HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0110.008 2024-2026Aloha PCPLUED Committee Members,
Thank you for your attention to the proposed telecommunications ordinance. I hold a PhD in
Communication, and am the Founding Director of Safe Tech Hawaii, a grassroots, all -volunteer
coalition, educating and advocating for safe technology across the islands.
I have over 20 years of experience in consumer wireless education. I'm writing on behalf of Safe
Tech Hawaii in opposition of Bill 24.
We oppose Bill 24 for six reasons:
1) It exempts many zoning districts from any permit requirements at all
2) It is far too favorable to the telecommunications industry
3) It was written by a non -elected official
4) It was not made available to the public in a timely manner
5) It gives the Planning Director far too much power >>
6) It excludes small wireless facilities (aka small cells) from any regulation
By exempting multiple zoning districts from any permit requirements, Bill 24 proposes
complicated regulations for wireless deployments. Anyone who lives nearby an exempted
district will be impacted by tower and antenna deployments. Their view -planes will be
disturbed, their property values plummet as the research shows, their neighborhood character
downgraded, and so forth. In contrast, Bill 194, provides uniform regulations that will be easy
to implement. Further, by exempting so many zoning districts, Bill 24 is too favorable to
telecommunications corporations giving them free reign.
By excluding small wireless facilities Bill 24 also gives telecommunications corporations free
reign. At the recent PCLUED meeting, on February 4, information was shared by Planning that
was incorrect. Namely, a Council member asked about including small cells in the ordinance and
HRS 206N-4 was cited as the reason why small cells could not be regulated. This is incorrect
according to HRS 206N-1: Applicability.
The state law that prohibits small cell regulation only applies to mounting small cells on publicly
owned poles. Since most utility poles in Hawaii County are owned by Hawaiian Electric Ind., a
private company, state law doesn't apply to them. This is very important to understand. Please
see my testimony in favor of Bill 194 for details about this, including the relevant section from
HRS 206N-1.
Bill 24 was not available to the public until your previous PCLUED meeting less than two weeks
ago. To this day we can't find a copy of it anywhere online.
We also noticed that, at the most recent PCLUED meeting, the slide presentation by Planning
was extremely biased. Bill 24 was given preferential treatment with multiple slides and details
highlighted, while Bill 194 had very few slides with mostly critical comments included. The
optics of this is of grave concern.
The process of duel ordinances has been extremely difficult for the community. It's confusing to
have competing ordinances on the same issue. The actions of the Planning Department caused
delays behind the scenes, and then with two ordinances ping-ponging back and forth between
the two planning commissions for months on end, sometimes resulting in the item not even
being heard - as happened here in your January 21 meeting - how could the average person,
with family and work obligations, track all of this or even begin to understand it?
As far as we can tell, Bill 24 was written by former planning Director Zendo Kern who was
appointed by the previous administration. It is the duty of publicly elected council members to
author legislation. With Bill 194 already introduced by a duly elected council member - only to
have a non -elected official submit a competing ordinance later on - is unprecedented.
The former Director went on to give Bill 194 an unfavorable recommendation while favorably
recommending his own. The former Director's ordinance goes far beyond simply updating the
code to bring it into compliance with state law, a law that's actually been on the books for
years. It's hard to interpret the former Director's actions as anything other than an attempt to
usurp the Council's legislative power. We hope you won't let him succeed with that.
Please note that under the "Pubic Comments" section of the former Director's proposed
ordinance, now Bill 24, he listed nothing but telecommunications corporations and
telecommunications advocacy groups. There was no actual input from the community - only
from telecom. And there are several instances in which the CTIA, in their oppositional
comments to Bill 194, included language that seems directly lifted from the former Director's
comments. This is very telling.
Please see my testimony in support of Bill 194 in which I critique the former Director's concerns
about Bill 194 as well as those of the CTIA and show how the vast majority of concerns raised
are without merit.
Thank you for your kind and thoughtful consideration of our comments. Please feel free to
reach out with any questions.
Sincerely,
F-.
Debra Greene, PhD
Founding Director
Safe Tech Hawaii
808-874-6441
debra@SafeTechHawaii.com