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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2006-08-25 TPLANNING DIR. PLANNING COMMISSION COUNTY OF HAWAI‘I HEARING TRANSCRIPT AUGUST 25, 2006 PLANNING DIRECTOR’S PROPOSED A regularly advertised hearing on the AMENDMENT TO CHAPTER 25, ZONING CODE was called to order at 3:55 p.m. at the King Kamehameha's Kona Beach Hotel, 75-5660 Palani Road, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii with Chairman C. Kimo Alameda presiding. Kimo Alameda PRESENT:C. ABSENT & EXCUSED: Andrew Iwashita red Galdones F William R. Graham Jeffrey McCall Alvin Rho Allen Salavea QdmdlRhq`btr` Rodney Watanabe Ivan Torigoe, Deputy Corporation Counsel Christopher J. Yuen, Planning Director Norman Hayashi, Planning Program Manager Phyllis Fujimoto, Staff Planner Jeff Darrow, Staff Planner And approximately 26 people from the public in attendance. INITIATOR: PLANNING DIRECTOR Amendment to Chapter 25 (Zoning Code), Article 1, Section 25-1-5(b) of the Hawaii County Code 1983 (2005 Edition, as amended), by amending the definition of “family” to read as follows: “Family” means an individual or two or more persons related by blood, state-sanctioned adoption, foster parentage, guardianship or marriage, or a group of not more than five unrelated persons (excluding servants), occupying a dwelling unit. The term includes individuals in larger group living situations described as group living facilities and family child care homes[.] and a group of not more than eight unrelated persons, plus any program staff, living in a facility licensed by the department of health. ALAMEDA:So moving on to Agenda Item No. 5, the Planning Director’s amendment. Staff? DARROW:Thank you, Mr. Chairman. ALAMEDA:Okay. Jeff, also, make note that Commissioner Iwashita had to leave us so we’ll be operating with eight Commission members today. Is there any objection to that? EXHIBIT D 1 WATANABE:It’s my recollection that he’ll rejoin us in Hilo for this and vote on it there, bring up the discussion. ALAMEDA:Okay. Jeff? DARROW:Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m going to actually read a portion of the Recommendation from the Director, that way we just lay it on the record. The Planning Director is initiating an amendment to the definition of family in the Zoning Code. This amendment will address group living facility type programs that operate within a single family dwelling, which are licensed and regulated by the Department of Health. Presently, group living facility type programs would like to increase their occupancy beyond five unrelated persons within a single-family dwelling have no options within the State Land Use Urban District unless they fall under one of several exemptions allowed by State law. If they are located within the State Land Use Agricultural District, a special permit can be applied to increase the amount beyond five unrelated persons. Group living facilities that presently require a license from the Department of Health include Adult Residential Care Homes or ARCHS, Special Treatment Facilities or STFs, Therapeutic Living Programs or TLPs, Developmental Disabilities Domiciliary Homes or DDDHs and Assisted Living Facilities or ALFs. These group living programs are meant to be non-institutional and are designed to be operated within a single family dwelling. They are low impact type facilities that are licensed or regulated by the Department of Health-Office of Health Care Assurance Division for compliance with the Department of Health rules that are applicable for each type of facility. The Planning Director believes that these facilities are accessory to the single family dwelling and that they provide valuable services to residential communities for disabled persons needing treatment. It is proposed that these group living facilities would be allowed to operate within the State Land Use Urban District with up to eight residents plus live-in staff, because they are regulated and licensed by the Department of Health. This would also include facilities that are located within the State Land Use Agricultural District on lots where single-family dwellings are allowed, which are those lots created before June 4, 1976. Additionally, this will allow such facilities within the State Land Use Ag District on lots created after June 4, 1976, as long as the home is also used as a farm dwelling. The definition for family is presently defined as “an individual or two or more persons related by blood, state sanctioned-adoption, foster parentage, guardianship or marriage, or a group of not more than five unrelated persons (excluding servants), occupying a dwelling unit. This term includes individuals in larger group living situations described as group living facilities and child care homes. The Planning Director is proposing to add the phrase, “and a group of not more than eight unrelated persons, plus any program staff, living in a facility licensed,” and we’re adding this phrase, “or certified by the department of health” to achieve the purpose of this amendment. EXHIBIT D 2 For the reasons stated above, the Planning Director is initiating this amendment to the Zoning Code and recommends approval of the change by the Planning Commission and the Hawai`i County Council. Since this amendment has been initiated, the Planning Department has received numerous letters, mainly of opposition. This morning we have received a letter with attachments from Marilyn McIntosh, who’s the Director of the Behavioral Services Division; and we’ve also received a submittal from Councilmember Virginia Isbell, which is this article that was within the West Hawai`i Today in today’s article. And this is identified on the top by “Treat the Addict, Cut the Crime Rate.” Are there any questions? ALAMEDA:Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:It appears to me that this amendment is specifically crafted to address the issue of the drug treatment facility that is being proposed for Keaau Ag Lots; and as such, I’m wondering why the hearing has been held in Kona rather than in East Hawai`i in Hilo. DARROW:This has been something that has been brought up in several letters, mainly from residents in Keaau Ag Lots. I can assure you the Director has been dealing with this particular subject matter for a period of several years. This item is going to be held here in Kona and it also has to be held in Hilo. So at our next Hilo, it is agendized for a Hilo meeting. SIRACUSA:So then we are not coming to a decision today? DARROW:Correct. SIRACUSA:We’re waiting until there’s a Hilo hearing as well? DARROW:Yes. SIRACUSA:Okay. ALAMEDA:Thank you, Commissioner Siracusa. Commissioner McCall? MCCALL:I guess, question probably for Chris. ALAMEDA:Sure. MCCALL:Okay, for whatever the current situation is for a group living facility or something, as it lies now, I guess for someone to use say the house that they purchased in Keaau or something, it would need to be a maximum of five unrelated people? ALAMEDA:Can you speak in the mike? MCCALL:Oh, I’m sorry. Is that, it would need to be a maximum of five unrelated people? EXHIBIT D 3 YUEN:Right. MCCALL:And it would need approval from Department of Health, some sort of permits of some sort? YUEN:Right. MCCALL:And was there any opportunity for the public to weigh in on something like this? YUEN:Not for five, no. MCCALL:If there was for more than five, it’ll be possible but they would need to get a use permit or -? YUEN:The Keaau Ag Lots being in a State Land Use Ag District, they could apply for a special permit for more than five; and that would be like the special permits we’ve seen here, public hearing notice to the surrounding areas and the like. MCCALL:So with the current situation, for instance, as with sort of the letters written there, if they wanted to do it, they could apply for a special permit and go that route? YUEN:That’s correct, yes. They could run a program with up to five people, unrelated persons in the home. They could request a special permit to go beyond that. This would allow up to eight unrelated persons plus program staff, as a matter of right. And just to follow-up on the last question, we had met with the Department of Health well over a year ago and agreed to do a definition change like this because we believe that it’s very important to have these kinds of programs and to allow them in residential areas, rather than in the few commercial areas we have. And they are not meant to be institutional in nature, they should be run out of a home. So we had met with them and agreed to do this amendment. It took some time for us to actually get to doing it. It would apply to the Keaau Ag Lots, but it would apply to a lot of other areas as well. