2012-06-07 Windward Transcript Hegarty

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KERN: And we’ll start with James Kiley, name and area in which you live, and then your time will begin. KILEY: Good morning. James Kiley. I live on Lehua Drive. I’m not a good testifier, but I’ll do the best I can. I’m not opposed to the commercial facilities, and I give John credit for his entrepreneural spirit. And we do need something in the area that will provide some local way to purchase goods, just because it costs too much to do it otherwise in some respects, plus essentially being able to walk down there and do that. But the reason I wanted to testify was although I support this, I’m opposed to the fact that it’s difficult for me to walk there. Because unlike people that live close I don’t have that little sidewalk that was put in by the County. And for me to walk down from Lehua Drive can be a little bit disconcerting at times. If I want to drag my kids or grandkids along it’s not going to work. So I just want to put a pitch in for maybe the County taking a look at improving pedestrian access on that road; and, of course, I know a number of studies that have been done as far as the speed limit not being taken into consideration by everybody. But the bottom line is I do support something in the area that will provide us with convenience. But let’s do something about providing safe access to that. Thank you. KERN: Thank you. Any questions for the testifier? Seeing none, thank you. Robin Benedict, name and area in which you live. BENEDICT: Hi, my name is Robin Benedict and I live in Ainaloa. I came to the last meeting, and I was in support of the store; and I’m still in support of the store. But I just kept an open mind to all the testimony that was being said at the last meeting. And I belong to the Ainaloa, well, my mother-in-law does cause we live with her, it’s her house. She’s an elderly person. She’s a member of the Association. And so I kept an open mind wanting to hear what Mr. Galimba said because he was against it, and I had some concerns. So, I had some questions. And so, and I just want to bring this out th to the Council (sic) that on June 5, there was a community meeting. Mr. Hegarty put together a meeting of the community, invited people, invited Mr. Galimba to come over. And I was ready with my questions because I knew that this meeting was going to happen today. And he never showed up. And so these are some of the concerns that I had. First of all, our community not that I know of was surveyed or even asked anything about this store. So the Association is representing us. And as you can see here and at the last meeting there was a lot of people that came and stated that the Association's view doesn't necessarily represent their view; and it doesn't represent our household’s view. All the people that I've talked to, my neighbors in the community, support the store. Another thing I heard, which was disconcerting, is that I heard that Mr. Galimba is moving out of our community and he’s moving to another island. And so if he is, I wanted to ask him that. I would have questions to ask him about that. And, you know, is there any intentional avoidance? I know that Mr. Hegarty tried to contact the Association and set up a meeting with the Association. Mr. Galimba never responded. So I have concerns about this. And if there is some kind of personal thing or targeted thing against the store -. Because as far as I can see it's a benefit to the community, it’s a benefit to the senior citizens, it's a benefit to the handicapped people in the community. I personally have a handicapped person in my household. I have a senior citizen in my household. I work, my husband works. And this store, and then I'm getting older and I forget things so, you know, I’ll forget to buy something and, you know, that’d be really easy for me. So personally that's where I'm coming from. There's a lot of things I want to say. But one thing, I want you to leave with this, the Association is targeting the store. It's across the street from where they’re 8 EXHIBIT C