The Chair suggested expanding the improvement district and spanning out the cost. Ms. Beck said that improvement districts area finance vehicle to fund the projects. She said that the Kilohana District is a large- capacity cesspool system, but because of the EPA mandate the County agreed to help, so that district is an improvement district. The Chair said he was curious as to why the County is not expanding the sewer system right out of Hilo, as so much development is going on up the hill. He asked whether this was because of the lack of engineers or money, and Ms. Beck said that there is a lack of engineers, even if there was the money to do it. Ms. Nicholson asked why sewers are being built in places where people will not connect, for whatever reason. Ms. Beck said that they are not trying to sewer where people are not capable of connecting. Building sewers is driven, for example, by the cesspool conversation project. Sewers are also built in areas that are close to the coastline. These in fact are projects that are on the back burner and which they want to move forward on. Ms. Nicholson asked what happens if someone is close to the coastline and does not pay to connect, and Ms. Beck said there is a County code that says if a property is accessible, it must be connected. If she comes across a person who cannot connect, she suggests taking out a loan, as there is a loan program. Ms. Nicholson said going back and getting people connected should be a priority, and Ms. Beck said that she was in the process of figuring out how to do that in Papaikou with the Wastewater Division when she was working there, but then she got transferred out of Wastewater to Technical Services. 11