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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2019-04-04 Public Testimony Transcript - Edmund Olson Trust SLU17-049REZ17-223WINDWARD PLANNING COMMISSION COUNTY OF HAWAII PUBLIC TESTIMONY TRANSCRIPT APRIL 4, 2019 Public testimony on the applications of EDMUND C. OLSON TRUST (SLU 17- 000049/REZ 17-000223) was taken at 9:14 a.m. in the County of Hawaii Aupuni Center Conference Room, 101 Pauahi Street, Hilo, Hawaii with Chairman Joseph Clarkson presiding. COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Gilbert Aguinaldo, Joseph Clarkson, Donn Dela Cruz, Donald Ikeda, Thomas Raffipiy, John Replogle. ALSO PRESENT: Michael Yee (Planning Director), Malia Hall (Deputy Corporation Counsel for the Windward Planning Commission), Jeff Darrow (Planning Program Manager), Christian Kay (Planner), Jessica Andrews (Planner), and Sarah Hata-Finley (Commission Secretary). And 12 members from the public in attendance. APPLICANT: EDMUND C. OLSON TRUST (SLU 17-000049/REZ 17-000223) Applications for a State Land Use Boundary Amendment from Agricultural to Urban for 14.95 acres of land and a Change of Zone from an Agricultural -20 acres (A -20a) and Open (0) to a Single -Family Residential -10,000 square feet (RS -10) zoning district for approximately 14.95 acres of land and a Change of Zone from an Agricultural -20 acres (A -20a) to a Family Agricultural -1 acre (FA -la) zoning district for approximately 24.73 acres of land. The subject properties are located mauka (west) of Wainaku Street and north of Amau`ulu Road in the vicinity of Clem Akina Park, Puueo, South Hilo, Hawaii, TMK: (3) 2-6-008:026 & 027. Note: This item was postponed to the May 2, 2019, Commission meeting at the request of the Planning Department. CLARKSON: The second item on the agenda, but one which we will not be considering today because it's been continued, is the Edmund C. Olson Trust. I see no one has signed up to testify on this matter. Oh—we do have two people wishing to testify, so we're not going to have any presentation. We're not going to have any discussion, but your testimony is certainly welcome. Would Jeno Enocencio and Dwight Vicente please come forward? Please raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth on this matter before the Planning Commission today? ENOCENCIO: I do. VICENTE: [No response.] CLARKSON: Would you please introduce yourself and tell us where you're from and then proceed with your testimony. 10V1111.11 1.1 ENOCENCIO: My name is Jeno Enocencio. I live over here in Hilo up in Wainaku area. You can hear me, right? [Mr. Enocencio was not using the microphone.] HALL: No, but you have to—we're recording. IKEDA: She cannot record. ENOCENCIO: Okay, my name isis it on? IKEDA: Yes. ENOCENCIO: My name is Jeno Enocencio. I live herein Wainaku area. Born and raised in the Amau`ulu section, which is, which is in question right now as far as the Olson Trust is concerned. I was born and raised here on these Islands, and basically I'm three generations of sugar planters and—and industry, and in the past 100 years, you know, a lot of my family members have been involved in the sugar industry. Everywhere from Ka`u to all the way up to Pahala, Honoka`a area as well as well as Kohala, and so many of us in the three generations that have occupied this various forms of activities in the sugar industry, we've come to know quite a bit about the different parts of the land that we're, we lived on. Everywhere from Hakalau, Pau`auilo, Honoka`a over in Paukaa, Amau`uluespecially Amau`ulu and Kalalau area. Kalalau, Pi`ihonua, Pu`u`eo—all these areas were basically housed by many Hawaiians as well as Filipinos, Chinese, Portuguese, and the majority of the haoles that was living over here was basically in the supervisory capacity. Now, the thing about it is, is that I recently was ranching and farming opposite of Mr. Olson's Trust properties in the Kalalau ahupua`a. It's alongside the Pi`ihonua Stream, excuse me, Pau Po, oh my gosh, I love that stream. I forgot its name. It starts with a "p." Pukihae Stream, okay? And, all throughout the years, we basically did a lot of our harvesting of `o`opu, `opae, you know, and also warabi and the different type of bananas and things and such, and we also did a lot of bartering up and down that area. Now the thing about it is, back in '57 when my dad passed on—he's a World War II veteran his leg was mangled during the war and stuff, so he couldn't really work, but he had a taxicab company. And, that taxicab company basically in his old Oldsmobile travelled from Pi`ihonua, all the back roads and stuff, all the way down to Honoli`i area, and sometimes he would make it down through Mamalahoa and go into Papa`ikou, Pepe`ekeo area. Pepe`ekeo was kind of too far, though, but Pu`u`eo Park, and