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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN CRCOC 2024/02/20 (2022-2024)Committee on Communications, Reports, and Council Oversight 22nd Session West Hawaii Civic Center 74-5044 Ane Keohokalole Highway, Building A Kailua-Kona, Hawaii February 20, 2024 CALL TO The regular meeting of the Committee on Communications, Reports, and ORDER: Council Oversight was called to order at 2:46 p.m., in the Council Chambers, Kailua-Kona, by Ms. Jennifer Kagiwada, Acting Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Ms. Jenn Kagiwada, Vice Chair Ms. Cindy Evans, Member Ms. Michelle M. Galimba, Member Mr. Holeka Goro Inaba, Member Ms. Ashley L. Kierkiewicz, Member Ms. Heather L. Kimball, Member (came in later) Ms. Susan L. K. Lee Loy, Member Absent & Excused: Ms. Rebecca ViIlegas, Chair Mr. Matt Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, Member 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 following individual registered to comment on Comm. 718, and came forward when called by the Chair: Cory Harden. COMMUNI- The Chair directed the Committee to proceed to the next order of business, CATIONS: Communications. Comm. 693: REQUESTS AN UPDATE FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT REGARDING HAWAI`I COUNTY'S ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGING STATION INITIATIVES From Council Member Cindy Evans, dated January 10, 2024. Postponed: February 6, 2024 (Note: There is a motion by Ms. Evans, seconded by Mr. Inaba, to close file on Comm. 693.) CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Let the record reflect that Council Member Kimball has rejoined us. Would you like to introduce? MS. EVANS: Yes, thank you. It's my pleasure to have a discussion on the charging stations. As you know, District 9 at the very end of the island, out in Kapa`au and Hawi, we don't have charging stations and a lot of people travel out to the end of the island. It's a beautiful place to visit and they get stuck and they knock on the doors of the merchants and beg, "Where can we do this?" We have one person in town who has an electric vehicle (EV) and has decided to put in a charging station because they realize the lack of. So, they end up at her doorstep and I just —made me realize that we're starting to see more and more of these electric vehicles and what are we doing? The other thing is I know the Congressional Delegation, U. S. Congress is putting out money and trying to get it out to the states to actually create more EV charging stations. Then the other thing is people are changing policies all across the U. S. in terms of planning and zoning. So, I thought this would probably be a good time for us to revisit, we haven't heard about kind of where we're at in a while. So, Riley Saito, who's our Energy, is your title Energy Officer? Please introduce yourself and your title, please. Thank you. (Note: At this time, Department of Research and Development Energy Specialist Riley Saito and Noel Morin of Big Island EV came forward and provided a PowerPoint presentation to the members of the Committee. For viewing of the subject presentation, see the DVD copy of the meeting proceedings on file in the Clerk's Office. A copy of the PowerPoint presentation is made part of the record, see Comm. 693.1) ACTING CHR, KAGIWADA: Teriffic. Thank you so much. Questions or comments? MS. EVANS: Thank you, I just want to — ACTING CHR KAGIWADA: Okay, go ahead, Ms. Evans. MS. EVANS: When is —do you have a handle on what the private sector and other people may be offering like Target and Walmart? Any sense of really how many charging stations we have on the island? Do you keep track of that? MR. SAITO: Yeah, that was that plugshare.com, that website. It's like 55 Level 2 chargers and the website also, I think, tracks comments or complaints or if they're working or not working. MS. EVANS: Yeah, things break down, right? So, this is called plugin? Page 2 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 MR, SAITO: Plugshare.com, MS. EVANS: Plugshare.com. MR, MORIN: Plugshare, yes. MS. EVANS: Okay, thank you. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay, other — MR. MORIN: I want to also just highlight the rebates that are available. So, Hawaii Energy, there's sustained funding now. There's a small portion, the barrel tax that funds this rebate program, and for a DC fast charger, that's like $35,000 for a host to be able to leverage. It's, you know, a check that they get once they install the charging station, and then for a Level 2 it's like up to $3,500. The reason I raise this is there's also this opportunity to encourage our public sector, I mean our private sector, local businesses, et cetera, to adopt a charging station, and it's a big educational opportunity. A lot of the cost between tax credits and rebates can cover the cost of a charging station and in many cases, it's actually a benefit for the business, right? You've got people plugged in, charging, and helping themselves to goods and services while their cars are being charged. So, I just wanted to highlight that. That's money on the table for our local businesses to take advantage of, and there's an educational opportunity. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you. Council Member Galimba. MS, GALIMBA: Thank you. So, I think this is making good progress, but I also kind of wonder about the private sector, which was just mentioned, and adoption of charging stations, not just at shopping centers, which I think Chair Kimball did address in her legislation a couple of years ago, as far as requiring parking lots to have a certain level of charging. But I kind of —my vision, and I could be wrong because it's just me, I'm no expert, but the obvious place to have charging would be either at home, which would require high levels of —to have a fast charging station is not, like as you said, we're not really set up for that at your home. The other place would be at work, which perhaps there is more opportunity there for people to —incentives for businesses to provide charging at places of work because there —is there any incentives for charging stations at work places that are not shopping—? MR. MORIN: Yes. The rebate program that I mentioned earlier will cover workplace charging and also multiunit dwelling facilities like condo complexes, that sort of thing. So, that's also a possibility. And importantly, with workplace charging, you don't need to have Level 2, right? If you're plugged in overnight, you know, your —I'm sorry, at a workplace, you're plugged in for a few hours. Page 3 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 That could be Level 1 charging and you can have more of these charging stations charging at Level 1 and supporting your employees. So yes, the rebate program does apply, the incentives do apply to these other -use cases. MS. GALIMBA: Which rebate program was that exactly? MR. MORIN: So, it's Hawaii Energy, MS. GALIMBA: Okay, Hawaii Energy. MR. MORIN: Yeah, Hawaii Energy. Yeah, you search on Hawaii Energy. You'll be able to find that. I can maybe put it in the chat if the chat is enabled. MS. GALIMBA: I know about Hawaii Energy. We just go and look at the website. I guess I have a very —you know, being in the middle of the charging desert, the 110 (volts) is not going to get you very far in District 6. It's 200 miles across, so you definitely-110 (volts) is not going to work too well. So, definitely would need —I mean even the Level 2 is sort of questionable, so definitely needing fast chargers, more fast chargers to really make that work for the size of our island. So yes, glad that we're getting more of them than some of the other islands, which are much smaller. Thank you. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA; Thank you. MR. MORIN: You're welcome. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA; Council Member Lee Loy. MS. LEE LOY: Thanks, Chair. Hey Noel, good to see you. Tell Benson he should have showed up too. MR. MORIN: Will do. MS. LEE LOY: I have a couple of questions, just more around how these sites were identified as far as coming soon new Level 2 stations, Aupuni, Kilauea, West Hawaii Civic Center, and Waiakea Uka. How did we land on those sites? MR. MORIN: I can comment on the Aupuni Center, Kilauea, and West Hawaii Civic and Riley, feel free to chime in. I mean these locations already have charging equipment, they're just old, obsolete, not working, right? So, those just require --they just needed to be swapped out, removed, and all the electrical infrastructures are already there so was a really easy, you know, project to address. So, that would be for the County offices, Prosecutor, Mayor's and West Hawaii Civic. And then I —actually, Riley, do you want to talk about the Uka ? Page 4 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 MR. SAITO: Yeah, I'll talk about this because Council Member Kimball, you'll love this one. This is a result of the Code that was placed in statute just last year. So, they're planning, Parks and Rec is planning the expansion of the parking lot at Waiakea Uka and the Code took into effect. So, as part of normal design engineering, installation, parking, charging, EV charging stations were included in the plans, in the budget. It was so normal of a procedure I didn't even know about it until they were about to move forward with ordering the equipment and installing it, and they said, "Are you still involved with that EV thing?" I go, "Yeah, kind of," and they said, "Well, we're getting these charging stations, but we don't know anything about them. I go, "You are?" And he said, "Yeah, and it's part of County doing business now," which is, I think, what the Code was intended to do was actually being delivered. So, it's awesome. That's how that got selected. MS. LEE LOY: Through this, either Riley or Noel, does that make the County eligible for some of this rebate and incentives and here's why. We have a number of assets that need a lot of work, and if this is another opportunity to braid more funding into, I don't know, a new gym out in Hamakua, you know, more ballfields out in Puna, but we bring in this infrastructure to incentivize that. I'm trying to work smarter, not harder, and grab as much money as we can off the table so these things can happen. Again, mahalo to Richard, Rep Onishi, who initiated a lot of the funding for Waiakea Uka gym, right? I'm just looking if we've explored that kind of modelling so that if there are future assets coming online, maybe they need to leap forward so they can take advantage of some of the funding that's available. MR. SAITO: As far as the funding available, it's usually based on the charging station itself, not necessarily tied to an adder or two or an incentive if you build a charging station, you know, you can build this, so to speak. So, we've been actually working on, from the perspective of the underserved profile of our community and taking advantage of that to go after funding because we are in such bad shape. MS. LEE LOY: Noel, did you want to add to that? MR. MORIN: Yeah, I was just going to add when you raised the question about incentives, it's unclear to me if the County initiated the project that they could submit for the rebates from the State. It's very possible, but I will say that for the projects that are being deployed, you know, by associated building partners, we do take that into account, right? So, if there's a rebate, if there's a tax incentive, that is secured on behalf of, in this case, it would be on behalf of the County. So, that would be —hopefully that addresses your question about incentives. Page 5 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 And then in general about funding, I want to make it clear that with the infrastructure as a service with Sustainability Partners (SP), there's no capital required up front or at all by the customer, right, the County or the State. We essentially provide a service, so, it is paid for by use, and in the event that the County wants to take over the assets, that's also possible. There's a 30-day, no penalty, you know, the contract is month -to -month. So, the service is available, at least for EVs, electric vehicle charging, and also the electrical infrastructure that's required to support that. So, if there are any other Parks and Rec facilities out there that needs charging, need to replace chargers, this is something that can be leveraged by the County. It's already part of the State contract. MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, I'm glad you're living in the multiverse like I am. I'm just trying to figure out, you know, what's out there that we could actually stand up more of these charging stations in areas that we're actually going to be deploying dollars to help rehabilitate. I mean we're under an ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) compliance decree at our beach parks. You know, like all these contracts to comply are being shoved out there. You know, if this would be ----I don't know, maybe Noel, you and I can go have a conversation offline to take a look at some of those assets and just explore what the options might be as far as some of the work that has to be done in repair and maintenance, and then maybe leap forward a little bit. And then I didn't see anything for the university systems, like is the State not deploying anything in their parking lots? Because I've got two in my district and their parking lots are big. MR. MORIN: Let me just comment on —the university system is part of the procurement, right? So, if they chose to leverage or reach out to get EVs and charging stations, et cetera, that's already procured. And as it relates to UH (University of Hawai`i), we're currently working with Manoa so maybe that's a starting point. But as far as the requirement to get more charging stations installed based on the size of the parking lot, maybe I'll defer to Chair Kimball. forgot the specifics around whether or not State facilities are included or excluded. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Council Member Lee Loy, do you want to let Council Member Kimball jump in or you have more questions? MS. LEE LOY: I do have a couple more questions. MS. KIMBALL: Yeah, I can wait, I have answers to your previous question, this question, and maybe other ones. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Why don't you finish up, Council Member Lee Loy. Page 6 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 MS. LEE LOY: Great. And then I just again, I'm just trying to think ahead of the curve where we're investing dollars and I think about, you know, new construction sites, right, where they're bringing in a housing option, they might be delayed with, I don't know, their timing requirements. But this might be an opportunity for them to say, "Hey, well we're going to leap forward in providing these services and that would be an incentive for us to continue that time extension." I don't know, just thinking out loud. Then finally, Riley, what is the lifespan, or Noel, the lifespan of these things as far as when do we have to—? Because here's the thing, Pm a big advocate, right now as we build new facilites, we should have a repair and maintenance chart that goes with it. So for example, Waiakea Uka Gym, it's coming online, beautiful facility, but I would love to see a metrics as to okay, here's some money to fix the roof; here's some money to fix the toilets; painting is five years; and it's all built in because over time, that's the areas that we've fallen behind to take care of our County assets. And I would love to see something like that along with these EV chargers where we're planning for the repair and maintenance of them. MR. SAITO: Well, with the Sustainability Partners arrangement, it includes operations and maintenance for the -and in general, it's the asset of an EV charging station is about --is expected to be about 10 years. And amazing, we've experienced the lifecycle in Hilo with Aupuni and County buildings that the warranty was for like five years and in year seven they just started dying. I mean like the screens, I don't think they're built for outdoors but they were, you know, first generation and the County was very forward -leaning in installing them in 2012. And that's where the various sites we have now, they're EV infrastructure ready, and that's why we're going with replacing the existing systems and adding new where it's very minimal cost because it has already been wired for that. But it does include the operation and maintenance and probably 10 to 15 years from now what you'd be asking for is hydrogen refueling stations versus EV charging stations. MS. LEE LOY: Okay. MR. MORIN: I'd like to just add to that. So, for the charging stations that are being installed by Sustainability Partners and under this arrangement, the company doesn't get compensated unless the equipment is operational. So, they're going to be maintained, right? If there's a component that's broken, they'll be replaced; if the machine needs to be swapped out, it'll be swapped out because at the end of the day, it's about the equipment being available for use. So, I just wanted to just raise that with at least the ones that we're working on, that that's part of it. And Council Member Lee Loy, I also want to just applaud the comment you made about just building in maintenance, you know, into the design up front Page 7 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 about anything, just about anything, right, including the building and all that. Because that's generally what results in a failure in the infrasture, is just not having that funding built in upfront so that, you know, you have the funds required to replace and repair items and have them last as long as they can. MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, and if not, in future budgets, that repair and maintenance fund actually does address repair and maintenance, but it's based on the asset and the condition of the asset, which goes back to our asset management. I know my time is up, but I'm going to leave you guys with one thing because I'm a big fan, Noel. I would love to see like an induction parking lot where it isn't a charging station. MR. MORIN: Yeah. MS. LEE LOY: People drive their cars on it and it's charging. I want Hawaii County to be the first. So, I'll leave it there. MR. MORIN: Yeah, I think that may very well happen with the bus, future bus charging. But yeah, great stuff, thank you. And I will reach out to you separately to, you know, respond to your request earlier. MS. LEE LOY: Great. Thanks, Noel. MR. MORIN: Mahalo. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Kimball. MS. KIMBALL: Thank you. I'm just so excited over here just waiting to speak. Sue, you set me up perfectly. There is something that I learned about in DC (District of Columbia) that I'm just really stoked about, which is as private homeowners we've been able to put like solar on our homes and get a tax break for doing that, but we're the government, we don't pay taxes. So actually, one of the biggest pots of money is part of the IRA (Inflation Reduction Act), went to the Treasury so that municipalities like ours can get a direct pay. So, things like putting in chargers, buying electric vehicles, buying electric buses, putting solars on their buildings, doing energy efficiency, all of these things, we can now go to the Treasury and get a rebate for. What's really nice about this program is the rebates that you get are higher if you put these installations in lower, moderate income families or environmental justice communities like those in your district, Sue. So, I see some really great opportunities to bring in some of those funds. They're still working on the final Page 8 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 rules of it, but I had no idea that such a big pot of IRA went to that program, but it worked so well in the private sector. It's nice to see that opportunity. Some of these things that are grant funded are eligible, which is even better. Like you get the money for free and then you get a rebate on the money that you got for free. The only thing that is not eligible is tax-free bonds, so something for us to think about in terms of how we pay for things. As far as UH Hilo, they're actually exempt because of the HRS {Hawai`i Revised Statutes} which says that a business or an entity can combine across the counties. So, if they've satisfied their electric vehicle charging in Honolulu, they don't have to satisfy it here, but that is being fixed. There's a bill this legislative session addressing that. I haven't checked on that recently, Noel, I think it's still moving last I recall. The last point I wanted to make is this arrangement with Sustainability Partners for installation and maintenance around EV charging and purchasing electric vehicles. Sustainability Partners is involved in a lot of these things, so just want to put a bug in everybody's ear that this is not the only, sort of infrastructure project we could have a relationship with this entity or a similar entity. Typically, these big infrastructure projects have been done through bond funding and there's a lot of good reasons for that. But this sustainability model, Sustainability Partners model is a different approach, and with all of the different resources out there right now, I think it's something we want to make —we may want to leverage more for other types of infrastructure projects. So, just wanted to make that statement. Thank you, Chair, for the flexibility. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Of course. MS. KIMBALL: I was very patient. Couldn't wait to talk about those tax rebates. I'm really excited about what they're going to mean for us. ACTING CHR KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member. Anyone who hasn't had the chance to speak yet, want to chime in here? If not, back to Council Member Lee Loy. MS. LEE LOY: Well, just to have that conversation, absolutely I do, but I kind of want to plant the seed out there so that more people are thinking along those lines, and I don't always have to come up with the solve. I'd rather other people go look for the solve, but you're right, really excited. Noel, looking forward to that conversation after this meeting, maybe a little later this week or next week for sure. Thanks. MR. MORIN: Yes, will do. Thank you. Page 9 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thanks, Council Member. Thank you, Mr. Morin and Mr. Saito, really appreciate this sharing of this great information. Question I have, if a bunch of small businesses, so not a Target or a Walmart, who might be able to swing some outlays to do this, but maybe like downtown Hilo, downtown Kailua-Kona, or some of the other groupings of small business we have in