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Watanabe and then Commissioner Siracusa? WATANABE:All right. I have a procedural question for Mr. Torigoe. I’m not going to open this up to debate. I think I already know the answer but, anyway, there’s no way to provide a proxy for this type of thing, yeah? TORIGOE:No. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Watanabe, what do you mean by, for my own clarification but -? EXHIBIT D 4 WATANABE:The reason I brought that up is because I knew it would have to be heard in both districts so I knew we would have a hearing or it would be agendized over in the Hilo side. But in similar fashion to the last time we had one of these amendments or proposed amendments, I won’t be able to make the next meeting. So that means, you know, I’m sitting here but I won’t be able to vote. So that’s why I asked if I could, you know, provide a proxy; but I didn’t think there was a mechanism for that. ALAMEDA:Very good. Thank you. I understand. Okay, Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:I’m looking at the third paragraph in the Revised Background Report, the one that lists all the various group living facilities that require a license from the Department of Health. And I assume, correct me if I’m wrong, please, Director Yuen, that these are categories that are part of the Department Health’s Administrative Rules? YUEN:Correct. SIRACUSA:And the definitions for them, therefore, are also part of the Department of Health’s. So I’m wondering why did you choose to go this route, changing the definition of “family” rather than just asking the Department of Health to change their definitions or to add another category that they would license? Do you understand my question? YUEN:Say more. SIRACUSA:Okay. They’ve got all these categories -. YUEN:Yes. SIRACUSA:That require a license from them, adult residential care homes, special treatment facilities, therapeutic living programs and developmental disabilities domiciliary homes. I’m wondering why they didn’t go the route of just creating another category that would require a license and setting up the various definitions and other requirements, rules and regs covering it, why it has to come this way for us to change the definition of “family? YUEN:Well, this has to do with the County’s limitation on the number of unrelated persons that can live in a home, in a single-family home; and that is contained in the definition of “family.” So we are carving out another exception that would let people in these kinds of licensed homes, they’re licensed by the Department of Health, have up to eight unrelated persons, plus program staff. Otherwise, they would be left at five. SIRACUSA:I just don’t understand why we have to change the definition of “family.” These people are obviously not family. And, so, why are we trying to force them into a definition that doesn’t exist on the ground. YUEN:Well, there’s a number of different ways this could be done, but the option and there are some downsides with the other ways of doing them. One of the downsides of listing the programs is that the types of programs they license can change over time. So that’s, EXHIBIT D 5 rather than listing these programs, that’s one way to do it; and the most efficient way, really, was to put it in a definition, by changing the definition of “family.” This also, this already exists. There’s another set of facilities that are already allowed up to eight; and that’s also contained in the definition of “family,” currently. There’s always a number of ways to do something like this. SIRACUSA:But I’m also concerned that this might be opening up another can of worms for something that’s not licensed by the Department of Health, but where you have a whole bunch of people, say a crash pad kind of situation, you know, and how do we, are we opening up possibilities with those kind of living arrangements. We wouldn’t be able to regulate them because they could say, “Oh, but we’re family, we’re eight unrelated persons, plus two,” or something like that. YUEN:No, because they wouldn’t be licensed by the Department of Health. SIRACUSA:So that’s the criteria then? YUEN:That’s included in the criteria, up to eight -. SIRACUSA:So that’s how we can get a handle on this. YUEN:Yeah, it says, “up to eight unrelated persons, plus program staff in a facility” -. I’m sorry, I’m going to be giving you the exact wording, “living in a facility licensed or certified by the department of health.” So it wouldn’t just allow any group of eight unrelated persons to live in the home. It would have to be in a facility licensed or certified by the Department of Health. SIRACUSA:And is it my correct understanding then that the corporate would not license that facility if they felt that the structure was too small to accommodate that number of people, or does that have to be spelled out somewhere about how many bedrooms, you know, that sort of thing? YUEN:I think it’d be best for the, I’m not sure we still have the Department of Health person here. I know that they have an extensive list of requirements for licensing; and I believe they look at those kinds of criteria. But best to ask them on that, specifically. ALAMEDA:That might be a good transition. If there’s no objection, I’d like to invite the Applicant or his representative, oh, that’s you. YUEN:Well, this is -. I think you just start, you take public testimony. I think if we still had somebody from the Department of Health it’d be useful for them to come up for this. I don’t think we do, though. I think she had to go. ALAMEDA:Okay. Well, I think we can move then to our testimony. Is that okay? All right, we have nine testifiers today, patient testifiers. I’d like to call up Eric Carter, Larry Thurman, Bernie Miranda is not here, and Gary Michell, and how about Dan Landis. Then the rest of you we’ll take after this. If you can keep your testimony clear, concise -. EXHIBIT D 6 CARTER:Mr. Chairman? ALAMEDA:Yes? CARTER:Mr. Chairman, before you swear us in -? ALAMEDA:Sure. CARTER:To kind of speed things up here, I think there are enough people today speaking in opposition. I can defer and wait till the Hilo meeting ‘cause I will definitely be there, provided you’ll put it higher on the agenda at the next meeting. ALAMEDA:Let me ask, do we have the agenda out already? HAYASHI:Unfortunately, the hearing agenda has been set and it’s last on the agenda again. ALAMEDA:We can’t move the agenda once it’s set but, hey, we like that recommendation. Anything that would speed things up is good for us so -. Okay, how about I swear you in. Please raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth now before the Hawai`i County Planning Commission? TESTIFIERS:I do. ALAMEDA:Thank you. Also, please note that when providing testimony, if someone previous to you has already stated what you want to state, then maybe you could summarize your points really quick as a way to speed up the process. However, we are very happy that you have stayed this long. We are interested in hearing your opinion and your views on this matter, so thank you very much. We can start with my far left. Sir, could you please state your name and address for the record? CARTER:Yes. I’m Eric Carter, 17-209 Meaulu Street in Keaau. ALAMEDA:Mr. Carter, you may proceed. CARTER:Thank you. Well, since you brought up the Marimed Foundation, there are just so many issues involved in this that it boggles my mind. But in their particular facility, they have two homes on one 1-acre lot and neighbors all around. And if you allow eight people per residence, plus some indeterminate number of staff, yeah, that’s 16 plus I don’t know how many staff. I know they have a minimum of two per house. This house was I think built around 1990 and, frankly, I don’t think the sanitary facilities can support this number of people. You have the issues with one driveway, people coming and going, they’re busing them off to Laupahoehoe every day for school, I believe, and bringing them back. Visitors, if you have any emergencies and the issues, fire, police, ambulance, I don’t think it’s, it’s just not a good situation for the community, for them, for anything. And I do believe they already some EXHIBIT D 7 runaways; and they’re not even in operation yet. Three girls a week ago Sunday, my neighbor came to my house and said she spotted the three girls hiding behind some ti leaves a couple of blocks down from where their house is smoking. And then when they were, she was on her power walk and then she was going back up, then it was clearly going into that house, that Marimed house, suddenly detoured when it saw them, came and asked, “Have you seen three th girls?” And it was about a little after 6:30, I think Sunday, maybe the 17, but