COM 0927.015 2004-2006 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

• Page 1 of 2 Mitchell, Megan From: Charles Flaherty [oneheart@aloha.net] Sent: Tuesday, June 20, 2006 1:12 AM To: counciltestimony@co.hawaii.hi.us Cc: Pilago, K. Angel; Isbell, Virginia, 'Bob and Julie Jacobson', phoffman@co.hawaii.hi.us; Holschuh, Fred; Ikeda, Donald; Arakaki, James; Higa, Stacy; Safarik, Gary Subject: Resolution 381-06 Aloha mai members of the County Council, I do not believe Resolution 381-06 is sufficient. I hope that the County Council will instead create and pass an ordinance which will place a moratorium on both rezonings and subdivisions with conditions to allow construction of infrastructure and truly affordable housing, that is, housing for 100% of median incomes and below. 1 ask that the conditional moratorium ordinance expire once the County Council has considered and passed the Kona Community Development Plan (KDCP) as well as any and all interim General Plan amendments which may be required. The KCDP has been promoted as a "community-based" process. However, recent rezonings such as Pua'a and Lava Kuikini have discouraged many Kona community members from participating further. The Kona community knows these rezonings will not provide additional housing to the great majority of Kona residents and will make our traffic crisis only worse. Your vote today will make it clear to the residents of Kona whether it is your intention to ignore or support our community. The Planning Director has testified repeatedly that existing rezonings and subdivision approvals are more than sufficient to maintain the current level of construction activity in Kona for many years. A conditional moratorium will have absolutely no effect on the economy, employment level, or real estate prices because it will not reduce the current level of commercial and residential construction. The Planning Director and the Director of Public Works have testified repeatedly that they and their staffs are completely overwhelmed by the current level of growth that is occurring in this County. A conditional moratorium will not reduce the number of permits applications and approvals. However, a conditional moratorium will reduce the number of rezonings and subdivisions that must be administered, thereby reducing the demands currently being placed upon County employees. I hope you are aware that the Hokuli'a and Ki'ilae rulings made it clear that the County government has not been complying with several laws for many, many years. Because the county's services are so overwhelmed, the Administration and this Council have been forced to change laws to conform to illegal practices, instead of causing the Administration to make changes to policies and procedures to conform to existing law. Meanwhile, the potential for additional litigation against the County continues to mount. The following four paragraphs are examples of this potential. The Hokuli'a court-appointed water monitor has issued reports that prove that golf course and landscaping activities are causing significant levels of nitrogen pollution in the nearshore marine environment. Also, numerous sediment samples from the coral reef offshore Hokuli'a contained herbicide levels that violated allowable state limits. Most recently, the Kohanaiki SMA permit application stated, "The proposed project will not have any substantial adverse environmental or ecological effect...... But the Hokuli a water monitor report stated, both intensive watering, because of drought conditions, and establishment of golf courses and landscaping projects at the Hokuli'a development would result in nutrients percolating to the groundwater and flowing into the m4ne No. T S Comm Ref. ToePra 6/20/2006 Ref. Date