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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN CHARTER 2019-03-25 (2018-2020) - Public HearingHawaii County Charter Commission Public Hearing Old Kohala Courthouse 54-3900 Akoni Pule Highway Kapa'au, Hawai`i March 25, 2019 CALL TO The public hearing of the Hawai`i County Charter Commission was called to ORDER: order at 5:06 p.m., in Kohala by Mr. Douglass Shipman Adams, Chair. ROLL CALL: Present: Mr. Douglass Shipman Adams, Chair Ms. Jennifer Zelko-Schlueter, Vice Chair Mr. William Carthage Bergin, Commissioner Mr. Paul K. Hamano, Commissioner Mr. Kevin D. Hopkins, Commissioner Ms. Sarah H. Rice, Commissioner Absent: Also Present: Ms. Michelle Galimba, Commissioner Mr. Christopher John Imiloa Roehrig, Commissioner Ms. Marcia A. K. Saquing, Commissioner Ms. Donna Mae Springer, Commissioner Ms. Bobby Jean Leithead Todd, Commissioner Mr. J Yoshimoto, Commission Attorney Mr. Jon Henricks, Commission Analyst Ms. Shannon Magnuson, Commission Secretary CHR. ADAMS: Welcome to the Hawai`i County Charter Commission's Public Hearing in Kohala. I am convening this hearing at 5:06 p.m. on Monday, March 25, 2019. This hearing will be recorded for the purpose of developing minutes that will be available on the Commission's website. The purpose of this hearing is to receive testimony from the public regarding the work of the Charter Commission to include proposed Charter Amendments that have achieved first reading status. I would ask you all to please silence your communication devices. At this time I would ask Commissioners to briefly introduce themselves to include identifying the district they have been appointed from. Commissioner Zelko- Schlueter. MS. ZELKO-SCHLUETER: Good afternoon. Good evening. Jennifer Zelko- Schlueter. I am from the Hilo district. Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 MS. RICE: Hi, Sally Rice and I am from the Kona district. MR. HOPKINS: I am Kevin Hopkins from Hilo. MR. HAMANO: I am Paul Hamano. I am from Hilo district also. MR. BERGIN: Billy Bergin. I was born in Hamakua but I live in Waimea. I am happy to be here. CHR. ADAMS: And I am Doug Adams from the Hilo district. Copies of the protocols for this public hearing are available at the registration table. To highlight just a few, I would ask you and I think most have done this, please register to testify at the registration table. I will stop what I am doing right now just to say briefly, obviously this is a little more of an informal kind of gathering than we have had in the past of course it is a public hearing, but to be consistent with all of the other public hearings that we will have, I will come off of my script that we are using right now, so just so we understand. I will call the speakers to the table. As you prepare to speak please state your name, any organization you are speaking for, and the relevant Charter section of proposed amendment you are addressing. Speakers will have up to a total of six minutes for their testimony. Speakers may testify once during this public hearing. To avoid the potential of Sunshine Law violations and to emphasize the purpose of this hearing, Commissioners shall refrain from making comments or asking questions of testifiers during their statements right? We good? Okay. I would ask all of us to please maintain an appropriate level of decorum during the hearing. We are all looking forward to providing an equal opportunity for all testifiers to make their statements. Finally, to provide some context for this hearing, allow me to briefly address the Commission's efforts to date and what follows. First, this is the fifth Charter Commission since the County Charter became effective 50 years ago. The Commissioners, all of whom are County residents and none of whom are elected officials by statute, were appointed by the Mayor and confirmed by the Council at the end of June, 2018 and we have met at least once a month since July, often times more than that, to accomplish our mission as the Charter outlines it. Which is to study and review the operation of the government of the County under the Charter. We have done that by receiving information from County departments, the Mayor, and the Council as well as receiving over 500 communications from the public and the County. Second, since October, we have considered 27 different proposed Charter Amendments to include changing the structure of terms for Council members, Page 2 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 refining the process by which the Public Access, Open Space, and Natural Resources Preservation mission is accomplished, adding disciplining options for the Council, the Fire Commission, and the Police Commission, establishing a Disaster and Emergency Fund, and modifying minimum qualifications for Corporation Counsel, the Fire Chief, and the Public Work's Director. Information on these and the other proposals is available on the Commission website, the link to which can be found on the County's homepage. Third, we are convening six public hearings, one in each geographic district as identified in the County Charter. Following these hearings, we have until the end of June to submit to the County Council a report on our activities, findings, and recommendations together with a draft of the Proposed Charter Amendments. The Council has 30 days to return the proposals with any alternatives to the Commission, after which within a month the Commission shall provide its final draft of proposed amendments to the County Clerk. Ballot language will then be developed by the Commission for submission to County voters for decision on the November 3rd, 2020 election ballot. At this time, we will take our first speaker and I would ask Ms. Hecht and also Mr. Winter to come to the table. Ms. Hecht you will be our first testifier and I would ask you to provide your name, any organization you are representing, and the Charter provision or proposed amendments you are speaking to. Mahalo. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC DEBBIE HECHT: Proposal No. CA -9 in opposition and Proposal No. CA -18 in support. MS. HECHT: Okay, good afternoon. Thanks for coming all the way out here. My name is Debbie Hecht and I am representing the Save our Lands Citizen's Committee. We ran the 2% Land Fund Campaigns three times now. As I rode up the coast I realized that due to the labors of Toni Withington, Gail Byrne, Fred Cochola, and many others, the North Kohala Coast has been preserved as open space and to protect cultural sites all the way almost from the port area. I know my good friend and ardent 2% Land Fund supporter, Fred Cochola is sorry he can't be here. He is on 'Oahu for cancer treatment. A big mahalo for listening to us over all this time. We thank you for your efforts to strengthen the fund, the 2% Land Fund, we have two more tweaks and for CA -9 and CA -18, that we would like to work on. For CA -9, we have a proposed change for a staff person to work full-time and only on the 2% Land Fund. Our proposal and the language I will submit to you Page 3 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 via email, is pay for salary, wages, and benefits for one full-time staff member employed by the Department of Finance, dedicated only to administering the activities contained within this section of the Charter and section 10-16 of the Charter. This is in addition to a staff member as provided in section 2-2.15 of the Hawai `i County Code. Right now the 2% Land Fund pays only for land acquisitions. We want this language because the current proposition that was proposed by Commissioner Hopkins is somewhat ambiguous. It says to pay "staff", now staff could be one or 10 people. The term is ambiguous. It can be singular, it can be plural, and we don't... we figured out that about, for salary, wages, and benefits, one staff person could mean as much as $100,000 that would be deducted from the fund, so you can see that if there was more than one staff person it would reduce the purchasing power of the fund. So, one reason, I mean two reasons that the staff person should work only on the fund is real estate deals are time sensitive and require willing sellers as we learned about condemnation. Willing sellers want to be paid as soon as possible because the taxes keep mounting up on property and they may have a use for the money. It also takes time... staff time to apply for matching funds, get appraisals, do surveys, and all the due diligence required for property purchased by government. The maintenance fund grants over the years, the six years it has been in existence, since 2013 have only been granted to six organizations and only nine percent of all of the money put into the maintenance fund has gone out to the non -profits. When Brenda Ford and I submitted this legislation, our goals were to get the non- profits, empower the non -profits with some money to do, to pay them, and you know, to keep their good works going. So that is why we need one staff person to work only on the 2% Land Fund full-time so we are going to be proposing that language via email for you all to look at. The other changes that are important, is for the maintenance fund, and so far we have come a long way. I mean we decided, you all decided last time to approve of building toilet facilities, small structures, and create trails or paths. Somewhere along the line we defaulted back to what is originally now... well, existing now in the Charter, where we can't pay people to... the non -profits can't pay people, and this is really important because this is something I have heard over the last six years from every single non-profit, the six non -profits that have gotten grants. They need to be able to pay people because volunteers burn out, I don't know if you heard, we were all in Kona, we couldn't hear very well, but a non-profit in Kali was talking about, that they had lua's in the parking lot and then people would walk down to the ocean, go for a swim, have to go to the bathroom on the way back up... I didn't hear it, my hearing may be isn't that good, but anyway, so they are asking volunteers to go pick up feces and toilet paper. Well, you are going to burn out volunteers pretty quick doing something like that. If you pay people to help with the land, it is very important so there can be volunteer coordinators, school education programs, which I know the groups in Ka`u are Page 4 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 already doing, and I know Toni Withington and her groups up here are already doing that. This could also create jobs in rural economically depressed areas of the island and alleviate volunteer burnout. This will help younger people who need income to work on the island and allow the non -profits to rely less on old retired folks like me and fostering the next generation of good land stewards. So, that is what we are... let's see, so in addition, oh in addition, I can't even read my own writing, sorry. In addition, I have been talking to people and I know you are talking and discussing about having the elections in November. This coming November, and I... nobody can figure out why that is a good idea. I mean the extra expense and why it is justified, I mean as far as I know, it is $200,000 to $300,000 to have another election. So, I think that if we wait until 2020 to have the election on the Charter Amendments they will be well vetted, all the questions will be answered by everyone around the island. Again, thank you for driving all the way up here, I hope you enjoyed the drive. Thank you. CHR. ADAMS: Thank you very much. I would ask Toni Withington to come to the table. Mr. Winter. JOHN WINTER: Proposal No. CA -9 and CA -18, commenting. MR. WINTER: Hello, my name is John Winter. I am a past Chair of the North Kohala Community Development Action Committee and I am representing Sustainable Kohala and I would just like to thank you all, A, for coming up here, and B, for serving on the Board