she thought they were waiting until it got dark and they’d make their getaway. So it’s just our CC&R’s clearly state we don’t allow businesses, non-ag businesses in the ag lots. And they are a business, there are employees, they pay them. They have lot of cash flowing, going through there and they keep saying, “Oh, we’re non-profit.” That means that all adds up to zero at the end of the year as far as I’m concerned, that’s all it means. And I know they don’t take people there for treatment who, that they’re not being funded by the Department of Health. I also have a question about this redefinition of family. Is that the State Department of Health, or the County Department of Health, or either one, or both? It just says Department of Health. Is that -? SIRACUSA:It’s not the County Department of -. CARTER:So it’s the County Department of Health which -? SIRACUSA:No, there is no such department of the County. CARTER:It’s just the County, Office of the State Department of Health that does things on their behalf, okay, okay. And, also, I just, how is eight people a magic number here? Is that, why not seven, why not nine? ALAMEDA:You can give your testimony and that may trigger some thoughts for our Commission. But we get to ask the questions. You make the statements. How’s that? CARTER:Okay. And one just little last thing. Imagine the situation where you have this one house here, and then you have another house next door, and they’re each certified by the Department of Health, and they have facilities in both of those. What’s to stop them from consolidating them into one larger facility? Is that a possible development down the road if that goes on, or third, or fourth? I don’t know. I think that even if you do allow situations like this, you must set some limits somewhere on things, aside from just, you know, eight people plus eight people. There’s just so many variables involved. And whatever happened to the good old variance? Is there something wrong, is that system broken? Is that why you need to actually go in and up the number you’re permitting per facility? Since they can apply for a variance and go through that procedure, I thought that was the way things should go. Thank you very much. ALAMEDA:Thank you. We may have some questions for you, Mr. Carter. Any questions for Mr. Carter? Commissioner Siracusa? EXHIBIT D 8 SIRACUSA:Well, I was wondering, the gentleman raised some issues and I was wondering if our Director would care to address any of them. ALAMEDA:Mr. Director? YUEN:Well, I think there were two questions he asked. One is how did the number eight arise or arose out of our discussions with the State Department of Health as to what the optimum scale of a facility like this would be? They felt that they wanted definitely more than the five unrelated persons. They thought that eight was sufficient. More staff the better the control level. So that’s why we added the staff as being additional to that. The eight was the clients. The variance would, this gets into a technical discussion of a variance. A facility would not qualify for a variance. ALAMEDA:Any other questions for our testifier? Seeing none, thank you very much, Mr. Carter. You can be seated. CARTER:Thank you. ALAMEDA:Sir, could you please state your name and address for the record? MICHELL:My name is Gary Michell. My address, office address is 75-166 Kalani Street in Kailua-Kona. I’m the Hawai`i Island Services Director for Mental Health Kokua. Mental Health Kokua has been providing recovery based rehabilitation housing for adults who have mental illness in the State of Hawai`i for the last 30 years. We do not have any homes right now in the Keaau Ag Lots, and so we’re not involved in that dispute. We are one of several housing vendors that are contracted by the Department of Health, the Adult Mental Health Division in Hawai`i County; and we are monitored and certified by Adult Mental Health Division. Just to give you some ideas of the numbers of consumers that we have served over the past fiscal year, we’ve served 135 consumers. That’s a total of over 15,000 bed days. Current zoning laws allow us to serve only five unrelated persons in group homes. We recently opened a property in the upper Kaumana section, a very large property about 2,500 square feet. We currently have five consumers in that house, although we’re capable of accommodating very easily eight consumers. What that means is that right at this very moment there are three consumers out there that either have inadequate housing or they’re homeless. Our studies have shown that the mentally ill, if they had adequate housing, mental health treatment is more effective, there’re fewer hospitalizations and they live more productive lives. On the other hand, for the mentally ill who do not have adequate housing, what we find is that they decompensate, they destabilize; and the end result is the use of County funding for police intervention, for emergency room visits, for increased hospitalization, and so forth. EXHIBIT D 9 The cost savings in terms of tax dollars is really dramatic. Community-based intervention services such as the homes that we provide here in Hawai`i County is approximately 10 percent of the funding required for institutional care. So we are respectfully requesting that the current zoning laws be amended to specify that eight or fewer persons who reside in a group home be allowed. Thank you very much for allowing me to testify. ALAMEDA:Thank you. Any questions for the testifier? Sure, Commissioner McCall? MCCALL:On your facility up in Kaumana, would you be willing to go through and get a special permit to allow, you know, go through a public hearing to allow that to have more than five? MICHELL:I wouldn’t have any objection to that, although I can say that we are certified by Adult Mental Health Division, we’re monitored very closely. If there are any discrepancies when they do do their observations, there are plans of corrections and so forth. But we certainly wouldn’t have any objection to that, no. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Watanabe? WATANABE:Yeah. But as a follow-up to Mr. McCall’s question, I believe special use permits are only permitted in ag areas; and I’m not sure if that area is in a ag district. Am I correct in that? YUEN:You said Kaumana or Kaumana City? MICHELL:It’s up at Kaumana on Amau Road, A-m-a-u. Maybe my pronunciation is incorrect. It’s Upper Kaumana. YUEN:I don’t know that area. Norman, what do you think? Is that State Land Use Urban? Amau Road, I don’t know where that is. ALAMEDA:Across 7-Eleven? YUEN:Sorry, where? HAYASHI:Is that in the vicinity of Wilder Road? MICHELL:Yes, it is. Yes, Wilder Road I believe it is, yeah. HAYASHI:Then that, if I’m not mistaken, that area could be zoned for Single-Family Residential use. YUEN:How big is the lot? MICHELL:I’m not sure the exact dimensions of the lot. I know the dimensions of the house, approximately 2,500 square feet. EXHIBIT D 10 YUEN:Is the house, is it in a neighborhood that looks like a single-family residential neighborhood of normal sized ag lots? MICHELL:Yes, yes. YUEN:I don’t know for sure the area but I think it’s in the State Land Use Urban District; and that means that they couldn’t apply for a special permit. MICHELL:Okay. ALAMEDA:Thank you. Any other questions? I have one. Gary, the question was asked earlier about the Department of Health’s criteria. From what I understand it’s pretty stringent. Would you like to comment on the criteria to actually, some of the criteria that maybe Commissioner Siracusa might be referencing to, to get it licensed from the Department of Health? MICHELL:If the facility needs to be licensed, we have one facility that is licensed by the Office of Health Care Assurance and there is a process that we have go through. For example, they look at the cesspools, for example. That has always been an issue. They look at staffing. Houses that need to be licensed, need to, again, be under the scrutiny of Office of Health Care. Their registered dietician, for example, there usually have to be a nurse involved in our particular case. So there are a variety of issues that need to be addressed before a house can be licensed. ALAMEDA:How about the number of rooms. Is that to be ADA-compliant, all of those other examples? MICHELL:Not necessarily. We have some of our houses that are HUD-funded by the Federal government that must be ADA-approved; but houses that are licensed do not necessarily have to be ADA-approved. ALAMEDA:Okay. YUEN:Do they check the size of the rooms. Is there a requirement for the size of rooms, number of people in a room? MICHELL:Yes, they do. Department of Health allows a maximum of two per room. ALAMEDA:Okay. Thank you. Any