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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN PWMTC 2020/10/20 2018-2020 Committee on Public Works and Mass Transit 27th Session Hawaii County Building 25 Aupuni Street Hilo, Hawaii October 20, 2020 CALL TO The regular meeting of the Committee on Public Works and Mass Transit ORDER: was called to order at 10:47 a.m. in the Council Chambers, Hilo, Hawaii, by Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Chair Mr. Matt Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, Vice Chair Mr. Aaron S. Y. Chung, Member Ms. Maile Medeiros David, Member (via videoconference from Kona) Ms. Karen Eoff, Member (via videoconference from Kona) Ms. Ashley L. Kierkiewicz, Member Ms. Valerie T. Poindexter, Member(came in later) Mr. Herbert M. "Tim" Richards, III, Member(came in later) Ms. Rebecca Villegas, Member (came in later) STATEMENTS The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, FROM THE Statements from the Public on Agenda Items. PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: The Chair called Tina Clothier, Interim Executive Director of Peoples Advocacy for Trails Hawaii (PATH), who registered to speak in support of Res. 746-20 (Comm. 1099), and came forward when called. CHR. LEE LOY: Communication 1100, Mr. Clerk, if you could read that in, please. COMMUNI- The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, CATIONS: Communications. Comm. 1100: REQUESTS A DISCUSSION WITH SSFM INTERNATIONAL REGARDING THE DEVELOPMENT OF SIGNAGE FOR HELE-ON BUS STOPS AROUND HAWAII COUNTY From Council Member Susan L. K. Lee Loy, dated September 29, 2020. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Mr. Clerk. I did get a note from Mass Transit that they'll be ready for us on November 5h. So with that, I'd like to entertain a motion to postpone Communication 1100 to our November 5h agenda. PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MR. BROWN: Sorry, Madam Chair, is it okay if we have a motion to close file first, then we enter discussion? And then, we could entertain the postponement motion. Motion to Close File: Ms. Kierkiewicz moved to close file Comm. 1100. Seconded by Ms. Poindexter. Vote on Motion Ms. Kierkiewicz moved to postpone Comm. 1100 to to Postpone: November 5, 2020. Seconded by Ms. Poindexter (Approved) and carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Chung, David, Eoff, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, Kierkiewicz, Poindexter, Villegas, and Chair Lee Loy —8. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Member Richards — 1. Excused: None. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you. Order of Resolutions, Mr. Clerk. ORDER OF The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, RESOLUTIONS: Order of Resolutions. Res. 746-20: ADOPTS THE HAWAII ISLAND VISION ZERO ACTION PLAN The Hawaii Island Vision Zero Action Plan would assist the County in eliminating traffic fatalities through infrastructure and policy goals and objectives delineated for affected departments. Reference: Comm. 1099 Intr. by: Ms. Lee Loy Motion to Approve: Ms. Kierkiewicz moved to recommend adoption Res. 746-20. Seconded by Ms. Poindexter. CHR. LEE LOY: In the room, we have Director Yee and Natasha. If I could call both of you folks up. And then again, Ms. Clothier, thank you for staying online with us. You provided just a wonderful summary of all the work that your group is doing, and I just wanted to open it up for some discussion. You know, as you mentioned in your testimony, Ms. Clothier, we saw it last year, this was something that came out of our Legislature in 2019. The plan itself is attached to Resolution 746-20 as Exhibit A. And we have our Director and Natasha here to answer any questions from our members. And I'd like the record to reflect that we have Mr. Richards joining us. Page 2 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 (Note: At this time, Planning Director Michael Yee and Transportation Planner Natasha Soriano came forward to address the members of the Committee.) CHR. LEE LOY: Mr. Yee, why don't you give us a little update on where we are on Vision Zero. MR. YEE: I'll let Natasha handle most of the inner-workings of the Vision plan. I want to back up for a minute, because as we near the end of this term. I get to be more reflective. This is a culmination of me attending the multi-modal tours that were occurring here several years ago, which some of you folks went to, Seattle and Portland and other places, to look at how we could support other modes of transportation. And during that training of a few years, Vision Zero was presented to us. And a lot of kudos go to Aunty Carol, to Tina, for really nudging me to want to play a role in moving this forward with the County. So I appreciate early on, couple years ago, got a lot of support from Council, from the Mayor, and this happened. And being reflective in that, there were other counties, like Maui who was trying to lift this up. They started ahead of us, and we're well ahead of everybody else in trying to do this. The State eventually passed some changes at the State level around wanting to create a taskforce around Vision Zero, and we're ahead of that. So instead of waiting, we have something we could present to the State, to say, "Here's what we're doing. This is what we want." So I'm very proud that Hawaii County has been at the top of its game around this collaboration. I want to really also applauda lot of the other departments were very, very participatory in our meetings. We got consistent turnout on this issue from them in