HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0227.006 1996-1998 pp~ l-'-~~
Charles H~n`son
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Mtn. iew, HI 9677..1 ~c,
CONY OF HAWAII
9 April 1~
County Council
Committee on Planning
Bill 276 -Subdivision Code Revision
My primary interest is in this billrs the part dealing with subdivisions of
Agricultural land. I spent 3 years trying unsuccessfully to subdivide my 18 acre
Ag-S land into 3 parcels. I had some hope that the new code would improve the
situation, but I do not see it in the current version (Draft 2).
I believe that what is needed is separate procedure that deals only with Ag
subdivisions. The current, one-size-fits-all, procedure has many regulations
which are appropriate only for residential and commercial. Separating out what
applies to Ag land is confusing and uncertain. This ambiguity could all be
overcome by adopting separate Ag procedure.
One problem I ran into before is a lack of guidelines for dealing with
undeveloped right of ways. In the area between Glenwood and Volcano Village
there are several of these right of ways, mainly adjacent to larger tracts of land.
Neither the State nor the County wants to take responsibility for these, and the
property owners are unable to do anything.
Drainage requirements in the code seem excessive for 5 acre and larger Ag
tracts. Section 23-4-40(b) requires drainage easements. Thrs just does not
make sense for an intermittent stream crossing a pasture. Section 23-4-37(c) is
not entirely reasonable far any subdivision. It sounds nice to talk about making
provisions fora "100 year storm; 'but the reality is that no one has the ability to
accurately predict what a "100 year storm" might be. This is especially true in
areas where accurate weather records do not even go back 100 years. Even
when they do -consider the Ohio River Basin which exceeded their "100 year
flood" levels earlier this year. I recommend that if the County wants to require
provisions fora "100 year storm," then the County should provide the data on
what this means. The same should be true for the "10 year storm."
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Section 23-2-11 addresses Farm Subdivisions in the Exceptions Division. It
appears that you have attempted to circumvent the problem by setting up a farm
lease procedure. I believe that if you look at the problems Oahu is having with
leased land you will see that this is not the way to go. If someone wants to lease
out part of their Ag land, just let them do it without any special County
regulations. If the County encourages and tries to regulate semi-permanent
leases, eventually the lessees are going to start lobbying for lease to fee simple
conversions. The way to go is to set up a system that allows actual 5 acre
subdivisions at a reasonable cost.
One final note - In the Zoning Code Section 25-5-75 addresses the matter of Ag
building site minimum width. The way the code is written, a 5 acre parcel can
have a length to width ratio of 5 to 1. However, a 50 acre parcel can not have a
length to width ratio of much over 2 to 1. Perhaps this is reasonable for new
subdivisions, but many existing parcels were created under different rules and
they do not meet this standard. Please change this so that the rule daes not
apply to existing parcels. Perhaps it would be better to transfer all of the
minimum building site rules from the Zoning Code to the Subdivision Chapter
and call them minimum subdivision areas.
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Chuck Hanson