questions, Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:Yes. Well, I’m thinking about the situation here where on a one-acre parcel with two dwellings, you’re looking at eight people plus two staff, so that’s 10 all together. And I’m wondering whether that parcel has a septic system as opposed to a cesspool because that would come down to 10 and 10, 20 people; and that’s like five gallons a day of water which EXHIBIT D 11 would put them in the EPA requirement for septic. It’s what, 100 gallons a day usage I think is one of the criteria. YUEN:The home would have to follow all other regulations; and if it, so it would have to follow whatever wastewater regulations applied. ALAMEDA:All right. SIRACUSA:But we don’t know at this point whether there’s a septic on the property or it’s a cesspool? YUEN:Well, we’re not dealing with any particular home or application here. All I can say is that if this passes, the home will still have to follow any other applicable regulations. And, so, if -. SIRACUSA:At this point it’s all theoretical. YUEN:Yeah, well, when it becomes actual, then, as I say, the homes has to follow the other regulations, including limits on wastewater disposal. So if it doesn’t pass that, it can’t be used, just as same though as any other occupancy of the home. SIRACUSA:Thank you for explaining that. ALAMEDA:Thank you, Commissioner Siracusa. Any other questions for Gary before I let him go? Seeing none, thank you for testifying today. Mr. Landis, Dr. Landis, did you get a chance to state your name and address for the record? LANDIS:My name is Dan Landis. My address is 17-123 Palula Place in the Keaau Ag Lots. I’m a research psychologist, social psychologist, whatever you want to call it. I retired about four years ago but I try to keep active by my research. One thing I’d like to, first of all I’d like to thank the Commission for allowing us to come over and for being as patient as you are. You say we’re patient, you’re patient, too, having stuck around this long. We in the Ag Lots have a problem and we’d like your help in solving that problem. The problem is that we see a slippery slope developing here. That is, number one, I would confidently say to you that there’s no evidence of the magic number eight of being a sufficient or necessary number to treat these kids. It could be eight, it could be seven, it could be five, it could be six, it could be, the numbers seem to have just been pulled out of the air; and I would say probably the Department of Health doesn’t have any evidence that that’s an optimum number. That may be for their funding, so extra funding stream; it may have something to do with that. But I would guarantee that it doesn’t have anything to do with the therapeutic effectiveness of what they’re doing. So I would suggest that you’d be very, very careful about approving any number above five. I personally like the idea of a variance. Director Yuen says that’s not possible but I wonder if we ought to maybe take a look at that and investigate it a little bit further. EXHIBIT D 12 I’m also worried about the phrasing of this particular amendment, particularly the phrase “department of health licensing approval.” My understanding from looking at the research over the last God knows how many years is that these types of community programs work best when there is community support, and I mean community support in the immediate area. That takes time, I would suggest to you. That takes time to develop. There are ways to develop it. I’m a fairly new newcomer to Hawai`i but I know enough about Hawai`i to know that there are ways in which you talk story, and where you get the community together and you go over and over and over, and you resolve these disputes. It takes time, probably a year before you even open up the house. Then you’ve got the community support. As it stands now with the way this is read, if I interpret it correctly, and I could be wrong, I’ve been wrong before, my wife keeps telling me that I’m wrong sometimes, is that all they need to do is get the Department of Health’s support. And once you’ve got that support, that certification, so on, it doesn’t make any difference whether the community supports it or not. But I’m sure there’s no provision in the Department of Health that they have to come and get community support. So they just simply move in whether it’s five, or eight, or ten, or whatever number. It also trumps any CC&R’s that might be existing in the development. You might have a CC&R that might prohibit it; and we happen to think our CC&R’s do prohibit this activity. But you might get a CC&R that specifically prohibits this activity, but the Department of Health certification would trump that. They come in, they buy and they’re on their way. So having said that, I also suggest, since we’re talking about the Keaau Ag Lots, that you take a look at the history of the Ag Lots. And I don’t know that much about it but other people do. And they tell me the history involves the Puna Sugar and the fact that these lots were made available to the workers in lieu of their last salary; and it was designed to provide a retirement and a long-term home for many of those workers; and many of those workers are still in the Ag Lots. A number of them have turned over, like our property, and so on. But a lot of them are still there; and many of them couldn’t come today, and they will be there at the Hilo meeting. They couldn’t come because they work, or otherwise. So I would ask you to be sensitive to that history. And people are very upset. Every meeting we’ve had, and I’m on the association board. I was one of those when they said with those who don’t want to be on the board sit down, I couldn’t sit down fast enough. So I’m on the board. But more importantly, every meeting we’ve had the vote has been virtually unanimous against this facility, and those meetings included representatives of Marimed. And I think the first vote was 50 to 1, the second vote was something like 80 to 1; and every time we’ve had a meeting, if you know association meetings, you know you’re lucky if you get this number of people to turn up. And on this issue we’ve had incredibly number of folks turn up; and they are very upset and very outraged about this facility coming into our development. And it doesn’t mean that we’re opposed to a facility that provides treatment for these kinds of children. We think that they’ve gone about it the wrong way, we think that it doesn’t fit with any of our development, it violates our CC&R’s and the number of other things that we’ve talked about. EXHIBIT D 13 So, with that, I will shut up. Pardon me, I’m an old college professor and I never know when to shut up. ALAMEDA:Are there any questions for our old college professor, Mr. Landis? Seeing none, thank you for your testimony. Appreciate your coming out to Kona today. Next testifier, would you please state your name and address for the record. THURMAN:Yes, my name is Larry Thurman. I live at 17-324 Palaai Street in Keaau, the Keaau Ag Lots. ALAMEDA:Thank you, Larry. You may proceed. L. THURMAN:Before I get into my statement, I made a note here a little bit ago. I want to revisit the eight versus five number again. At one of our very first community meetings that we had, I recall the person from Marimed standing up and saying, “Well, we’ve got to have eight because it’s not cost-effective at five.” But nobody seemed to have brought that up; but I find it very ironic that the Director’s proposal comes up with the same number eight as that person from Marimed did. I had a 30-year career in law enforcement in California. I retired as the equivalent of a police chief in Hawai`i; and after that I went into private investigation and did defense work for another five or six years. And during that time I became very familiar with programs like this, not only for children but for adults. And I’m here to tell you that there are very well intentioned and I support the programs; but there are places to place them and there are places not to. The politically correct term for kids like this is “children at risk;” and when you have a program like this, you have situations like Mr. Carter brought up about the three kids that walked away from over there. You have many of those. Unfortunately, some of those when they leave they decide to break into homes, they decide to steal cars, and that type of situation. But the biggest problem is, is that in addition to those eight people that live in that house, they have friends that are going to find where that’s at, and they’re going to come over and try to visit them. So you’ll have more than just those eight and it’s a constantly rising thing. Now the great majority of the people in the Keaau Ag Lots are my age or older; and they don’t need to be worrying about leaving stuff out and it walking off. They don’t need to be worrying about their houses getting broke into when they’re not at home. For those reasons, I’m really opposed to this. And like it or not, that’s going to happen; and like it or not, a lot of these kids are going to be referred to this program as a condition of probation because of some criminal activity with the juvenile authority, with the court authority, before they got there. And that’s all I have to say. ALAMEDA:Thank you, sir. Questions? Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:Yes. Do you think that with two adult staff living in the house, they would have better control over what’s happening if they were only five clients, or students, or children in the facility rather than eight? Is eight spreading, do you think that eight is spreading EXHIBIT D 14 a little thin? And, for example, if there had been five instead of eight, would those three girls have been able to get away, would there have been more supervision? L. THURMAN:I think the only way that you can guarantee that they’re not going to have situations like Mr. Carter is if you have one supervisor for each attendant there and they have a leash on them. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:No thank you. ALAMEDA:Thank you, sir, thank you for your testimony. Thank you for coming out, appreciate it. All right. We have Sarah Ho, Richard Walker and Marilyn McIntosh. Please come forward? Please raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth now before the Hawai`i County Planning Commission? TESTIFIERS:I do. ALAMEDA:Okay. Thank you. All right, we can start from on my left. Ma’am, could you please state your name and address for the record? HO:Sure. My name is Sarah Ho. I reside at 75-5529 Hahai Street in Holualoa. ALAMEDA:Thank you. Did you provide us with a written testimony? HO:No. I did not. I just came this morning. ALAMEDA:Thank you for coming. You may proceed. HO:If I may just share my perspective. I am a mental health consumer in recovery by bipolar disorder. I have taught recovery courses islandwide and on Maui Island. I co-facilitate two support groups and probably am acquainted with, between 3- and 400 mental health consumers islandwide. So I have a perspective of the spectrum of recovery that is perhaps new to most of the members of the Commission here. Clearly, not all of us in recovery are young children. There is a very serious housing shortage for persons with mental health issues. We, with mental health issues, many of us have made some poor and self-destructive choices in our lives. We are attempting to get out from under those choices and get our lives back. We also, almost to a person, I, in fact, cannot think of any exception to this, we have had in our early childhood adverse experiences that have affected the way we’re able to learn, function, deal with the world. We are looking for a second chance. We are looking to get our lives back; and I see people over and over again who are doing that. The opportunity to live in a home rather than on the streets of Kailua, and I should mention that it is not only the Keauhou home that would be affected by a decision change by this Commission, but there are other housing group home facilities in the Kailua-Kona area which could provide extra beds for people who are currently homeless and in need. A person who’s living on the street EXHIBIT D 15 becomes desperate, frightened, as Gary said, decompensates rather easily. It’s easy to get drugs on the street, it’s easy to fall back into despair on the street. If one has a place to come to at the end of the day, a place literally to lay one’s head, it can go a very long way towards supporting the belief that recovery and a better life are possible. I think that this change, although it seems rather small just to go from five to eight beds in a house, we’re talking then of three extra beds in a number of houses, and each one those represents an individual’s life. That person’s life might be turned around by the opportunity to be in a home rather than on the street. And I think that kind of change is part of what we all want to do in the world, to make it a more humane and welcoming place. So I would urge the Commission to consider approving this County-wide shift on behalf of all of us in recovery. Thank you for hearing me out. Appreciate it. ALAMEDA:Thank you, Sarah. Appreciate your testimony. Any other -? Commissioner Graham, for Sarah? GRAHAM:Just a piece of information, thank you for your testimony. You did mention the decision by this Commission. I just want to let you know, and everybody here, that my understanding is because it’s an amendment to the Zoning Code, the County Council will make the decision. So we’re just having a hearing today, we’ll be having a hearing in Hilo, and then we’ll make a recommendation to them; but they will make the final decision. So it’ll be awhile. HO:Thank you for that clarification. ALAMEDA:Any questions for Ms. Ho? Seeing none, thank you so much for coming. You may be seated. HO:Thank you very kindly. ALAMEDA:Ma’am? Please state your name and address for the record? MCINTOSH:Hi. I’m Marilyn McIntosh. My address is P.O. Box 2008, Kealakekua, Hawai`i. I’m the Director of Behavioral Health Services for the Big Island Substance Abuse Council. I really can’t speak on the Keaau Ag Lots; and we’re not running an adolescent program right now in the way of a residential or therapeutic living facility for adolescence. But I do want, I can comment that the report that Sarah just gave hits everything on the head that I was going to say, also. We deal with people coming in who are homeless, who have no way up unless we can help them by giving them a home to start structuring their lives again. Yes, some of these people are referred by probations, paroling authorities, Big Island Drug Court; but the homes help to give them back their lives. And with the help of such people as Probation, Big Island Drug Court, and the Paroling Authorities, we have a stronger leash on these people, to use the term that was earlier used “leash.” It’s very, very helpful. Those people out in the community that he was earlier speaking of, “high risk,” they are out in your community already. If we can get them in to EXHIBIT D 16 therapeutic living programs, we can get them off the street, we can lower crime, as mentioned in the West Hawai`i article today that Virginia Isbell brought in, 80 percent of crime can come down in your own backyards. As far as the number eight, it’s not a magical number, it’s not a therapeutic number. It’s a number of needs. Right now there are people on waitlists who are seeking help, who want treatment, who want recovery, who want their lives back. And we have waitlists of people wanting to get in; and they fall in between the cracks and we lose them. We try to re-integrate back into the community. That’s why we’re looking at houses versus putting them out into the boondocks, segregate it from society. We’d like to see these people come back into the society as contributing members. BISAC is working with the standards of the Department of Health, Alcoholic and Drug Abuse Division. We’re audited. They come out to our facilities and check them on a quarterly basis, so we have those standards to come by. We have rules and regulations already in place for our houses. We have policies and procedures that we follow. With that I’m going to end. ALAMEDA:Thank you. Any questions for Ms. McIntosh? Seeing none, thank you for your testimony, really appreciate it. You may be seated. Sir, will you please state your name and address for the record? WALKER:Yes. My name is Richard Walker. My address is 35-1805 Kapehu Road, Papaaloa; and I may be able to shed some light on some questions that were asked of residents of the Keaau Ag Lots earlier. Mr. Yuen mentioned that the planning had begun for a change, making this an amendment over a year ago and indicating that that ruled Marimed out as a focus. But, in fact, Marimed has been operating on this island for a couple of years now. They’ve been in Papaaloa. They first bought the property in our neighborhood in July of 2004 and began operations around October of that year. It was a big surprise to us because they made no attempt to outreach; and, consequently, they earned the enmityof most of the neighborhood, except for there is one homeowner that has been working with them in having the youths pave and haul gravel and so forth for him. But as is the case in Keaau Ag Lots, otherwise, it’s unanimous that they’re not appreciated based on our experience with them, both their attitude toward the neighborhood and in our experiences with their