the meetings that we held. So thank you to everybody. Meanwhile, I'll see if Natasha has anything to add around the Vision plan and itself. MS. SORIANO: I guess, you know, some of the highlights. We did crash- mapping and some data analysis with the consultant, SSFM, and from that data, that's how we got our actual planned items. One of the more interesting things that we found is that alcohol and drug impairment are some of the biggest factors in our crashes. They don't—our crashes don't normally tend to happen during the peak hour, where there's a lot of cars, so that indicates, you know, speeding, also becomes a factor. One of the bigger equity pieces is that Native Hawaiians are three times more likely to die in a car accident than white or Caucasian residents, and that 85 percent of the crashes involved local residents. So they're not tourists, they're people who live here. So these are really affecting families here on this island. Page 3 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 With that, education and encouragement. We are trying to focus a lot more on impairment driving. We did also kind of looked at distracted driving, although it didn't seem like that was like a really big factor. You know, it might be hard still in this day and age to kind of factor that in. Some other highlights. You know, on the engineering side, we've been talking about traffic-calming things. Things that reduce speed; taking a look at how we engineer our roads to make it safer, or to encourage drivers to not be as reckless. So this is going to kind of go in hand later with Complete Streets, which will provide a lot of engineering that will support Vision Zero, as well. CHR. LEE LOY: Great. Thank you, Mr. Yee. Natasha, thank you so much for your hard work. Council Members? Ms. Poindexter, please. MS. POINDEXTER: Yeah, I heard you, of course, Complete Streets always captures me. And as I was on a tour, actually where you came from, in Oregon, and what they have set up there in Portland is just amazing, because it's like the pedestrians always have the right-of-way. And in the area that we were in, you didn't see cars at all. It was bicycles, you know, pedestrians walking; you had some of the transit. But no vehicles in that area that was Complete Streets. In fact, the stoplights were interesting too, because there were stoplights for the bicycles. And had the bicycles on the, you know, the image of the bicycle on the streetlights, you know, red, yellow, and green. So that was really interesting. And then other towns that we went through you know, and that's what I wanted for Honoka`a town, actually. One town, it looked like Honoka`a town, and it was all striped diagonally, and it was just for pedestrians, you know, walking through that town. It was really interesting on how they started to eliminate vehicular traffic, which was better for the environment as well, you know, because a lot of people don't have electric cars. Or is it hydrogen now? So yeah, I'm so looking forward to getting to that point where we do have Complete Streets. So thank you for bringing this forward. Really appreciate it. I yield at this time. MR. YEE: Just a quick response. I know you meant Pacific Northwest. I was from Washington, Seattle, not from Portland; and I'm also a U-Dub (University of Washington) Husky not a Cougar. I just wanted to make sure about that. MS. POINDEXTER: Yeah, I think that 1-just I need correction. We went to Washington first; that's where the complete street started. In fact, in Washington that's where they turned an old, I think, military base into an assisted living, independent living village, where they had a waterway that would go down, recycle the water. So yeah, I'm sorry. That's correct, because it was Washington. Because I remember talking to you about that village that was sustainable, you Page 4 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 know, environmentally friendly. And the way they would take rainwater, if there was storm rainwater, collect it, and be able to recycle that into the village itself. It was just wonderful. So our trip started off—our complete street started off in your hometown. Sorry about that. MR. YEE: So to add further, when we look ideas from other places in the world and other places on the continent, they're good ideas. The challenge will always be, how do we apply that here in our local context, with our local economic challenges and everything? It will never be easy. But I also—again I'm a Planner, so I will always encourage us to dream bigger, to have a vision for how we can improve within the context that we live in. Thank you. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Poindexter. Mr. Richards. MR. RICHARDS: Well, I'm glad that a Husky could work on a Cougar planned village, so it's okay. That being said, I do appreciate this coming forward. And some of the conversations we've had, Michael, over the time. You know, talk about these Complete Streets, and I'm the guy that pushes back against the complete street, and this has to do with the conversation we had. It's got to be coming up on two years now. And we talked about having safer communities, but we're engineering these Complete Streets do 60 (miles per hour) in a neighborhood, you should be doing 30. And so that what was brought up that there's a mistake being made that we're over-engineering these roads to allow people to go fast. Because regardless of what the speed limit is, yeah, we need to shrink them down. And so when it comes to the planning side, and I do appreciate your comments of planning, this had to do