2018-06-21 Leeward Exh A (AMEND SMA 05-005)

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MCMICHAEL: Please think about the safety of the people. UNGER: Thank you. Sharon Willeford and Max Newberg? Is there anybody, oh, here we go. Why don’t you go ahead and start with your name and area – oh, please raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth before the Planning Commission? TESTIFIERS: Yes. UNGER: Thank you. You may start. Please state your name and area of residence. WILLEFORD: Aloha. UNGER: Aloha. WILLEFORD: Good morning. My name is Sharon Willeford. I’ve lived in Kona for the last 40 years as a public school teacher. I was at Kahakai Elementary School where at that point we had no evacuation plan for the children. Once a year we would march them down to the stone church. I don’t, I’m not sure what that would, in case of perhaps a fire or, I don’t know, but it never made any sense to me, nor did we ever practice or plan anything to get up out of the area. So I’m definitely concerned about the children and the numbers of children that may be coming in, and the school is not equipped to handle, it’s a small school. Having lived on Ali‘i Drive all of this time, to this day I’m often sitting in traffic for as much as a half an hour right in front of this development area before Lunapule Street. The traffic is backed up in both directions often but mostly to town. I’m very concerned about the allocation of the water to these units. I believe at the current time at least three of our wells are still down. Water is life. We don’t have unlimited source of water in our aquifers here. And as Simmy mentioned, we have salinization happening. We also know about sea rise. I’m concerned about pesticides and sewage from the development going into the ocean and into the ground water. We, if you paid attention to the recent floods in Kaua‘i, many of my friends are still suffering. I do not understand the designation by FEMA, excuse me, what, I don’t, anyway, let’s not go there. We cannot redesign or whatever the terminology was a flood zone; a flood zone is a flood zone. Did you see what happened in Kaua‘i? The houses were wiped out that were built in a flood zone. Wiped out into the ocean with all of the animals and, and it still hasn’t recovered. The coral reefs are covered in debris. The roads are still blocked. And we know what’s happening on the other side of our precious island. This is sacred land; we need to respect this land. I’ve often said to you, let’s have a moratorium on building and development. There is no need. We need to take care of what we have and fix it. We need to take care of the local people. There are so many homeless kānaka. It’s a horrible injustice that nothing is being afforded to the local people by you folks. How much is enough? How much greed? UNGER: Ma’am, if you could direct your comments to the Commission — WILLEFORD: I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Thank you. UNGER: — and please review and summarize. 22 EXHIBIT A