Pahoa and other places wanted to attract or wanted to have some EV chargers, is that something they could approach Sustainability Partners about? Or what would you suggest as a way that a group of small businesses who maybe don't want to do or don't own necessarily one parking lot individually? How could they encourage this placement of EV chargers near their businesses? MR. MORIN: Yeah, so I'll answer in two different ways. So, if they wanted to —well, number one, they need to explore the cost to do something, you know, to install a Level 2 charging station. In some cases, it may not be that much because maybe the access to energy is very doable. In a situation like that, between the tax credits and also the Hawaii energy rebate, most of the cost could be covered, right? So, there's a need for public education and inquiry where these companies can reach out and get a sense for what it could cost to do it net. As far as the question about Sustainability Partners (SP), we work with municipalities, with hospitals, universities, so they wouldn't qualify as a customer that we would work with. However, if there are facilities nearby, right, and, you know, down in Pahoa for example, there may be County facilities nearby. I know that there's the ---Parks and Rec for example, but other facilities as well. Installing charging equipment there approximal to where the economic activity is, might be a solution that could be applied, right, where SP could be applied. So unfortunately, no, it's for municipalities, for durable entities. But some of these customers may be able to leverage these generous benefits and be able to get them installed, they just need to reach out and ask. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay. Thank you very much, Noel. Mr. Saito, any —did you look at all or in the future, could you possibly look at say downtown Hilo, the Armory parking, or one of the parking lots that are both used for County buildings and used for businesses downtown? MR. SAITO: We are —what's in the works right now, across the counties, is a proposal or consideration to install charging capabilities on utility poles. So, I think part of the analysis needed is what utility poles are actually carrying the 240 (volt) energy for Level 2 or 120 (volt), you know, what is the capacity of what that pole is carrying to bring electricity down the pole and put charging stations. Then, you've got to look at the street, the parking space, onstreet parking, onstreet charging. But then, it is interesting that, you know, it is powers available coming down that pole, which is much easier infrastructure than trenching across a parking lot, right? So, that's under discussion right now. Page 10 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 As far as when you're saying like downtown Hilo or where there's more frequent utility poles, that's one area. So, you're not tying it to parking lots, but you're tying it to access corridors, which are frequently travelled. So, there might be something there, and I think it's a grant. The conversation happened a couple of weeks ago that I saw the potential, and to me, I wanted to get a geospacial map on all the location of all the poles with the capacity. Then we look at the traffic pattern. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay. MR. SAITO: You know, just distill it down that way. But there is a potential. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: And maybe meet with your economic development people in R&D (Research and Development) to think about some of these economic centers that could be supported by doing — MR. SAITO: Interesting. You know, the Target model because I was actually with Sun Power when Target decided to put in PV (Photovoltaic) system on their Kona store tied to the electronic charging stations, electric charging. They tied it into one bundle with the intent of drawing customers to Target, but having it charged by photovoltaic panels. ACTING CHR, KAGIWADA: Yeah. MR. SAITO: That was a corporate thought and process. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Yeah, I would like to see us maybe help our smaller businesses too, if we could. MR. SAITO: Right. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Yeah, okay. And then actually, you bring that up. I was just wondering, I know there was that solar -charged charging station at the Community College that was put in. What ever happened to that? Is that still running? Has it been successful? What are the issues? MR. SAITO: Yeah, I tried to look for the owner that dropped it off and I haven't been able to find the person again. You know, it's a start of —you have it? ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: We can find them, yeah. MR. SAITO: And then, because after couple of attempts of grants and things like that with Mauna Kea and looking at the solar radiance of that location is one of the best in the islands because most of the clouds are below the elevation. So, having that available, because like Council Member Evans mentioned, a lot times Page I I CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 in the outlying areas in Ka`u or wherever, it's desperation because you got there running on power. So, you take any opportunity to get a boost so you can get back to EV civilization, whatever. So, that is something that actually I typed in is to look at doing an analysis of highly desired locations for portable charging like that, where you can just drop and go because it's about $65,000 each, I think. Our CFI (Charging and Fueling Infrastructure) grant average cost is about 100,000 (dollars). ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay. Noel, do you have any other information about that particular charging station, if it has been successful? MR. MORIN: It is still working. I mean I see cars plugged in as I drive by there. I think it was supposed to be like a proof of concept. It's an older machine. I put in the chat a link to the company that actually sells these and their newer machines that have better output. And I think that the gentleman was just —who installed it wanted to also circulate it, like move to other parts of the island so they could demonstrate it to other communities that you can have this standalone system. Importantly, these are very portable, they're portable, they can be put on the back of a flatbed, assembled in a couple of hours. In the event of a catastrophic emergency, they can be transported to other locations and they could be used to power, not just cars, but systems, right? So, they could provide emergency power if needed. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay, great. Well, thank you for that update and thank you both for this presentation. I don't see any other lights on, so I think we'll wrap up here and yeah, look forward to moving forward with this. Thank you. MR. MORIN: Thank you. Thank you for this opportunity and honor. Thanks again. Aloha. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Great. Yeah. Alright, we have a motion to close file on Communication 693, all those in favor? Page I2 CRCOC-22 Vote on Comm. 693: Filed The motion to close file on Comm. 693 was carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Galimba, Inaba, Kierkiewicz, Kimball, Lee Loy and Acting Chair Kagiwada — 6. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Evans, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, and Villegas — 3. Excused: None. ACTING CHR, KAGIWADA: Alright, thank you. February 20, 2024 Comm. 718: REQUESTS A PRESENTATION BY DENNIS FLEMMING, FOUNDER AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF HAMAKUA INSTITUTE, REGARDING POTENTIAL ECONOMIC ADVANCES FOR HAWAI`I ISLAND From Council Member Heather L. Kimball, dated January 30, 2024. Motion to Close File: Ms. Kimball moved to close file on Comm. 718. Seconded by Ms. Lee Loy, ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Ms. Kimball. MS. KIMBALL: Yeah, thank you. Just wanted to give the opportunity to Mr. Flemming, not related to my husband. There's two m's in his last name, one m in my husband's last name. But Dennis runs the Hamakua Institute, which is in my district, and I'll let him go into the details, but he has a presentation to us today around economic opportunities in the County. The reason why I thought this was so important is we often have the conversation on the dais about how we don't want to have all of our eggs in the tourism basket and how vulnerable it makes us to just be so reliant on that one industry and the need to support greater diversification of our economy. So, this analysis, I think, helps provide sort of a framework for us to be thinking about areas we might consider incentivizing or supporting in terms of growth areas that would allow us to have a more diverse workforce, more diverse economy, and as a result, have a more sustainable economic environment for our islands. But, I will pass it over to the Hamakua Institute Director, Mr. Dennis Flemming. Thank you, Dennis, for being here, and thank you, for your patience. Page 13 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 (Note: At this time, Executive Director of Hamakua Institute Dennis Flemming came forward and provided a PowerPoint presentation to the members of the Committee. For viewing of the subject presentation, see the DVD copy of the meeting proceedings on file in the Clerk's Office. A copy of the PowerPoint presentation is made part of the record, see Comm. 718.) MS. KIMBALL: Thank you so much, Dennis, for being here and for the presentation. I think for my colleagues, this last slide here is probably the most pertinent in terms of opportunities for us to think about supporting these different sectors and growth of these sectors in different ways. So, with that, Chair, I yield and open it up to my colleagues if they have any questions for Mr. Flemming. Thank you. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member Kimball. Everybody's studying their pages very much. Anybody have comments or questions for Mr. Flemming? Council Member Inaba. MR. INABA: Yes, thank you so much for being here today and being here at this late hour. In terms of the duplication of efforts across these different fields, what were some of the recommendations that you folks had? Because in some cases, it's opportunity for collaboration and in others it's more a competition between service providers. So, is there any kind of overarching recommendations you provided for that duplication? MR. FLEMMING: Well, in terms of removing the silos and kind of working towards common strategies, a lot of it started with the early dialogue of establising the Hawaii Island agriculture partnership. We try to use data to really stimulate some dialogue around where people see that data is leading their own industry or their own business. So, a lot of the analysis and the findings that have come out of that dialogue, which in the case of the agriculture has been going on for a few years now, have really focused heavily around, kind of the needs for shared processing infrastructure. It has been —constantly comes up as a key issue. A lot of concerns around kind of the need to either streamline or to update permitting and regulation requirements in some of the sectors. Housing is an issue, ag housing and housing in general. I mean we've documented a lot of this, and one of the challenges in having a partnership that kind of is meant to encompass all agricultural segments and when we kind of add in food into that cluster, the whole distribution in wholesaling and retailing side, there's a lot of varied interest. So, what we try to do is build upon, kind of the work of the groups that are targetting specific industries and producer groups and kind of leverage their activities, help to kind of connect them to larger resources. Page 14 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 So, lot of the efforts have been involved, kind of seeing where there is a shared interest and a need, and then kind of putting together project teams that can work together on either a new project proposal, or in some cases, people have existing grants and programs and there's kind of existing resources that can be put together in a way that gives them more synergies in the work that we're doing. But it's a collective action kind of an effort and I know that a lot of you are involved in those and you know how, like they say, it's kind of hurting cats at times. It's hard to get people kind of going in the same direction when you're not all under one big grant. If we had received that EDA (Economic Development Administration) grant we might have had a much more kind of a cohesive strategy. But we also would have lost some of those organizations that either didn't qualify for EDA funding or weren't kind of a part of that coalition. So, there are advantages to doing things in more of a piecemeal basis, but there is no getting around the fact that it takes a lot longer and a lot more coordination. MR. INABA: Thank you. Council Chair Kimball, being that this is from an organization based in your district, to what extent is this being used or integrated in with the Department of R&D's initiatives in-house at the County? If you could share at all. MS, KIMBALL: Yeah, and you can certainly add to this, Dennis, but it is my understanding that this particular analysis was Hamakua Institute was contracted by R&D to produce this as well as there were previous assessments that Hamakua Institute did including, specifically, for the ag sector and an analysis of the Hamakua area as well as an island wide agricultural assessment, I think Michelle (Galimba), you may have participated in that. But it's what we're gradually stepping forward, I think, in some of this from that build back better challenge and trying to incorporate —process steps that were identified through that grant application and engaging in those even though the grant didn't successfully —we didn't successfully get that grant. I hope that answers your question. Did I get that right, Dennis? MR, FLEMMING: Yes. MS. KIMBALL: Yes. Thanks. MR. INABA: Alright, great. Well, thank you again and yeah, would be interesting to see, especially with discussions we had this morning around education and the future of that sector, you know, what kind of development we can really start to bolster up that early pre-K (Kindergarten) education here on this island because there's just a shortage of workers there. I still work in the field. So, it's a need and this kind of information and this presentation to the body is Page 15 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 super informative. So, I appreciate you, and thank you, Chair Kimball, for getting him out here today. Thank you. ACTING CHR. LEE LOY: Thank you, Council Member, Council Member Lee Loy. MS. LEE LOY: I just have two questions, and I`m—one, thank you, love the bubbles. I get it. We really focused in on the opportunities that we have for ag and the ag industry and you've highlighted a number of spaces where we can look forward to new challenges. Do you have any information as to the amount of our State budget that is committed to ag? MR. FLEMMING: I don't have that with me now. I know it mostly by the complaints that we