and doing that work you are doing. I suspect like our action committee, you are paid about the same amount, so I am particularly grateful for that. It is a lot of work to do and there is you know, satisfaction is about the only recompense you are going to get for that so... I am also very glad that Ms. Hecht went first because she has limited what I have to say down to maybe like what she said, but this 2% Fund has really been important and because of the work of Toni and our community access group, it has really helped the nature of... sustaining the nature of North Kohala and many other places on the island and I really appreciate your resistance to any attempts to erode this and degrade this fund. It has been really, really important for the very nature of this island. I agree with Ms. Hecht about the single staff person, all the money from that fund that can go into land acquisition would be better, and having too many staff would take away from that. Incidentally, if it does come up to $100,000, I think there's five people in the audience who would volunteer for that position. I also agree that transferring over the control on CA -18, to the Department of Finance in handling the volunteers is better and being able to pay volunteers is really important. That is not taken out of the 2% fund that is from non-profit funds up here that just allow us to use those funds to keep people from burning out. I am Chair of our Coqui Frog Coalition right now and trying to get people to battle coqui frogs at night etc is just... you need to pay people okay, they come with good nature, but they will burnout without it. Thank you. That's all. Page 5 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 CHR. ADAMS: Thank you very much. If I could ask Maya Parish to please come to the table. Ms. Withington. TONI WITHINGTON: Proposal No. CA -9 and CA -18 commenting, Proposal No. CA -8 in opposition, and Proposal No. CA -17 in support. MS. WITHINGTON: Yes. Thank you for coming out here, all this way on a nice day like this. Especially, I think a lot of our people are out mowing lawns now because we have had two weeks of rain. My name is Toni Withington and I represent several Kohala groups for two of the things that I would like to talk about and myself for two. I represent five groups of people, of community groups that have been working in open space and coastal preservation for about 40 years now. I have spoken to you before so I am not, I am going to try not to repeat anything. The groups are, Kohala Lihikai, Ka Makani 0 Kohala `Ohana, Malama Kohala Kahakai, Maika`i Kamakani 0 Kohala, and Malama Wahi pana 0 Kohala,. We very much support CA -9 with the idea that it is better to have one person staff. One person working full-time can do this job. I have been working with PONC staff for... ever since they started, 2007, 2000 something... and having one person full-time would really get this job done and be able to have things proceed in an orderly fashion. We have found times when we couldn't get responses from PONC people because they were off doing other things and it is just... these types of acquisitions need almost constant going and the big complaint that a lot of the owners have said is that it just takes so long to get from the point of starting negotiations to the end, to the clearing of it, and that is because we haven't had somebody in the County working full-time on this, so that... our groups really do support that part of it. Just a single staff person. On CA -18, which is the amendments that Commissioner Rice has put forward, we very much support those too. The groups that I represent currently steward four pieces of land, four projects, two of them through the maintenance fund and it is very difficult, like John says, to get people to come out year after year after year if there is no incentive to keep the work going and having, being able to bring professional people in to do things. And, the way that it was structured originally was too rapid, it is you know, everybody, even Brenda Ford who wrote it says that it didn't work out right. It needs to be in the Finance Department, the people who know how to do grants, and it needs to be more flexible than it is right now. So, I think those are the two things that I would like to support for your consideration. Now stepping into the individual, I would like to speak to CA -8 which is the Council terms. I am very much in favor of the two-year terms and the reason I am in favor of the two-year terms is this, we live at the end of the road. We are, as you know, just coming out here, it is hard to get people to come out here. We are all excited that we have a chance to talk to you. It is very hard to get people out here and what we know from experience is the most time that we get people out here is before an election. Truly. That is when we get to see our people in... on a Page 6 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 regular basis and if you made it four years, we would be sitting out here all by ourselves twiddling thumbs for a while. So, that is why at least I am in favor of the two year terms. And the other one is the emergency fund. I think that is a great idea. I think we got caught when the eruption and the hurricane... we just got caught flat foot without enough money to handle emergencies and I think focusing on putting a portion of our money aside and not being able to dip into it like they were... dipped into the Open Space Fund, is a good idea, so I do support the emergency fund. Thank you. CHR. ADAMS: May I ask Maya Parish. MAYA PARISH: Proposal No. CA -9 and CA -18 in support. MS. PARISH: Aloha. Thank you all so much for coming out here this evening. My name is Maya Parish and I am simply here representing myself. I live up here in Hawi in North Kohala and the Open Space, 2% Open Space Land Fund is very dear to my heart. I think it is part of what makes this community so unique and special, the open space, and this island so unique and special