with moving the economic generators not at the back of a parking lot but putting them upfront around the roadway, so you slow down the traffic, because that also is traffic-calming. So since we're kind of poking fun at each other—but the point is there; that to traffic calm, traffic slow down, we need to do something along those lines. That's why I push back against the completes streets. Because Val I agree with you, having the village type of neighborhood. But the Complete Streets sometimes work against that, and having the wide roadways are sometimes counter- productive. So I think we have to keep that in mind as we're going forward. To that, I also had a question. You know, you talked about impaired drivers and all that, I didn't see anything through here referencing a tired driver, and I know that's been highlighted in the last couple of years it's been a real big problem on the highways. And I think about that, not so much now because we don't have a lot of people driving because we don't have a lot of economic generation. But I question the "tired driver." Which comes back to the planning, makes more sense for us to build more housing in the west side since that's economic generator side. So I think we have to keep that in mind going forward. Page 5 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 Also, the traffic calming. Being west side and, Val, maybe you see it periodically, especially the Kona mauka road, we get lines of traffic. Ten, fifteen, twenty cars, because we have people that are going too slow. They were doing 40 miles an hour, when they should be doing 50. Then we started this anxiety going, and people start taking chances. And I throw this out, Michael, because it's again, planning. I don't know what the solution on that one is. Either we have pullout lanes or if we haveI think there's a law on the books, as far as if you're obstructing five cars, you've got to pull over, but we don't do that. And so I think as we strive for this Vision Zero, we have to look at some other things, as well. So, more of a comment. I was just curious, was "tired" ever looked at in any of the data that you looked at? MS. SORIANO: I don't think it was explicitly in the data, mainly because it's hard to—at the time of the accident, a lot of the data comes from the FARS (Fatality Analysis Reporting System) data, which is police data. It's hard to gauge that. The only other probably indication is time of crash. But even in that, there was no significant indication that more crashes are happening in the nighttime than they are during the daytime. It's kind of actually pretty on trend with the national averages for that. And then to answer your comment about Complete Streets, you know, I don't I think there's a very logical approach. And that Complete Streets don't necessarily mean wider streets. And that we can even retrofit the streets that we have now to accommodate all users of all abilities. But it takes kind of a little guts because, you know, it will be a maybe a little bit of a detriment to a driver. But in our Vision Zero report, one of the other staggering statistics is that in our mode split bicyclist on only account for like half a percent of our travel mode, but is five percent of the deaths. And then similarly for pedestrians, it's something very low, maybe about three percent but is accounted for eight percent of our deaths. So we have to start looking at prioritizing our most vulnerable users of our roadways. And so this plan does that, and I think Complete Streets does that, as well. And, you know, it takes planning and designs and asking the community what they want in order to deliver a transportation project that can be used by everybody. MR. YEE: I'll also add that I think there might be some misinformation about what Complete Streets is. And so I think as Natasha and them will bring it forward soon, we'll certainly sit down with you to have you understand what is being brought forward on the Complete Streets program. Page 6 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 And again, I'm a planner. So trying to get from point a to point b in the fastest way is not in my DNA. So I don't think it's about getting to a place as fast as possible. Right now it's about trying to do it in the safest way. I will say during COVID (Coronavirus Disease) we have seen a downtick in fatalities here on the island, which would make sense. Less people on the roads and stuff, and there's less deaths. Which goes into probably inferring that as we create more places for people to live near their work center, we should reduce that travel time and see less deaths. So that's always going to be a goal for us. So just wanted to add that. MR. RICHARDS: And I appreciate that. The Complete Streets' statement, you know, we're talking the gridwork laid out, having the sidewalks, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I don't think that necessarily is well representative of our communities, which are more rural communities, since like the pathways, like we have in Waimea and all that, I think that is better. But it's also the walking communities, which comes back to, to be truly walkable, you'll need a bit more dense. And so we're talking about increasing our density a little bit. If we're too spread out, you would have to walk too far—and people end up driving anyway. And I realize it's a balance, it kind of depends on the community. So I look forward to that coming forth, Chair. I yield. MR. YEE: I can make promises right now. I'm saying there's going to be a wow factor when Natasha brings forward the Complete Streets. I think you will be wowed with the work that's gone behind the ideas. MR. RICHARDS: Okay, thanks. She must have gone to Washington State. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Mr. Richards. I know Ms. Poindexter put on her light. So I wanted to keep in context. MS. POINDEXTER: I just wanted to make a comment, too. Because I know that Complete Streets, when we went on that tour, and especially in Washington where we started off, it was a suggestion of the people with Blue Zones and when we work with the government there, about narrowing the streets. Because they had areas, where like people use as raceways. You know, we have that too, long stretches of highway. And what Washington did in the area we visited, they started putting roundabouts there because that slowed down traffic. So they were looking at the roads existing that were wide roads in neighborhoods that were long stretches, they put roundabouts in. It slowed down traffic. And then other areas, when they were building new roads, is to build it smaller, with turns in it. And they said that it helped slow down traffic. And then working with Ron Thiel, when he was in the Traffic Division, is how did we do it? You know, you look in Waimea, when I go toI'm going to go mauka Page 7 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 to Kona and I'm passing by Waimea school and the library, there's these funky lines all over the road, that is triangles, going like this. And I'm driving up to it, it immediately makes you slow down because you're coming to crosswalks. That was a brilliant idea because it catches your attention when you're driving, and going, "Whoa, what's going on here? I better slow down, something's happening." So,just being creative that way. I thought Ron Thiel did a great job in doing that. In fact, he convinced the State to allow him to do that, as well. I thinkI forget in which area. And the person who was in charge there, at the State level here on our island, had admitted to first not agreeing with Ron, but when he put it in and that happened, he said it worked. He couldn't see the logic at first, but it worked. So I am so looking forward to what you've come up with. And yeah, so as far as wide streets, the whole purpose is to get them more narrow. Because even us, when we drive, right, when it's wide you don't realize you're going 65. But then as soon as you get to one smaller road, you know, no way you can do 65 because you feel like you're going really fast, you know. So that's why the idea of smaller roadways. So I'm hoping DPW (Department of Public Works) somehow takes that into consideration. But I'll yield. Thank you, Madam Chair. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Ms. Poindexter, for that visual. With that, Ms. Kierkiewicz, please. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Thank you, Chair. I know, Val, I was going to say, "Where you going 657 That's over speed limit. Just kidding. Thank you, Director Yee, Natasha, for the presentation and the copy of the plan. I appreciate at the end, how you've organized the various themes and identified various goals. And there's a timing element to it, right? Short-term, two years; mid-term, five years; long-term, ten years. So does the action happen once this plan is adopted? Or is action happening as it relates to the different goals in this plan already? MR. YEE: Well, there are certain elements that are already happening, when it comes to, let's say education, encouragement. That already happens in certain areas. Like PATH (Peoples Advocacy for Trails Hawaii) will be doing some of that work—does some of that work. I think some of the longer terms one, it certainly lays out a plan. So it could take money, it could take funding. We now know the projects we may want to identify. Let's say in the future, with the next administration, then they want to prioritize CIP (Capital Improvement Projects), maybe Vision Zero projects could be rated a little higher for implementation, let's say if Vision Zero was a priority for the next administration. And so then you would have a list of some areas you would want to put some funding toward, right? Page 8 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 But also, I think with the State doing their plan, hopefully they will have some funding available that we could go after to implement some of our projects, too. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: So you've kind of entered into an area that I was going to go to, change of administration. I don't anybody is going to argue against adopting these principles. I mean, they're obvious that we need to do these things. And so how are we going ensure that the principles within Vision Zero are infused within the culture of County government? So doesn't matter who's mayor or who's head of the department, the people that are actually doing the work, like Natasha, know that they need to continue to do this work and adopt the Vision Zero lens in any of their work. MR. YEE: So I don't want to get too far off track. But it takes progressive leadership, right? In the end, there are going to be a lot of the folks that do this work that are not the director or deputy. But it's going to begin with directors and deputies who can support, certainly takes a mayor. So I think that's just part of, you know, your ability to screen who's going to be the next leadership for the County, right? MS. KIERKIEWICZ: And in terms of like accountability, I noticed that there's like annual progress report. But is the taskforce going to ensure that all the key implementers are on