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UNGER: —This is Commissioner Unger.
<br />DARROW: Oh, sorry.
<br />UNGER: Just to clarify. We have a State, we have the State Legislature passing HR[S] 153, and
<br />now we're attempt—now, we're talking about coming in line with that with our rules, and maybe
<br />this is a Corporate Counsel question. Do we have to? I mean, are we mandated that we have to
<br />come into, into alignment with what the State has done or do we have the authority to say, well,
<br />State, you are doing what you're doing. We've decided to keep our same rules. So, I think that,
<br />that probably just needs to be a discussion for clarity purposes.
<br />HALL: Yeah, the State, the actual HRS 205A gives the Planning Commissions ultimate
<br />authority, so it doesn't go through anybody else but you guys so, technically, when it comes to
<br />State law, usually the rule is you can make it stricter but you can't pull, you can't go the other
<br />way and make it less lenient. So, I guess, if you guys wanted to, you guys do have the authority
<br />to, to not conform completely. But, it does, I guess, run into some problems when if we do end
<br />up in court. All the other jurisdictions are doing it this way and then we're doing it a different
<br />way. It gets a little messy, but it's still within your authority to amend your rules the way that
<br />you see fit.
<br />HENKEL: Any other questions? Go ahead, Jeff
<br />CLARKSON: I
<br />HENKEL: Oh, I'm sorry.
<br />CLARKSON: I'd like to follow up on that. So, my understanding is that we certainly as a
<br />Commission don't have the power to make a definition such as a minor permit that is at odds
<br />with the State definition as enacted by their State law. All we have the capability of doing is
<br />determining what part of our remit we can assign to the Department to execute. So that if we
<br />have a value, say for the minor permit, that is different for assigning that, let's just go to the
<br />existing 125,000, $125,000 valuation level, my understanding is we could keep that but that
<br />would not change the definition of a minor permit being anything that's less than 500,000. The
<br />State defined it that way, and we have to follow that. All it would mean is that the Commission
<br />as a whole would have to assess every application over a 125,000, and the Director would only
<br />be able to deal with applications where the valuation was below a 125,000.
<br />So, I mean, we can take on that workload. Apparently, there are about 20 of those applications
<br />per year, but I would just be advised that if we don't want to let the Department handle them, we
<br />have to handle them.
<br />SELF: Um
<br />HENKEL: Here's Amy Smart [sic], Corp. Counsel.
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