as compared with some of the other islands. We are you know, one of the least developed and it is one of our dearest treasures I think to really preserve and protect for future generations and I am here to speak in strong support of CA -9 and CA -18 as well. I will echo the great big heavies who came before me. They are the real experts and have been doing the work for a long time. Both of these amendments seem to serve to strengthen the 2% Open Space Land Fund and to make it more efficient, to work better and to work as was originally intended. So, as we know, things need to be revised sometimes to meet their ultimate goals and in this case both amendments I believe in strongly, so I don't want to take up too much of your time, just... it is a real honor to be here and thank you so much for coming to listen to the community. CHR. ADAMS: Thank you very much. Do we have any other speakers? We have a speaker? MS. BYRNE: Oh, is that me? Nothing like sneaking in... that means I won't have time to prepare cliff notes. So just come on up? CHR. ADAMS: Come on up. So as you are coming up, I would ask you to provide your name, any organizations that you represent, and the Charter proposal or section of the Charter that you are speaking to. GAIL BYRNE: Proposal No. CA -9 and CA -18 in support. MS. BYRNE: Yeah, my name is Gail Byrne Baber and I am speaking to the PONC issues on the agenda. CA -9 and CA -18. So, think I was here or at least before you guys long distance in February. Testified from Kona. Thank you for your time and for being here. I was on the PONC Commission for a couple of Page 7 Hawai`i County Charter Commission — Public Hearing March 25, 2019 years. I know that you guys are giving up family time and work time to do the work that you are doing so we are greatly appreciative of that. I have been volunteering my time with a lot of these wonderful people here in this room for I don't know, 16, 17 years working on open space issues and it has been a great pleasure. And the first time I ever went before the County Council was in, I think 2003, I was with John Replogle from Kali and we were there testifying about the Honu'apo purchase and the... I believe the testimony I provided was two pages of citations and research on the economic benefits of open space and similar efforts around the country that have provided a lot of great opportunities for people. So, I am here to just reinforce I guess the rural economic development opportunities. I know that was part of the intention behind the maintenance fund. We just got our first grant this last year, 2018 Kohala did, under the maintenance fund. We submitted it I think first in 2013 or 2014, so it took a while. And the reason why I bring that up is that kind of speaks to the need for one of the amendments and that is a dedicated staff person. I know there are a number of reasons why it took a while to get that grant, but I think having someone focused on that would be very helpful. Part of the reason behind pursuing the maintenance fund as I shared in February and you have probably heard from other folks here tonight was to be able to support the families and the communities who know these lands really well, and it makes sense to engage them continually. They have been working these lands, they have been stewarding them forever and to provide the resources to do so, and of course there is an economic motive for that as well. I mean and we circulate dollars locally and they stay here locally. The other part of the... I think CA -18 that is on your agenda today speaks to the need to be able to pay staff people in these organizations that are working on implementing projects under the maintenance fund. I can definitely speak to that personally. It is difficult not to be able to reimburse people's travel, you know, if we are not going to be able to... if we don't allow the amendment to go forward, the folks that are primarily working on these projects are the ones that have financial means to take time away from work or don't work, or are retired, and really what we want to do is to be able to engage all levels of the community and often times these people, the folks that are... I am sure you have heard this from the Ka`u people and the people at Waipi`o, you know, they are smaller communities and the people who have applied for these grants are the people who have worked on the lands for a long time and it makes sense that they should have some of those expenses to be able to be paid for. Without my cliff notes I think I have covered those two points. I just want to thank you again for your time, for coming all the way up to Kohala. Thank you for keeping the 2% fund and the maintenance fund intact and I hope you will make those small little tweaks that will make it a lot easier for those of us working on the ground to do the job. May I ask... something just popped into my mind...I know you guys are really well aware of how the maintenance fund was spent in the last few years. I believe Page 8 Hawaii County Charter Commission Public Hearing March 25, 2019 with a dedicated staff person, we will be able to get the grants out sooner. I think I spoke to that just a second ago. There was one other point that I wanted to make... well, I am sorry. I guess that is the end of a work day and pau hana for me, but anyway, that you for your time here. CHR. ADAMS: Thank you very much. Are there any other testifiers? It appears that we have no more speakers. I would like to thank all of the testifiers for their statements, the Commissioners for their attention, and the staff for their efforts in helping us convene this hearing. Our next public hearing will be held Friday, March 29`1' at 5:00 p.m. at the Na`alehu Community Center, 95-5635 Mamalahoa Highway, in Na`alehu, which is in Ka`u. So I would ask all to please drive safely and thank you for attending this hearing. Commission Approval: April 25, 2019 M Do ass Shipman Adai , Chair 201:- 020 Hawaii County Charter Commission Page 9