track with taking various actions? What does that look like? Or is Natasha in-charge of everyone? I'd like that. MR. YEE: Someday for sure. MS. SORIANO: I think it's going to be partnership with PATH. Tina still on the phone? MS. CLOTHIER: Yes, I am. MS. SORIANO: Yeah. So I think Tina and I have discussed it will be a partnership with PATH. The report and things would be a County document, so it would be coming from, probably me. And really trying to keep like at least quarterly meetings with these stakeholders to just gauge where they are, it's not holding their feet to the fire, by any means. And then the other part of it is we do have a lot of State partners, too. I have a vision that we'll continue that partnership, mainly because we have support from DOH (Department of Health), as well. So they're always on us or giving us money, and trying to do and push the envelope and see MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Department of Health you said, DOH? Page 9 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MS. SORIANO: Yeah, Department of Health. In their trying like get more money into the built environment, and getting health and safety in that way. And, you know, we're the other part is lobbying too, for some of these laws surrounding, you know, even just traffic tickets and how that money is being spent, we've had that discussion at the stakeholder meeting. How do we support red light cameras and automated enforcement, you know, things like that. Because that's the other the really big thing for our County is that we have, you know 18 percent, if you look at on the maps, 18 percent of our fatal—our fatality crash network, 18 percent of the roads are State. So it's going to take partnership. It's going to take commitment from—definitely from Planning Department. So that's maybe all the assurance I can give personally. And again, in partnership with PATH. And they've hired a new ED (Executive Director) who's super passionate about pedestrian and bike advocacy, so I'm really excited to work with them going forward, as well. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Awesome. Tina, did you want to weigh in at all about past involvement and making sure that folks take action? MS. CLOTHIER: Yes, thank you so much. PATH is committed to seeing the Vision Zero Action Plan through the entire time of, you know, the timeframe that we're anticipating it will take to reduce our traffic fatalities, the next ten years. This will be one of the primary responsibilities of the new Executive Director, and the PATH board is completely behind this. I was thinking one of the ways that we can ensure that this continues to move forward again, I had mentioned earlier that this was a living, breathing document, is that the County Council requires that the Vision Zero taskforce report annually with a progress update. And that way it's always top in line, we can get to the point where this plan this action plan is institutionalized, that you have an expectation that there will be results, and consequently the public will have that same expectation. We hope at some point in time to have a Vision Zero webpage on the County Council, I'm sorry, on the County's website. Jules Ung is very keen to assist us with that. So that's also another way to keep the community abreast about of what, you know, what measures are be taken towards this reduction in traffic fatalities and serious injuries. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Thanks, Tina. Director, did you have something that you wanted to add? No, okay. Thank you, Sue, and to all involved in this effort, I really appreciate it. Chair, I yield. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Ms. Kierkiewicz. Chair Chung. Page 10 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MR. CHUNG: Yeah, thanks. Of course, you know, I support the adoption of this plan and I really thank and congratulate all of those who have been involved. But, you know, I've got some comments on this. You know, Natasha started off by saying, you know, a lot of these fatalities are related to alcohol, right, substance abuse. We don't need statistics to know that, right? That's real intuitive, quite frankly. One thing that wasn't mentioned and which I think is also intuitive, and I kind of looked this thing over real fast, I would suspect that most of these fatalities are on the highways, okay. And I just looked at this thing really quickly; seems to indicate that, okay. You know, I've always said that—you know, what do I I've said there are three kinds of lies, right: lies, damn lies, and statistics, right? So we've got to watch out how we use these statistics. It's really important in reading these things correctly and applying them correctly. BecauseI guess the premise here is, is that because we have all of these fatalities, now we're going to segue into Complete Streets, which are really centralized in the urban areas but not so much on the highways. So it's a bigger picture we have to look at, okay, if we want to reduce fatalities, you know, traffic fatalities. For example, I see a lot of roadblocks in the urban area. Everybody going slow in the urban area, you know, I mean, especially at night. Highways though, if you put the roadblocks entering the highways, that's going to make a big difference, I think. You guys going to stop already doing that. Okay, you're going to reduce traffic fatalities on highways greatly. But that's not, you know, a planning thing. It's a law enforcement issue, right? You know, I know Ms. Poindexter is an expert on Complete Streets and all of