hear from our members quite a lot, but yeah, it's like one percent, I think. It's a pretty small — MS. LEE LOY: I actually think it's .003 and so, for me when I see this and I see these areas of opportunity, but when our own state is not investing in this area, it's a really big uphill climb. Could you get that? I'm just coming from a space we can only control what we can control, right? And if this is an area where we can lean on our legislators to say if we're going to get serious about economic opportunities within our ag industry, we need to be committing a lot more resources in that area if we really want to see these bubbles grow. Does that make sense? MR. FLEMMING: Yes, very much so. And so many of the stakeholders we work with are really committed to that. We are actually planning to give this presentation to the Big Island Caucus for the State legislators and during the forum that we had in Waimea last year, we had commitments from Senator Tim Richards and Representative Kalahoa about pushing for more resources in the State budget. Certainly since we have such a big focus on ag and food, we feel that this clustering to show it and all this data that we actually have for the whole state. One of the things that I was encouraged by was the Deputy Director of Department of Ag, Dexter Kishida, was at the forum. When looking at that bubble chart for ag and food, he immediately picked up on the fact that many of these sectors of our ag economy that have very high concentrations of producers on this island, you know, we should see a higher concentration of the services and support functions from the State on this island as well. He picked up on it right away, and I think some of the aquaculture data that I've seen prepared for new legislation on aquaculture made the same point. They had mapped out all of the stakeholders in the sector and like all of the producers were on this island, but almost all of the regulatory and support functions were on Oahu. So, these Page 16 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 concentrations, I think, can be very helpful in making the points of where infrastructure should be invested in with State funding as well as County funding. MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, if you're going to make this presentation to our Big Island delegates, I would highly suggest you get that this is our total State budget, and this is what we're committing to the Department of Ag, and then use this bubble chart to your point, right? How do we move the right services over here so that we can actually realize that economic growth rather than it being Honolulu centric? It's actually —we're having the people and the things in the area where it can happen. I was also wondering, just out of curiosity if there was a way for you to take some of these bubbles, and overlay the —I'm trying to put it in a nice way, like how much do people get paid? Because when I look at something like the tech industry, it might appear to be a small bubble, but we know that they make larger salaries. And I was just wondering if there was a way to say, "Yes, it's a small bubble, but those jobs are highly paid." And then the opportunities in our ag industry, big bubbles, and how do we compensate so that again, the economic opportunities not only happen for the industry but the people working in this industry? Then how do we focus legislation in that area so we actually get kind of two bites out of the apple, right? We're growing the industry and the economy, but the people working in that industry will then see higher paying jobs, which then leads to all the other pieces of housing, housing opportunities, and it's that multiplier factor. Do you have any information on that? MR. FLEMMING: We don't have data in terms of this data set that we've been working with in terms of average, say salary levels for the jobs that we have. But we started talking to the folks that are working on the Good Jobs Hawaii program who have a lot of data but they have different data than we do. So, we have been talking to them about how we can cross-reference this data, and I think that's where we have a lot of opportunities out of the investment in this data that the County has already made, is because, I mean we're just starting to work with it. We have quite a lot of very granular data on individual businesses and it's lacking some data points that if we cross-reference with others, it would give us a much more in-depth understanding of this. So, the Good Jobs Hawaii folks have been working more off of surveys and things that get into individual skill levels and salary levels, and when we cross-reference that with this data, it will give us a lot more. So, we expect to keep kind of working this data. There's a whole set of analysis around establishments and where they are, which we have them even by GPS (Global Positioning System) coordinates so we can map all of the data as well. So, we expect to keep working with it and keep building upon it together with all of the partners that we're working with. Page 17 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 MS. LEE LOY: Then my final question, I was really curious around that pharmacy piece that just kind of hung out there. Any thoughts as to why because we made great investments for our College of Pharmacy here, and I just wanted to understand how that ended up kind of off the chart compared to everything else. MR. FLEMMING: You know, I haven't had a chance to dig into the details. We had hoped during the summit that we'd looked at this data that some of the folks from the health sector would give us some insights. But, you know, when we get more granular with this data, that's when we tend to find the mistakes and correct it a lot more, like when we first looked at this data, we had —it was showing laboratories and imaging centers as just being off the charts. It was like this huge portion that we didn't think was there, and then we realized later that like the Hilo Medical Center had put all of their staff under that category. So, once we were able to kind of see where there might be some anomalies in the data, we could correct them, but it's kind of an ongoing thing. The thing that has been really useful for us is any updates of data that we get the corrections are still hold, So, we expect to kind of keep building upon this data set working with UH and others to kind of add to it with more other pieces of data that will give us new insights, MS. LEE LOY: Yeah, and that's another one. It was kind of out there but we know that's like good paying jobs, right? So, that second bubble would have made a great conversation, I think. It might be kind of an anomaly out there, but it's still a high -paying job. Thank you. Thank you for the information, really appreciate you being here this afternoon. MR. FLEMMING: Thank you. MS. LEE LOY: I yield. