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Hawai`i County Charter Commission -7 January 25, 2019 <br />more were part of a County Council Resolution back in 2015 authorizing the <br />County Finance Department to go ahead with negotiations with the owner to <br />purchase them. That is four years ago and the County Finance Department has <br />not approached the owners yet. We need those three parcels to complete four and <br />a half miles of coast line that is directly related to Kamehameha the Great. It is <br />his homeland. It is our homeland for where our Hawaiian nation carne from, so <br />please don't change that fund. Our groups have also been involved in the <br />maintenance fund. We maintain not only two of the parcels that were purchased <br />by the Open Space, but we also maintain three other parcels and we also maintain <br />the coastal land in front of `Upolu airport runway another mile. We already are in <br />the process of stewarding land, with the County, without the County, other places <br />we steward land. And we do think that it needs to be fixed. It is not right the way <br />it is. It needs to be put in the Finance Department and it needs the changes that <br />are part of the communication in front of you. So if you have any questions, I <br />will be available but I thank you for your attention. <br />CHR. ADAMS: Thank you very much. Now if I could ask Ms. Greenaway to <br />come to the table, Mr. Fijima. <br />LESLIE FIJIMA: Proposal No. CA -7 in opposition and Proposal No. CA -9 in support. <br />MR. FIJIMA: Thank you for your service and there is a fellow Vietnam veteran <br />named Joe Carvalho who is a member of that effort in North Kohala to preserve <br />lands. He is a Keiki 0 Ka `Aina of North Kohala Kapa`au and so you know, what <br />the previous speaker spoke to, he has, I don't see him much, but he has expressed <br />his you know sadness that the loss of access to the ocean because of people <br />moving in who have large amounts of money and who purchase land and cut off <br />access. So I am speaking in opposition to CA -7 and in support of CA -9 because <br />you know I am a refugee from Oahu. I moved up here in 86, lived in Kealia for <br />seven years and now live in Waikaloa and one of the things that made me come to <br />the Big Island was because of access to open land and since I have moved here, <br />the quality of life for myself has actually been degraded I feel. Because of loss of <br />access to different places. You know in Honaunau you can no longer go down to <br />access this place called Don Uchi where the Ulua fisherman used to go because it <br />is gated. You can no longer go to freely access Kealia Beach because access is <br />now cutoff. It is limited. You used to, where the resort is being developed up <br />here in the North, you know the developers cut off the access 20 years ago right <br />and in a recent West Hawaii Today article about that there's several County <br />Council members that support putting in writing the requirement for that public <br />access and the way that public access is now described was by invitation only to <br />certain groups right, that doesn't sound like public access to me. And the public <br />access in all of these North Kona resorts is a joke. Families can't carry their <br />coolers couple hundred yards, take their keiki down to the beach right. Those <br />places are being developed for the exclusive use of people who have lots of <br />money who do not live here. So, preservation of open space for future <br />generations is critical to quality of life. When I look at my granddaughter's baby <br />Page 21 <br />