these things because she's been through various trainings, but I've got to disagree with, you know,pedestrians have the right-of-way. And you know what's the it's dangerous. It's a dangerous concept. It might be good if you're able to implement Complete Streets. Have smaller, narrower streets, you know, it might work. But giving the pedestrians the right-of-way makes it very dangerous, and I'll explain why. Who has the dangerous instrumentality? Is it the pedestrian or the driver? It's the driver, right? And I bet everyone here has come across this situation. You're driving, you're going make a right turn, either a pedestrian will run across the street from your blindside, when they don't have the right-of-way, or worse yet, a bicyclist on the sidewalk coming fast or either on your blindlane. There are too many variables. Too many distractions for a driver, with the dangerous instrumentality, to be worried about this kind of stuff. I mean, are you expected to now look in your review mirrors to see if someone is coming on your blindside and then you forget to look out what's happening in front of you? Page 11 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 People have to follow the law. That's all it is,plain and simple. If you are allowed to walk, then you walk. If you're not allowed to walk, don't walk, right? And same thing with the drivers, they have to follow the laws, too. This is all about regulation. There has to be some order in the way we do things. But to have pedestrians believe that they will have the right-of-way all the time, I think it's dangerous and you give them a false sense of security. In New York City, you go in New York City all the time, right? As soon as that light turns, you know, for pedestrians, nobody walks because they know cars are coming already, because they have the right-of-way, and that's how it should be already. Everybody has to watch out for themselves and make sure that they follow the order that's prescribed by law. But, you know, I do like this because it does set forth a lot of data and statistics, and that's always important. But again I'll just remind everyone, it's how we read these things and apply it, that's all important. It's a lot more than that, yeah? What's kind of—what caught my eye and attention was, why is this three times more, Hawaiians are prone to fatalities? You guys you got any theories on that? What's going on there? I mean, you guys have the data. Have you guys crunched it and tried to figure out what's going on? Because no sense we get data if we're not going to figure out what's going on, right? MR. YEE: I think it would be hard to draw big conclusions over why Native Hawaiians are three times more likely. I think we can certainly have some, you know, gut instincts why that might be, but we'd be guessing. I think from when we were using an equity lens to look at some of the data, it just stuck out, right? When you see a disparity, when you do this work, you want to try to understand, but kind of hard to know everything from a police report. And you're not asking the person who suffered the fatality, right? MR. CHUNG: So we don't know. But we might guess, but we don't know? MR. YEE: Yeah. MR. CHUNG: Okay. But it's not an aberration, though. It's something that is consistently come up? MR. YEE: Consistent. MR. CHUNG: Then is there a game-plan to address that, you know, with the Hawaiian community? Well, not just necessarily in the Hawaiian Homes community, but just the Hawaiian community in general, is there some ? MR. YEE: Well, without getting into details, you know—so enforcement is just one of the five areas, you know, that we had recommendations for. So all five Page 12 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 areas have to work together when we make these action kind of plans—what we take action in, that hopefully improve the entire situation. So we don't just you know, the old thinking, it was enforcement, enforcement, enforcement, right? Vision Zero brought forth that there are other areas we can focus on to help reduce fatalities besides enforcement. Enforcement plays a key role; don't get me wrong. But part of the focus of Vision Zero is to look at the other areas. So it's education, right, encouragement, are the areas that we can certainly help with the Native Hawaiian population. MR. CHUNG: Okay. Anyway, but I do support this and I appreciate all of your hard work on all of this, too. But if we can make huge in-roads in the highway, incidents of highway fatalities, you're going to cut this thing in more than half, yeah. MR. YEE: I would agree. MR. CHUNG: Yeah. Okay, thank you. MS. SORIANO: Could I just add? I mean, so DOT (Department of Transportation) is a partner in the stakeholders. And as they're going through their process for their Vision Zero plan, you know, I think we'll see narrower roads. Right now they're 12 feet, and that really doesn't do speeding. If we can get to 11 feet, that will help. You know,part of it to is striping and maintenance, so that's a commitment, I think, that the district engineer has made, to do maintenance in a more timely manner. Sorry, there is like one more other point that I wanted to make, but now I kind of lost my train of thought. You know, with regards to Native Hawaiians, the action plan item, so that last half really points to, what are the actions we're taking in response to the data that we have. Another thing is that with the data that we,we've noticed you know, we could either go into the infinite realm of how much data do we need or we can try to focus. So moving forward, that might