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Galimba. MS. GALIMBA: Thank you. Thanks for coming and doing this presentation and for making agriculture and food look so good. I see what you're doing there. I think that it's valid in some sense, but it also, I think you can also, as you were saying, analyze it even further because I think there's, you know, some of the bigger bubbles are like restaurants and food retailers and that's —a lot of them are imported foods, so is it really part of our food chain that we're trying to build that agriculture part? Maybe not, but there's also parts of it that are, I mean, locally grown, sourced food is very hot right now. So, there are a lot of restaurants that feature that and there's a lot of them that are, you know, they're not just saying that they're doing it. I mean, sourcing a good percentage of their food locally and Page 18 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 coming up with new kinds of ways of cooking and presenting and making farmers look good. So, I think for me, the thing that we really need that crosses all of these sectors is like a culture of entrepreneurialism because we are —I think we just have a lot more opportunities around that because we are a hospitality, tourism place. So, folks now are looking for very specific kinds of experiences when they go on a trip. So, I think there's a lot more opportunity around that. There's also, I don't like social media very much, but like Instagram and Facebook, the Marketplaces offer a place for entrepreneurial activity for young folks to create a clothing brand, and you see that crossing Iike, you know, farmers and ranchers have a certain amount of growing cache. So, there's actually a lot of young folks that are creating brands of clothing that are sort of making it fashionable. There's like one of the early ones was Mauka Man but there's just so many now that —so there's definitely a lot of cross -cluster opportunities there, and as you've mentioned also, high tech agriculture; very specific example of that is Hawaii Farms up in Waimea. You know, they've just gone and then — greenhouse cucumbers and tomatoes and now they're going to do lettuce, and they're just extremely successful. You just see they're hiring lots of people and that is a very specific kind of story of having the access to capital, which is pretty rare in Hawaii, to have the farming talent and the access to capital and the financial knowledge to put all of that together into an entrepreneurial company that has just been growing like crazy. So, I mean we do have some success stories in Hawaii for sure, around agriculture and we have a lot more that we could do. I guess it hasn't worked so well to have big companies come in and try and replicate what they do on the mainland here in agriculture space. There's been, you know, I mean Villarose might be successful, I'm not sure. We'll see, but there has been a lot of stories of it not happening, things not turning out the way that they thought they would. A very good example is over there in Hamakua Coast in `O`okala at that dairy, yes. Yeah, so again,entrepreneuri al ism, if we can figure out a way to somehow get our young folks, like get that fire into them, I think we could just have a really amazing agriculture economy and general economy here. One more note, when you do the analysis of what percentage of the State budget goes to agriculture, I think what goes to the Department of Agriculture is tiny in their yearly budget, but I think should also, perhaps, look at the monies that were invested into ADC (Agribusiness Development Corporation) to buy land and sort of look at that. I mean, can't say that it has been 100 percent successful, but it has been a lot of money. Yeah, so there are some opportunities there as well, and not so many on this island, but on Oahu and Kauai. So, not relevant to us, but perhaps one day they could invest that kind of money here. Thanks. Thanks again for coming and showing us this analysis that you've done, very interesting. Page 19 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member Galimba. Council Member Kierkiewicz. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Thank you, Chair. Hi Dennis, just a few questions. Thanks for the presentation. So, the focus of the Hawaii Island cluster of opportunity is on food and agriculture because that is like the wheelhouse of the Hamakua Institute? MR. FLEMMING: Well, the wheelhouse of our work is really kind of economic development overall and what we call market systems development. We have a very systems -oriented approach at looking across the board at what are the systemic constraints that are kind of holding back growth. So, our focus has been on the Hawaii Island agriculture partnership, and when this Hawaii Island clusters of opportunity project came about, it really started off with some efforts from some folks that had done the same project on Oahu. It's called the North Shore Economic Vitality partnership, and it followed the same kind of approach. So, they approached us and said they wanted to do this and so, when we talked to County R&D, we had a focus because of the BBBRC (Build Back Better Regional Challenge) application on ag and food. So, we knew that we wanted to use this data well beyond just this exercise for the rest of —clustering the rest of the economy. So, there's a heavy emphasis on ag, but we have these other three clusters and we have a team of people that are working with business leaders in forming action teams to start doing more collaborations. So, it's not limited to ag and food but because of our work with the ag partnership, that's kind of our highest priority. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Okay, that's very helpful. I was having a conversation with Dane Wicker, he's our Deputy Director for DBEDT (Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism) and we were talking about workforce development opportunities. So, there's this, you know, on the State list of priorities, yes, to strengthening these economic anchors, if you may, like agriculture but also working to invest in and cultivate emerging sectors like the creative industries and technology. You mentioned business leaders, and I'm on your website and it talks about this initiative, "building a coalition of people and organizations supporting a group of visionary business leaders...." Who are the visionary business leaders and what portion of their time is spent residing on Hawaii Island? MR. FLEMMING: We started reaching out to, you know, mostly the biggest employers. So, a number of the business leaders that we had first invited to some initial meetings before we actually got the data was focused on, you know, Parker Ranch. We had invited Dutch Kuyper to it, Chad Buck in relation to —I know he's based on Oahu but they have such a big operation here. And then people Page 20 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 from Keck Observatory on the knowledge and technology. We had people from aquaculture, Tim Wyban. We had a couple of people from the North Kohala Resorts Association, I forgot the full name of the group, but the main association of the largest resorts. Yeah, people that various members of the team that knew — Toby Taniguchi from KTA had joined. So, the focus was primarily on the largest employers and the largest companies, but in some cases, we had kind of smaller companies where they've expressed an interest in the collaboration. MS. KIERKIEWICZ: Okay, that's very helpful. For framing the work of like cluster opportunities, I'm curious if there has been any thought given to how you might engage the youth of our community? I understand like the point of this particular study is to figure out what are the needs of industry today? There's a clear need to fill jobs that have been vacant for years, and so, building that workforce now, but how are we making sure we have an eye to the future and really acknowleging the sort of jobs that will keep our youth here? So, I want to point your attention to a recent workforce development workbase learning opportunity report that Vibrant Hawaii recently published. You might be on their email list, but it's called "Bridging Gaps, Building Futures-Workbased Learning Opportunities on Hawai `i Island." I have to acknowledge this because there's this idea of what we