people escaping, and traffic issues, noise issues, and so forth. I can shed a little light on the Department of Health requirements. In the earlier testimony stated that there was a limit of two per room. However, at the facility in our neighborhood, they have one large unitwith bunk beds. So that may be that they’re following different rules than the mental health situation. Also, in terms of Department of Health issues, they bought the property which is on catchment, as all of our properties are, and only later discovered after making their investment that the County, or rather the State Department of Health was going to require them to be on County EXHIBIT D 17 water, which, of course, is impossible. So now they’re spending a great deal of their funding on trucking water, and all the times we have big water trucks coming up. So there seems to be a difference of approach between a lot of these mental health things and the Marimed Corporation itself. They seem to be good in making enemies and alienating those whose neighborhoods they’ve entered. I wish it were otherwise, because I think we can all agree that this is a need that needs to be served. But I don’t know if they’re the low bidder, or the only bidder that’s attempting this sort of operation but it has proven pretty unpleasant for those that have to be around it. And the idea of trying to re-define what a family is as a way of increasing their ability to obtain funding on a per structure basis seems unfortunate, because it seems an unnecessarily broad net. Simply the fact that they are licensed by the Department of Health seems a little cavalier, based on what appears to me and many others the difference in their methods compared to some of the other examples we’ve heard today. So re-defining family, Mr. Yuen has said that there are many ways to go about it. But I can’t understand that this is the right one to try to re-define what a family is, simply by eight unrelated individuals sharing a living space. One might ask how many feathers do I need before you tell me I have a duck. It doesn’t follow; and it doesn’t make sense to a lot of people on the face of it, I think we’ve heard today. So I understand you’ll be going forward with this and hearing testimony from others on the other side of the island. I, myself, drove over to be here. But it may be that there’s another way of approaching this that might be fairer and take into account situations and the appropriateness of the way the people might take off with this, if they can stuff more people into a house through bunk beds, or whatever. And I’d be happy to answer any other questions about our experiences with this particular organization. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Graham? GRAHAM:I just wanted to ask Jeff in regard to the testimony, since we heard about two Marimed facilities now in Papaaloa as well as Keaau, I’m wondering if they have been cited for, you know, violations of our Zoning Code, or whether they’ve ever come to you for a special permit which they could apply for in order to be in conformance with the Ag District? DARROW:I’m not familiar with any violation or complaint from them previously when I was working as a zoning inspector. Do you know if they’re operating with more than five unrelated people? WALKER:I understand that, you know, in our zoning, which is Ag, that they are automatically able to operate with up to eight as it is currently. YUEN:I don’t know what the situation is in Marimed and Papaaloa. I don’t know anything about it. Aside from knowing that there’s a Marimed in Papaaloa, I don’t know anything about it. DARROW:It’s something we can look into and find out what the situation is there. EXHIBIT D 18 WALKER:Yeah, as far as violations we are aware of the, you know, various police issues, and so forth, when they have to go up there. ALAMEDA:Seeing no further questions -. Oh, you have a question, Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:Yeah. I’m involved with Pahoa Weed and Seed; and part of what our group’s focus is trying to increase the amount of treatment facilities and intervention opportunities. I very much support treatment facilities, especially ones that are homey and not institutional looking, which would drive me crazy if I was in one of them. And, yet, I’m not sure what the best way is to implement situations like that. The Director said that there were more, there was more than one way to do this; and I sure would like to hear what all the options are, first. For, you know, like having, I can understand -. All right, you know, I’m on boards of non- profits, I understand that you can only serve so many people with “x” amount of money, you know. And, so, if it takes eight residents in a home to be, to make it cost-effective because of what your funders require, for example, that you serve a minimum number of clients, then there still has to be some other possibilities. And I would like to have the options spread before me like a smorgasbord so we can see what we have there, rather than just have one possibility, you know, change the definition to family and not be told what the other options are. Would you care to address that, Director? ALAMEDA:Mr. Director? YUEN:Well, as an over-arching kind of framework, you either have a permitted, something is either a permitted use or you have some special kind of procedure to allow it, or you don’t allow it at all. So this approach is that it would be, you know, up to eight would be a permitted use. Another option is that, it could require a use permit which would require coming before the Planning Commission on a case-by-case basis. Another option, if you want a smorgasbord, would be to allow nine, or ten, or seven, or six. You know, there’s a whole range of options. SIRACUSA:And variances. You forgot variances. YUEN:Variances are different. Please, I don’t want to spend, you know, a long time talking about what a variance is; and it would be difficult to call this a variance. ALAMEDA:Commissioner McCall? MCCALL:I guess mostly comments and then -. I know I’m not supposed to be testifying, but I guess I will anyway. Hopefully, it’ll come out with a question, Chris. I’m generally uncomfortable. I mean, I do see the need for treatment facilities. You can attest that there is, you know, that they are very valuable to the people being treated and that putting them in a community setting is part of the treatment; and that it is very valid. But, given that, I have a problem when you put any treatment facility in a residential neighborhood or any neighborhood. You are affecting all the neighbors. And saying that these people are out there anyway is not EXHIBIT D 19 really -. You are concentrating, I don’t want to call them trouble-, you know, some might be troublemakers, some might be, you know, whatever. But you are concentrating them in an area. And given the current situation, and I think that these treatment facilities, to some, they have a bad name because they are not controlling these individuals. I think enough people can attest to, you know, times when people, kids run away. We heard about that in Keaau Ag Lots, that kind of thing. I guess my point is what needs to be done is the, I would like to see, number one, public hearings for any type of thing. If the use permit route is the way to go, that would make a lot more sense to me than changing the definition of family. And I would like to see these treatment facilities, I know it’s going to cost more but I think the treatment facilities need to figure out a way that they will be a benefit and an asset to the community. And if they can be an asset to the community, the communities will bring them in and will want them in their community. But that is not the case at this point in time, you know. If the treatment facilities can become, you know become wanted in the communities then they won’t have a problem as a public hearing. But I feel that the public needs, and I think this is a good example, the public needs to have a say in what is happening here.So I think this is the wrong route to go. I think the right route is something like a special permit type of situation that will give the public the ability to have a say with what happens in their community. And they would change the treatment facilities so that they will become an asset to the community. In a way, if I can make a question of it is, is there a way, Chris, to, you know -? That would be the way I would want to support it, if we have something that’s more of a special permit, that’s the route. YUEN:Let me explain -. ALAMEDA:Any other questions for the testifier? Seeing none, thank you. You may be seated. YUEN:You want to finish the testimony before we have this discussion because