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some low talking, because I’ve established what they are allowed to do there and not allowed to
<br />do there. And the income that we make from that vacation rental allows us to pay our mortgage
<br />and stay on that land, you know, because we don’t have multi-generation old family living on
<br />one piece of property any more to maintain Ag land as ag land. So I have some concerns about
<br />the unclear language in the bill in terms of Ag land and, you know, people who are able to, or the
<br />lack of ability to get a special use permit for a future vacation rental. And furthermore, just
<br />allowing people more options in agricultural zone so they continue to operate as agricultural
<br />zone, because every single one of my neighbors – I live in a tract of two to six-acre properties –
<br />they are not farming, they maybe have people that come and pick, and they just sell it to
<br />Greenwell, but that’s all they are doing. You know, we are actively trying to increase food
<br />diversity here, sell fruit to our local cooperative, Food Basket, and, you know, we made 20
<br />dollars on Jaboticaba last week, which took two hours to harvest, and that doesn’t count for all of
<br />the pruning and all the other work that went for the rest of the year. So I actually really urge you
<br />to consider the use of vacation rentals, appropriate and responsible hosting of vacation rentals in
<br />ag land so that we can continue to support agriculture and young small family such as myself
<br />who have to pay for preschool and our working members of this community to continue to do
<br />what we do. So please consider addressing that in the bill. Thank you. \[Applaud from the
<br />audience.\]
<br />
<br />KING: Good morning. My name is Jeff King and I live in Kona Isle, one of the condos that
<br />falls into the area that’s between the two Resort Nodes in Kailua-Kona. I’m glad this issue is
<br />now being considered now, because I wanted to just emphasize that this complex that I live in, it
<br />was built, intended to be a, you know, short-term rental. They are only 524 square feet, they are
<br />all identical, single parking space; we are not taking away from long-term housing options. This
<br />has traditionally been used in this way. We pay our taxes, and ethically everyone should be as
<br />well. They should be registered. And just please consider, you know, some sort of plan
<br />adjustment or whatever that would help us in the event that 108 goes in because we just don’t
<br />want to end up in a situation where people are going to lose their ability to rent those properties
<br />that they’ve invested in. So, thank you. \[Applaud from the audience.\]
<br />
<br />UNGER: Thank you.
<br />
<br />MOE: Good morning, Chair Unger, Commission, Mayor. My name is Egen Moe and I
<br />currently reside on the Island of O‘ahu. I did live here in West Hawai‘i for about 15 years. My
<br />daughter was born here, Kealakekua, a lot of family, so I too have seen the change. Currently, I
<br />do work for a builder. We have two projects on the island – pardon me – one in the Mauna Lani
<br />Resort and also one in Keauhou.
<br />
<br />One of the things that Mayor Kim talked about earlier was fairness in this approach and, you
<br />know, it would seem that a lot of the concerns are more zeroed in on residential communities and
<br />the impact that the unregulated vacation rental is having on those areas, and it’s, it’s clear to see
<br />why, it’s easy to see where, you know, the pain is coming from. It’s just, you know, looking at
<br />this bill, hearing comments, hearing even some of the questions from the Commission, it would
<br />seem that there is a lot of work that will need to be done. For instance, you know, why would
<br />you pass a bill, if you still need to update your zoning maps; you would think that you would do
<br />that first before putting a bill in place. You know, just, and I can give more and more and more
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