think youth want and then there's what youth wants, and it's very illuminating. I urge you to check it out. Just one of the statistics here of the educators, community members surveyed, 51 percent of them think that our kids want jobs in ag and food systems. The reality is 23.3 percent see them working in that industry. The most popular sectors were creative arts, health and wellness, and technology and engineering, and the creative and health and wellness industries may not necessarily be something that was high -ranked by educators and folks in our community. So, I want to acknowledge that resource and bring it to your attention. I think it's worth having a conversation with Vibrant Hawaii and, you know, really diving into this particular report. More than a thousand folks around the island were engaged in this one-year endeavor to compile this information. So, if we're looking at creating these opportunities, let's make sure that they're people that actually want them, that's all. Thank you so much for your work, I appreciate it. ACTING CHR, KAGIWADA: Thank you, Council Member. Alright, anybody else? Alright, thank you so much, just a couple quick things. I'm very much a visual person, and so, I really appreciate these dots, but I'm just wondering on the last one, the Hawaii Island Competitive Advantage Job Growth one, which follows this one. I'm just looking at the size of the dots versus the numbers you have here, and they don't seem to equate. So, the size of the dots, like for instance, Research and Development has 368 over here and Food Retailers have 302, but Food Retailers is much larger. So, I'm just wondering, is there some — Page 21 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 am I not getting it? I'm trying to understand what the —what I'm looking at as far as this chart goes. MR. FLEMMING: I don't have my glasses here. So, it was the —which one were you saying — ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: So, if you look at Research and Development over here on this circle, it says 368, right? MR. FLEMMING: Yes. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: And then if you look at Food Retailers on the circle, it says 302. MR. FLEMMING: Oh, okay. Sorry. ACTING CHR KAGIWADA: But see the size of the different dots? So, I'm very confused. So, it's not the — MR, FLEMMING: Yeah, sorry, it's not —it should be better notated. This kind of circular graph is the number of jobs added over the last 10 years. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay. MR. FLEMMING: Whereas, the bubbles that you see on the following page is the total number of jobs. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay, so those two numbers are not at all--? MR. FLEMMING: Yeah. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay. MR. FLEMMING: So, like the Food Retailers, for example, are already a large number of employees, but they only added 322 jabs over 10 years. So, that's the difference between the two graphs. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay, thank you so much. And then my other question is how were nonprofits included in this, if they were at all? Or is that something that wasn't —I would think, especially for these health care, arts, crafts, you know, those kinds of things. MR. FLEMMING: They're not included in the bubbles here. The, you know, generally, in terms of economic data, the government agencies and nonprofits or community services are combined. Actually, community services is initially Page 22 CRCOC-22 February 20, 2024 combined with health care, and I pulled that out. It is a very large sector, and I don't have the numbers in front of me, but one of the things that we were looking at for this analysis is what sectors are kind of driving economic growth. So, we don't typically look at government and nonprofits as those economic drivers unless, you know, thats kind of new investment coming in. One of the things that we've seen as we've looked at the non -growth sectors that aren't hightlighted in these graphs is that there's a lot of sectors that are kind of growing with our population that you would expect that kind of level of growth but then, there are others that are kind of dependent on other sectors. For example, construction is heavily dependent upon a lot of other factors as to how much that's growing. So, we were focusing more on those sectors that we would see as kind of the drivers of growth as opposed to those that might be benefitting from growth in other sectors. Government and nonprofits is a big sector and it is one of the biggest, depending on how you cluster them, and it is an important one. It is one that we've been kind of looking at other analysis for in terms of understanding how that supports the rest of the growth. And that's a big part of the dots that we're trying to connect in this process, because even though we may be engaging business leaders in some of this dialogue about where the growth strategies are, we are also trying to engage different government agencies and nonprofits that are working in these sectors as to how that kind of public/private collaboration can produce more results than things that are done separately or individually. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Okay, great. That gives me a bigger picture because when I think of —for instance, what Council Member Kierkiewicz was talking about, a lot of young people that I talk to, you know, a lot of their thoughts and ideas are going into either like kind of entrepreneurial stuff or more nonprofit work, which I find interesting. So yeah, I don't know how you would capture all that in this or if you need to or not, but — MR. FLEMMING: Well, we are trying and I saw the announcement of that report. I haven't had a chance to read through it yet, but this is where this cross referencing is really helpful because I know that Vibrant Hawaii has the economic stream. There's a lot of really good feedback and information on, you know, growth segments that we haven't really tapped into. What we're really hoping is to try to get kind of parallel efforts where you can see kind of what are the biggest businesses trying to do in terms of growth, and where are the smaller businesses in that equation, and is there some synergies that can be done where we can kind of connect the smaller end of the mark with the bigger? ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Well, thank you very much, Mr. Flemming. This was all very interesting, we appreciate it. I think with that, we're all done here. So, we have a motion to close file on Communication 718, all those in favor? Page 23 CRCOC-22 Vote on Comm. 718: Filed ADJOURN- MENT: February 20, 2024 The motion to close file on Comm. 718 was carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Galimba, Inaba, Kierkiewicz, Kimball, Lee Loy and Acting Chair Kagiwada — 6. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Evans, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, and Villegas -- 3. Excused: None. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: Motion to adjourn? There being no further business, at 4:54 p.m., Ms. Galimba moved to adjourn the meeting. Seconded by Mr. Inaba and carried by the following voice vote: Ayes: Committee Members Galimba, Inaba, Kierkiewicz, Kimball, Lee Loy and Acting Chair Kagiwada — 6. Noes: None. Absent: Committee Members Evans, Kaneali`i-Kleinfelder, and Villegas — 3. Excused: None. ACTING CHR. KAGIWADA: With that, we are adjourned. Thank you. Approved: Ms. Re ecca Villegas, Chair Communications, Reports, and Council Oversight Committee RVljm 14. 20 �4 (Date) Page 24