all those areas there. And, we'd do a lot of bartering. A lot of the bartering was vegetables and as well as meats, you know, cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, hogs, and things of such. Now, that river area, and that area that Mr. Olson wants to develop into housing and commercial tenements or whatever, buildings as he wants to put up regarding residential as well as condominiums and apartments, is areas that have poor, really, really poor drainage. Not only is it poor drainage, every year whenever we have heavy rains and stuff, that Wainaku Street floods out to the max right below Clem Akina Park. The drainage over there is really, really poor. This year was really bad because it went all the down to the apartment areas—Riverside as well as EXHIBIT B 2 Val Hala causing, you know, major traffic issues and stuff. And, as far as where the water goes, it went down to the highway which caused a lot of land—what do you call—landfalls. Okay, now, it's not so much that, you know. There needs to be a hydrology test—oh, there's a time limit? [Referring to Ms. Hall's cue sign.] Oh, nobody told me that. How much time did I have? HALL: Three minutes. CLARKSON: Three minutes. ENOCENCIO: Okay. CLARKSON: Because you were not informed, please proceed, but try to wrap it up reasonably soon. ENOCENCIO: Okay, the thing about it is, is there's a hydrology issue, and which needs to be really looked into as far as drainage and all this stuff. Now, you know, it worked well with, what do you call, cesspools. I don't think it's going to work too well with, what do you call, sewage being pumped down all the way down to Keaukaha or wherever it's going to go. It's going to be some major, major infrastructure that needs to be looked into. Another thing, I'm not sure if a cultural survey was ever anticipated in this project or if I, you know, an EIS was ever committed or anything like that, but that really needs to be looked into. There's a lot of artifacts still being discovered on the land, even though the plantation used that area for a hundred years. Now, also, the last thing I'd like to input is basically this. How did it get from Crown lands which was leased, okay, by the Crown, and then families up there, all of a sudden the camps starting closing up, they broke down the camps that I was living in, Camp 4, and then Camp 2, 3, 4, and 5 was demolished and then we went move down to Camp 1 after my dad died, then Ha`aheo, then into Wainaku. We need to look further into this. How did—or if there is a title to that land. I think Mr. Olson needs to present that, and also the Bureau of Conveyances need to acknowledge the fact that there is a clear title and it's not cloudy. I want to thank you very much for the opportunity. I will submit a written testimony, though, on behalf of keeping prime agricultural lands agriculture. Thank you. CLARKSON: Thank you. Any questions from the Commission for this testifier? REPLOGLE: Yes, you said the drainage was poor, but it is still usable good agricultural land that's not going to interfere withI was told this that many new subdivisions are happening as a result of needed housing, and those small areas were impractical to farm because of what they would do with adjoining people living there. ENOCENCIO: Well REPLOGLE: —And that, you know what I'm getting at? EXHIBIT B 3 ENOCENCIO: Yes, sir. REPLOGLE: Okay. ENOCENCIO: You know, the thing about it is, is that if you go to Clem Akina Park right now, you'll see `uala being planted, sweet potato. REPLOGLE: Yeah. ENOCENCIO: You'll see where it slopes down and things like that. Now the `uala is pretty good, you know, it will retain the soil and stuff like that, but, you know, other types of grasses like Guinea grass and California grass and things like that will retain the soil from coming down. The thing about it is, is that the Clem Akina Park, usually is the flat area, it absorbs, not necessarily absorbs, it's run-off into the street area. The drainage down there as far as, you know, that's supposed to go I guess into the river, you know, is always plugged. For some reason, it cannot contain the capacity of water being drawn from that area. It forms kind of like, there's tributaries, and then after that it pockets right into the Clem Akina Park area. Now, the thing about it is, as far as—these are prime agricultural lands. Deep soil, rich soil that we should be using for, for food, for developing food. For ranching and farming. That's what we were doing. That's what we were doing at our farm was teaching kids about agriculture, animal science, and aqua sciences. Teaching them all this stuff We was leasing from Kamehameha Schools, but I think they got another idea as to what they want to do with that land, you know, and right now we're in litigation on that. But, the thing about