2014-01-09 Windward Exh B - Items 5 & 6

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MELROSE: My name is Jeff Melrose. I’m, I work special projects of the Mayor and the Department of Research and Development. But I’ve been the, kind of the staff link to this conversation from the early stages. And I just wanted to add a couple of quick comments to this. One is, again, affirming the role that this group of people played trying to get to the bottom of serious and complex issues, trying to use a joint fact finding process that we could kind of penetrate in. These three-minute testimonies about positions don’t necessarily get us to good decision-making, so this was aimed to try and have a sustained conversation. The very first and most important recommendation that this group has is to establish, is to undergo, or to initiate, a health study that is specifically focused on issues of geothermal and the relationship between particularly H²S but maybe other things on the surrounding community. That is the No. 1 goal. And you will hear today a real interest in moving that forward. And that’s clearly on our agenda to initiate, and we are working with the John A. School of Burns (sic) to help us develop that scope of work in a very disciplined way so that the product can be put out to a variety of different folks and say, you know, how do we, in other words, look for a variety of different folks who can conduct the study. And there are several around the nation who do that kind of work and we would like to be able to do the work. So that’s high on our agenda. What we are doing today is really some of the low-hanging fruit that was kind of easier to start moving on in your term and then ask you to kind of teach us how do you get through the process of moving money out of the Geothermal Asset Fund, and understand how that works so we are able to come in more streamlined and clear each time for the next kinds of things we have to do. So just know that the primary goal that this group has, and I fully support it, is to establish a broader community health study. And just so you know that’s high on our agenda and something that we will continue to bring forward to you, as we can do so. But it’s a little outside of our wheelhouse to design epidemiology for a complex community-base health study that has, that would stand peer-reviewed rigor, you know, and provide us all with the kind of information we are looking for to make our decisions. So that’s the next piece of the puzzle. So I just wanted to add that to the Mayor’s list because really it is the most important piece of the report recommendations, and clearly I didn’t want that not to be on the table when we, when you start with your deliberations for this. So, any questions or? GONZALES: Any questions for Mr. Melrose? Thank you, sir. Commissioners, are you all right? Bathroom break, anyone? Good? Keep going? I would like to take public testimony at this time. We are going to call you up four at a time. We are going to ask your name, where you live. And you are going to have three minutes each. Please keep in mind that I think our goal here today is to select the claims adjuster to go over these items then come back to us, so just bear that in mind when you are testifying. Mr. Jon Olson, Steve Sparks, Paul Kuy Kendall and Suzanne Wakelin. Suzanne, still here? If you all could raise your right hands, please. Do you swear to tell the truth before the Windward Planning Commission today? TESTIFIERS: I do. GONZALES: All right. Why don’t we start, ladies first, Ms. Suzanne, name and where you live, and then three minutes. Thank you. WAKELIN: Good morning. My name is Suzanne Wakelin. And I live on Pohoiki Road, just down the road from PGV. So I have been following the issue of the Geothermal Study Group very closely. My family and I moved to the area just a little over three years ago with no awareness of the issue surrounding geothermal in the locale, and was surprised to find out that things were really not as good as we had been led to believe before we moved here. So before moving to Puna, I 6 EXHIBIT B