we can have -. MCCALL:I’m sorry. I thought we did have the testimony. ALAMEDA:Actually, we have one more testifier. MCCALL:Okay, I’m sorry. ALAMEDA:Sir? WALKER:Just on the subject of changing the definition of family, it just seems so far from normality when, in our case, the family has 18-aged sons all with history of behavioral disorders, drug abuse and criminal activity to described that in the same, with the same word as what we would think of as being a healthy growing up environment or want for a neighbor. It’s two different things compared to some of the mental health adult sorts of things that we’ve heard about. I’d like to contrast that and make sure that there’s a distinction made. Thanks. ALAMEDA:All right. Thank you, and you may be seated. One more testifier. Richard Thurman? Thank you for waiting patiently. Richard, could you please raise your right EXHIBIT D 20 hand. You swear or affirm to tell the truth now before the Hawai`i County Planning Commission? R. THURMAN:I do. ALAMEDA:Okay, again, please state your name and address for the record? R. THURMAN:My name is Richard Thurman. My address is 17-204 Meaulu, Keaau, Hawai`i. Thank you for taking the time to listen to us. Unfortunately, I’m the last one up and probably the longest winded of us all. Is it okay to introduce evidence? ALAMEDA:Did we have that as part of our packet? What’s the title of it? R. THURMAN:This happens to be from the Planning Department. ALAMEDA:I think we might already have it. R. THURMAN:A letter from Marimed Corporation, and then also a letter from Mr. Chris Yuen in rebuttal or an answer to that letter. ALAMEDA:Jeff, could you take a look at that, please? Mr. Thurman, you did give us a letter. Did you send us a letter of your testimony already? R. THURMAN:I probably sent a couple of letters and a couple of emails, and at the County level and at the State level. ALAMEDA:Okay. So just let me ask Jeff. If we don’t have it, if you could attach it to his letter? Would that be appropriate? DARROW:You mean, to make copies? What I can do is pass them around now. We can pass it around now; and then we can go ahead and make copies for the Commissioners for the next meeting. So, at least at this point, we can see, you folks can take a look at it. ALAMEDA:Okay. Thank you. You may proceed, sir? R. THURMAN:Thank you. First of all, I’m from California. I’ve lived in Hawai`i, going on four years now. I am a home builder. Remodeling is what I do for a living. I’m somewhat familiar with the building codes and the ordinances here of the County of Hawai`i, just completing a house in Keaau Ag Lots. The reason I built the house in Keaau Ag Lots was I built the house. I live in a house for a couple of years, and then I sell that house, and I move on; and I build another house. I do one at a time, I do it right, and then I move to the next one. I entered into the Keaau Ag Lots specifically because it is zoned and the CC&R’s specifically specify that there are no commercial businesses allowed in there, to include me. Because as a building contractor I cannot even use my own home address as an operational address because commercial businesses are not allowed in the Keaau Ag Lots. The Keaau Ag Lots, and there’s a good reason why. First of all we have the brand new Kamehameha School right across the street EXHIBIT D 21 from us. We have the Keaau Elementary School right down the hill from us. We have the brand new Keaau Intermediate School that’s to our back door; and then we have the Keaau High School that is just another quarter of a mile away from that. And here we have a company or corporation that’s non-profit that’s wanting to put at-risk children in the middle of all four of our schools, knowing full well and acknowledging that there was a situation developing when they came in and purchased the residence with this in mind. And I think Mr. Yuen addresses that very adequately in his response to their request. And if you’ll note that in Marimed’s letter that you’ll notice that they requested this information at the time they entered into escrow, not at the time of the date of the original purchase of the home. As far as amending or changing the number from five to eight in a residence, we’re beating around the bush here. We know the reason why we’re here. This got put on the agenda because Marimed wants to move into the Keaau Ag Lots, and they want to open it up; and they need eight persons per house in order to make it work. Well, the two-story house up front is a five-bedroom home; and if you put two beds per occupant, then you have it. However, the staff is supposed to be 24-hour staff and they’re supposed to be on duty. So now, where’s the staff going to sleep, number one? Number two, how many staff is going to be out there, according to the proposed amendment? And number three, we have a two-bedroom home that is in the back of the big house that you’re going to get another eight people in? Now I understand that the Department of Health is supposed to regulate, and supposed to come out and inspect, and they’re supposed to making all these changes. Well, under this amendment, what happens to the Fire Department coming out and looking? What happens to ADA coming out and looking? What happens to excessive no on-site parking? As a builder, and I did a lot of commercial stuff on the mainland, I’m very familiar with ADA requirements and Code requirements under ADA. And these houses, I mean, I can even get down to where they’ve got to have 32” doors for interior doors, none of the accessways can have more than two percent grade. They do not have any outside elevators, all the windows upstairs do not pass egress codes, there are no fire escapes, there’s no two-way out. I mean, I can go on and on in this situation, as far as this particular -. And I understand and appreciate why it’s being presented in this fashion. However, it is just the way around to be able to get operations started. In the family code, it passed as the ag designated area. And we were quite told blank-and-blank, we’re going to open up a garden and we’re going to have 16 people maintaining a garden in the back of this house so we can comply with the Ag Code. He stood right in front of 50 or 60 people and made the statement, no problem, this is the way we’re going to do it; and if you don’t like it, oh, well. Now I had a real problem with that. And then, when the gentleman stood up and threatened me with a ADA civil lawsuit and said, “Well, if you don’t let us in, we’re going to sue you because you’re discriminating against the handicapped, then I really had a big problem with that. And I can go on and on, but you’re going to get to hear me in Hilo, so I will shut up, and let you read the letter. I have safety issues, I have they’re near the schools, the man offered to sell it back at a profit in less than a year, the overcrowding, the houses don’t even come close to being able to comply, they don’t have enough square footage, they knew right upfront and they EXHIBIT D 22 acknowledged that the CC&R’s did not comply and as a builder and developer, the CC&R’s were civil legally binding contracts. And I don’t know how the folks over here write legally binding contracts but usually when they’re done signed and signed up by the County and accepted by the County, those CC&R’s are usually in compliance. Well, now, we have a company that wants to come in and route around the CC&R’s and go around the compliance of a CC&R, a legal binding contract. Any questions? ALAMEDA:Any questions? SIRACUSA:Are you going to pass that? ALAMEDA:Seeing no further questions -. WATANABE:Not of the applicant. I have a question for the Director. ALAMEDA:Okay. Hold on now. I want to just thank our testifier for coming out today, and I’m sure we’ll see you in Hilo. Thank you, again, for your testimony, sir. Commissioner Watanabe? WATANABE:Yeah, and I’m wondering because they may have a point with the CC&R’s, not so much as a matter of saying that this particular, ‘cause they seem to be taking this very personally as it’s only directed to this one and just this one subdivision; and I don’t believe that was the intent. And, however, what I’m thinking is that the Association would, indeed, have some enforcement rights through the CC&R’s, through the court system, in spite of this proposed amendment. What’s your take on that? YUEN:The enforcement of the covenants is a private matter to be taken to the courts. The County does not enforce private covenants. WATANABE:Yeah, I understand that. But what I’m saying is because the CC -, if they really feel strongly the CC&R, say, prohibit this, they could in that case then take this through the courts and see if the judge would agree with them. And, in spite of this, so this