it is, with the Olson property, that should be maintained as prime agricultural lands. Yes, we have a housing shortage. Yes, we should be developing houses and stuff like that, but who is it for? Is it for the local generation that's here right now, or is to for outsiders that have jobs, major jobs, two, three jobs living in Honolulu that they can transport back and forth without any problem. But, what about the housing? Who is it for? We have so many Hawaiians—not only Hawaiians. We got haole people, Filipinos, Japanese, Portuguese, lot of people are on the streets right now. They have no place to go. A lot of them are being evicted. Why? Because there's no jobs. What if we created these jobs, you know, in agriculture, animal science, and aqua sciences. Right now, I'm the Director of the MSU CLARKSON: Please ENOCENCIO: the Mobile Slaughter Unit. I just wanted to throw that one in. The Mobile Slaughter Unit was trying CLARKSON: —You'll have another, you'll have another opportunity to testify ENOCENCIO: —Yes, all right EXHIBIT B 4 CLARKSON: when this actually comes before us for a decision. Any other questions? REPLOGLE: Thank you. CLARKSON: Thank you. ENOCENCIO: ENOCENCIO: Thanks, appreciate it. CLARKSON: If not, I'll ask Mr. Vicente to introduce himself and then proceed. VICENTE: Good morning. My name is Dwight Vicente, representing the Hawaiian Kingdom. These lands are actually leased under King Kalakaua, he bumped up the leases from three to five years to 25 years. He knew the United States was up to no good, and that's why those lands was never ceded, illegally ceded in 1898. They were leased out as agricultural lands to the sugar, pastoral, coffee, that's why whenever you have the, the zoning agriculture, you're going to notice, those are the leased lands under the Kingdom. So, and what they're trying to do is get a zoning change from the Land Use Commission supported by HUD and supported by the Hawaii County Planning Department that has no jurisdiction over these lands. These are not the ceded lands. The ceded lands fall under Hawaiian Homes, and that's 1,750,000 acres. There's over two million acres that was not ceded to the United States illegally, and there's a reason for that. There was a contract they couldn't break. Just like the, in 1893, they tried the annexation, and it never passed because there was treaties that was going to end, in 1897, and that was the last treaties because of the illegal acts of the United States. But, that doesn't mean that the Hawaiian Kingdom doesn't exist. There's over two million acres of Hawaiian Kingdom land. Iolani Palace still stands. It wasn't given away. If you read the Joint Resolution, it states government buildings. Harbor—not the water itself, but the buildings, the structures at the harbor. There's a lot of things ambiguous, Joint Resolution that was written in 1898, and those people were American citizens, here with an unconstitutional treaty because the President of the United States nor did the U.S., King Kalakaua sign it. So, you have to question what was going on. Is this criminal activity? Yeah. Is it an act of war? No. There was no war declared on either side although there was gun fire. U.S. Minister Stevens on board the navy ship when he visited this island fired the cannons at the Islands, at Native Hawaiians. And, they did it on the outer islands, not on Oahu. They just landed the troops at Oahu illegally. The Pearl Harbor Treaty, amended 1875 treaty was not legal because the United States cannot have a harbor or a station in the military outside of Article I, Section 2, Clause 3. That's thirteen states only, and they have to purchase it under Article I, Section 8, Clause 17. And, that's only the 13 states, there's no amendment that adds any new states or extends Northwest—Article V of the Northwest Ordinance beyond its limits. They got incorporated, non -incorporated territories under that. Now a lot of countries are on there right now. I'll name—South Korea, Japan, Philippines, Guam, Northern Marianas, Micronesia, Panama, Samoa, Haiti, Virgin Isles, Puerto Rico, Germany, Spain, Middle East—wherever you see the U.S. Military. They're called unincorporated territories under Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution. EXHIBIT B 5 CLARKSON: Please wrap it up, sir. VICENTE: So, there's constitutional questions. These lands, the County has no jurisdiction over it, the Planning Department, the Land Use Commission, HUD. So, we reserve the rights of this Kingdom. Thank you. CLARKSON: Thank you. Any questions for this testifier? If not, thank you both. You may sit down. Is there any other person that wishes to testify on this matter? [There were none.] The discussion ended at 9:29 a.m. Respectfully submitted, Sarah Y. Hata-Finley, Secretary Windward Planning Commission EXHIBIT B 6