be something as an action plan item, or just even looking at data, and how we're going synthesize more maps later to refine our action plan. That is definitely something we would be doing in the long term with our evaluation. MR. CHUNG: So are you telling me then that the State is looking at narrowing their highways? Because most of the roads that are under the State jurisdiction are, you know, those long highways. MS. SORIANO: Yeah. MR. CHUNG: Of course we've got, I think, maybe parts of Kanoelehua, maybe some parts of Kamehameha. But is that what you're suggesting? Page 13 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MS. SORIANO: Not necessarily narrowing the pavement, but we would be narrowing the striping. MR. CHUNG: Right. MS. SORIANO: And that's something that they would entertain, as a measure. MR. CHUNG: You mean narrowing the driving lane? MS. SORIANO: Yes. MR. CHUNG: I'll tell you what going happen, again just using my intuition, not going reduce the incidents of fatalities at night which are related to drunk driving, and going increase the incidents of accidents during the daytime with non-alcohol. That's what I think, and I could be wrong. But that's just what I think. MS. SORIANO: And then another action plan item to that, is to support legislation for a highway patrol. MR. CHUNG: There you go, okay. Again, enforcement on highways. That's good, yeah. But that might never come to fruition. MS. SORIANO: It might not. MR. CHUNG: Yeah. MS. SORIANO: But the work we're MR. CHUNG: And as far as I know, County is supposed to enforce on State highways too, right? Yeah. I mean, it would be good if we had an additional layer of enforcement on those State highways, but we still are primarily responsible for the safety of pedestrianI mean, drivers on those State highways, as well. And we can enforce, so I think that's a real key component. You said it is a component to all of this, and let's make sure that is something that is advanced. MR. YEE: Just an interesting thing I learned during this process, and this came from Mitch Roth in his participation with us. Was you know, in having officers, when they do their DUI and impaired driving, and they pull somebody over and they run test, it's a very specific training the officers have to go through. But to be able to get that training right now, the trainers don't come to Hawai`i Island, so then they have to send them to Oahu to go get the training. And so there's limited budget for that. So part of the goal with Vision Zero was, how do we get the training here so we get more of the officers trained in this? So when it comes to the prosecution of these cases, would they have more success, right? You know, it's all these details that—even enforcement. But going through this process, you highlight where the gaps are, and hopefully you find improvements to it. Page 14 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MR. CHUNG: But it's not so much the prosecution. It's the deterrence. You don't want guys thinking, "Hey, they not going have roadblocks on the highway; so as soon as I get over that singing bridge, I'm home free already." MR. YEE: Yeah, but they can't put out the checkpoints if they don't have the trained officers to work the checkpoints too, right? So it goes in hand-in-hand. MR. CHUNG: Yeah, I mean, I don't want to get into an argument on all of this because I'm not a law enforcement expert. All I know is, you know, what my intuition tells me, right? And if the statistics are borne out, the data bears that out, most of it is on the highway. If that's the case, let's concentrate or put extra concentration on those highways, and then we can greatly reduce the fatalities. Guarantee, you know. Yeah, okay. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Chair Chung. Mr. Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Thank you, Chair. Aaron raised a good point. In Puna, specifically, I see it as having a very high fatality rate as far as accidents, you know, and it's clear. But what he touched on was, it's State highway. A lot of people get confused, you know, County should do better in Puna, but the majority of our large roads in Puna are actually State-managed highways. So how do we tie into the State? I know this is based on HRS (Hawai`i Revised Statutes). One of our partners is DOT, great. But going forward, you know, how do we protect the pedestrians and citizens on the State highway from the County level? MR. YEE: So the State did passI can't remember, was it reso. or what. But couple of sessions ago, they passed the State taskforce for Vision Zero. So as that taskforce does its work, there will be recommendations. And there's cross, you know, department—County participation on this taskforce. That I would assume they're going be able to push down recommendations to how the State should things on State highways. So part of that is waiting for that taskforce to do their work. Like I said, we're kind of ahead of the game. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: So say the County recognizes, or the County Council or whoever it may be, recognizes the problem, like for me Mountain View post office or anywhere above them—two nights ago I had dinner with some friends, and coming back there was an accident in the middle of the highway. I don't know what happened, but it happens a lot. So how does the County then work with DOT using not clean streetssorry, Complete Streets to better and complete safer routes in our community? Page 15 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 MS. SORIANO: So I'd just like to mention again that Vision Zero is a systematic approach. That while maybe the County doesn't have any jurisdiction over the design of the road in that time, we're hoping that the other actions through education, enforcement, encouragement, that we hit some of these other factors that are around those fatalities, whether it be curving impaired driving, through drugs or alcohol education. And even just trying to create a driving culture, that then is a little bit more aware of pedestrians, more aware of bicyclists. That's something that's kind of lacking in our driver behavior. And if you go to places like Portland, and if you are a pedestrian or if you are a bicyclists, you feel like you're seen. And yes, we probable are at a tipping—we're not even at the tipping point to say, "Hey, we have so many bicyclists. We have so many pedestrians." But part of that is building facilities or making decisions so that if we build it, they will come. Kind of like designing for the hoard in anticipation. We do that with vehicles. So again, I can't give any specifics as to how do we hold the State accountable. We do that through the encouragement, the education, the backways lobbying in the legislation in which they are able to do. But the plan itself, again it's systematic. So we're not just looking at all of the deaths on the highway. We have to look at the factors that go into that and how do we affect every single aspect of maybe that one crash. MR. KANEALI`I-KLEINFELDER: Okay. Sorry, when you said designing for the hoard, I saw zombies in my head, so I had a moment there. Well, I look forward to seeing what this can do for the County. Aaron raised some good points. I am interested to see how we interact with the State, when we see a problem or an issue, how the Council can drive some of that change. And I think if we don't start planning long term, which is good. I like that you're planning and really enforcing some of these ideas as we look at a new subdivision creation or, you know, different roadways in our County that are problematic, then we aren't doing any justice for generations coming. So good step. I'm looking forward to seeing how you implement it and being a voice in that. Mahalo. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you. Val, before I call on you, I'm going to check on Kona, if there's any comments in Kona. MS. DAVID: Thank you, Chair. Nothing. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you. Ms. Poindexter. MS. POINDEXTER: Yeah, and I just wanted to clarify on the pedestrians having the right-of-way. Because I totally agree with Chair Chung, you know, on Page 16 PWMTC-27 October 20,2020 what he said about the pedestrians not having the right-of-way. When I talked about the right-of-way, I meant in the areas that we visited that had—was like a small little town. That was striped that way, like a big crosswalk, that they had the right-of-way. So it was done in their planning of Complete Streets. And I'm not the expert in this. I would say that Tina Clothier is because she was on that trip with us, as well. And she's continued to do great things on this island. So I was so glad to be part of that trip with her. And then we talked about, you know, the statistics of the Native Hawaiians, or even just Hawaiians or locals who are dying on the roads, you know, we all—and I've been there. I had to travel all times of the—during the weekends, at night, and when my children had activities, and the activities are in different communities. And the distances that we have traveled all times of the day and night is really difficult. You know, it may not be drunk driving. Somebody may be falling asleep because we're coming home too late from an activity. And then you have all of the people trying to get to work. You know, we have people who do shift-work at the hotels, and then you have shift-work at the hospitals. So it's not necessarily getting to work you know, speeding because I'm late, then got to take over. I mean, I've seen that happen. Or coming home,just tired from your shift. I've heard a lot of that happening, too. So a lot of that, I think, are these numbers. That's just my opinion. and it's because we have long distances to travel because of work. So I'd love to see, yeah, more opportunity to work within your communities. I know the plantation gives everybody a bad taste in their mouth, but they had it right; you know, they built the homes around the mills. People could walk to work, even. You know, it's that type of environment. And I know we can get there and not going back to the plantation days but building that whole concept of building things within your community so you don't have to leave your community. The only thing is you know, sport activities. So you've got to travel. You've got try—go play against the Vikings and try to beat them, or whatever. So I don't think we'll get rid of that, where families will be traveling and stuff. So I'm so glad that all of this is coming up as part of the discussion. And I'm looking forward to seeing what's coming. Thank you. I yield. Thank you, Madam Chair. CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you. Thank you, everyone, Natasha, Michael. Tina, thank you so much. You know, clearly,people are seeing this as a systematic way to bring about change. We have a project coming up, and will put it on a future agenda, on some of the education that we're doing down in Keaukaha. And the wayfinding that we're doing with the kids there, refreshing some of the bike programs and the road vernacular for the kids to learn. So I'll definitely put that on a future agenda. Page 17