amendment could go through, yeah, it could affect other areas that possibly don’t have CC&R’s, or where there isn’t as much hostility with the neighborhood, within the neighborhood; and for those areas where they do have, well, they might have some recourse anyway through the court systems, which wouldn’t apply to anything that we’re doing. But it could be a vehicle for them, available vehicle for them to stop something like this? YUEN:Right. You can have something that’s permitted by the Zoning Code; and if there’s a covenant against it and if it is in other respects enforceable, then they can take it to a private, to a court and get enforcement. The question of enforcements of covenants as a, one of, yeah, there’s a lot of reasons why we don’t get into it. But I have to say that, number one, it’s a very much legal matter. The courts tend to look at the covenants very, as to draw them as narrowly as possible, they give them as a narrow a scope as possible. Second, if the court finds that there have been, that the covenant has generally not been enforced in the past, the court will not enforce the covenant. And it’s not possible for us to sit in the, typically in the Planning EXHIBIT D 23 Department and be able to answer those kinds of questions. But what you’re saying is absolutely correct in that just because the Zoning Code has been amended to allow something, if it does, in fact, violates covenants and if those covenants are enforceable, the judge can say that notwithstanding what the Zoning Code says it’s not, the judge is not going to allow it. PUBLIC:Mr. Chair, may I say something? ALAMEDA:No, you may not. Sorry, your testimony is over. Once you give testimony, see you in Hilo, once you give testimony, that’s your chance. So you want to think about all the -. PUBLIC:All my comments -. ALAMEDA:Yeah, I’m sorry. That’s going to be out of order. I apologize for that, sir. You may want to bring it up in Hilo’s meeting, though. Commissioner Watanabe? WATANABE:Oh, no follow-up. I just wanted to hopefully put on the record and point out that, you know, in spite of this, the public, to some degree, does have recourse, assuming they have, like in this case, a protective covenant. ALAMEDA:Okay. Other comments? Okay. Moving forward, our next -. What’s our next step? Okay, so in terms of this particular agenda item, we’ll revisit it at our next meeting in Hilo or –? YUEN:Just, Jeff McCall had a question I thought we -. ALAMEDA:Okay. YUEN:Just to briefly explain my own thinking on this. I always, I get to the, I think ahead to the end result; and the end result I think as a community is that we want to have facilities like this and we want to have them ultimately in residential areas. So the question is what is the process? I have to say that I can’t think of any reason why it would be better in one neighborhood, if you look at the range of residential neighborhoods, why it would be better in one neighborhood than another? I haven’t heard any reason to tell me why it’s worse to have this in Keaau Ag Lots than in Paradise Park, or Piihonua, or Wainaku, or Kaumana. You introduce a use permit process, for one thing you’ve been there. You can, a neighbor can request a Contested Case Hearing. We have what typically involves attorneys.It can involve an appeal to Circuit Court after a decision on the Contested Case Hearing. It has often been a process that’s, that even to get back to the Commission is nine months; and then the appeal to court can be another nine months. You’re introducing a process that makes it much more difficult to establish these kinds of facilities. And I say I don’t see, the objections that I hear from, apart from the covenants which are a private matter and not something that we could consider, I don’t see a reason why you would say it’s good in one kind of neighborhood and not good in any kind of neighborhood. ALAMEDA:Follow-up? EXHIBIT D 24 MCCALL:Yeah. I do in some ways I agree with you, but I do also feel that the public should be involved in this. Because, otherwise, to me it is a taking, you know, of people’s property rights. And I, I don’t know, I just feel that the public, I just, in my opinion, the public should be involved; and, to me, that’s one way to force these facilities to do a better job, that they are not a detriment to the community but an asset. ‘Cause I think that can be done. ALAMEDA:Mr. Torigoe, before I entertain further comments on this issue, it kind of sounds like with Commissioner McCall’s end statement that we might be moving into discussion which may not be part of our protocol. How much more of a discussion should we entertain at this point, given that they will be mentioned again in Hilo? ‘Cause we could start debating now and, you know, take us to the end of the wee hours, but -. TORIGOE:I don’t think you want to do that but -. WATANABE:You might be still here at the Hilo meeting. TORIGOE:No, I mean, you’re taking testimony; and you should be discussing the merits on it if it’s pertinent to the testimony. You know, you can discuss it as you go. ALAMEDA:Okay. So if it’s pertinent to the testimony, then we’re in compliance with our own procedures. And just to let the testifiers know again, once we allow even a remark from one testifier, then we’re going to have to open it up and allow everybody else that same time. So just so you guys know I don’t want to be mean, but that’s the stuff, the protocol, so -. Commissioner Siracusa? SIRACUSA:I just want to say in relation to Commissioner McCall’s comments about involving community is that if you’re trying to bring these people back into the mainstream of society, bringing them back into community and that’s the reason why you choose this kind of homes in residential areas, then you can’t expect the community to accept them if you don’t do the initial outreach to the community and try to make that happen. It appears that Marimed has not done this. We had a situation with, is it Waters of Life Charter Schools? So it is coming in and not outreaching to the community first, just jumping in. And we’ve seen this before, and it seems that these people are going about it backwards where they should really be going and learning a community maybe calling some town meetings, or, you know, putting out what they want to do and put out some feelers and let people know, let the community know what they want to do and why, how important it is and what the advantages are to the community, what the drawbacks might be, you know, have an open process. And whenever you don’t have that, no matter how good the program is going to be, you’re going to have people who are suspicious simply because they feel that they’ve been left out of the process; and that’s no way to generate trust and community cohesion and bring people back into community. It’s a way to push the community away from these people; and I think that’s counter-productive. ALAMEDA:Commissioner Graham? EXHIBIT D 25 GRAHAM:Like Commissioner Watanabe, I’m going to almost for sure be missing the next Hilo meeting so I might just toss my comments now. In general, I feel very much like Commissioner McCall. To me, to do this is to take the public out of the process; and I don’t do that lightly. And the Planning Director’s comment a few minutes ago that he thought, you know, that there are places where it’s appropriate and in places where it’s inappropriate, I don’t think he’s correct on that. And evidence to me is like fairly close to where I live in North Kohala there is a residential living facility for people who are recently out of drug programs and that house is also in an ag district. There are nearby residences, maybe not so much as Keaau, but it operates well. I don’t think there are any problems with the community. It has been there for a number of years, it’s fine; and, obviously, the one in Keaau or Papaaloa is not fine given by what we see is going on. So I think it is location specific. It may be good or it may not be good depending where. ALAMEDA:Any other comments to put on the table now before we sign out for today? Are we due for a continuance? MCCALL:Do we just continue? We need to move or -? ALAMEDA:Yes. We don’t need to make a motion to continue this for, it’s already continued, right? TORIGOE:I think it’s being scheduled. But if you want to just see if there’s any objections to continuing this and if there’s none, then that’ll be it. ALAMEDA:Is there any objection to continuing this to the Hilo meeting? Seeing none, so noted. All right, thank you, our citizens of the Big Island, for showing up today. Appreciate your patience and your testimony. The discussion ended at 5:30 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Sharon M. Nomura, Secretary EXHIBIT D 26 EXHIBIT D 27