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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2024-10-09 Hāmākua CDP GP Q&AHāmākua CDP Action Committee General Plan (GP) Questions and Answers Wednesday, October 9, 2024 Land Use Q: Is the term “NIMBY” (Not In My Backyard) going to remain in the plan? A: The term “NIMBY” is used to describe a common dynamic in land use planning, where opposition to development can sometimes arise based on proximity, even when projects may align with broader community goals or environmental sustainability. While we understand that the term can carry a negative connotation, particularly for those who advocate for environmental preservation, our intention is not to criticize community members or environmentalists who raise legitimate concerns. Rather, it serves as a reflection of the challenges we face in balancing different perspectives on land use decisions. The County respects and values the input of environmental advocates and others in the planning process. We included the term “NIMBY” to foster an open discussion about the complexities of land use, not to cast judgment on any group. It’s important to us that all voices, especially those advocating for environmental stewardship, continue to be heard and respected as we move forward with planning efforts that prioritize sustainability, cultural preservation, and community well-being. Q: How are the Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND) Guidelines consistent with the Laupāhoehoe community? The community development planning process emphasized protecting the rural character of this area. (Reference to page 92, Table 21) A: TND guidelines are included in the GP as a resource to inform land use planning and encourage walkable, mixed-use communities that foster a sense of place. TND promotes pedestrian-friendly design, reduces reliance on cars, and enhances livability by incorporating public spaces and compact development patterns. The TND characteristics provide an option that could be applied in medium density urban (MDU), which is indicated by the darker orange in the proposed General Plan Land Use (GPLU) map below. Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 2 Q: What does junior department store mean in the context of the TND Character Guidelines (page 92)? A: A junior department store is a smaller-scale department store that offers a more limited selection of merchandise compared to larger, full-line department stores. It typically focuses on key categories like clothing, accessories, and home goods, and may cater to a specific niche or demographic. In the context of Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND), junior department stores are relevant because they provide convenient access to essential retail services within walkable, mixed-use communities. By offering a range of goods in a compact format, junior department stores align with the TND goal of promoting local, accessible commercial options that support the everyday needs of residents without requiring long-distance travel, thus contributing to a more sustainable and cohesive neighborhood environment. Transportation and Infrastructure Q: What does the objective regarding reducing vehicle miles traveled (VMT) mean for the community? (Reference to page 116, objective 19) A: This objective supports the County’s transportation goal to improve multimodal options and increase connectivity across the island. This objective speaks more to county actions and does not take away the individual freedom of owning a vehicle. Reducing VMT can be achieved Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 3 through various policies and actions that promote alternative modes of transportation, such as mass transit, bicycling, and walking. It involves collaboration among different departments and agencies to prioritize and design capital projects that support active transportation goals. The objective also includes making roadway designs more pedestrian-friendly and multimodal, updating traffic impact analysis requirements, and increasing community engagement around alternative transportation options. By implementing these strategies, the goal is to decrease dependency on personal vehicles, mitigate traffic congestion, and support sustainable transportation practices. Process Q: Will the County Council and Planning Commissions be allowed to make amendments to the plan? A: Chapter 16.1 of the 2005 General Plan outlines the process for the comprehensive review of the general plan. The Planning Commissions will review the plan and make recommendations related to amendments. The County Council ultimately adopts the general plan, but there have been recent questions discussed at Council as to their ability to make substantive changes prior to adoption. The general plan is intended to be a living document that can be amended. By way of example, the 2005 General Plan was amended in 2006 and 2007 to address and amend some elements that were not addressed when adopted in 2005. This process referred to as interim amendments is outlined in Chapter 16.2 of the 2005 General Plan. Q: What tool or formula is used to calculate “sustainability”? On page 32, one of its definitions is, “Strikes a balance among economic, social and community, and environmental priorities”. A: In the GP, sustainability is defined as achieving a balance among social, economic, and environmental priorities to ensure that current and future generations can thrive. This balance is not calculated through a one-size-fits- all approach but rather through careful consideration of the unique challenges and opportunities in each community, with a focus on long-term benefits. Communities island wide have expressed a desire to promote growth and development that supports the well-being of residents, protects our natural resources, and fosters economic resilience. Q: Define the term “stakeholder” and who are the stakeholders that are presenting these plans to the County? A: The final draft includes the definition of “stakeholder” on page 19 in the glossary of the plan: Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 4 Stakeholder is any individual, group, or organization that has an interest or concern in a particular project, decision, or activity and can be affected by its outcomes. Stakeholders can include a wide range of entities, such as employees, customers, suppliers, investors, government agencies, community members, and non-governmental organizations. They can influence or be influenced by the objectives, policies, and performance of an organization or project. Effective stakeholder engagement and management are crucial for the success and sustainability of any initiative, as it helps ensure that diverse perspectives and interests are considered. The term is not meant to single out private entities or specific interests, but rather to emphasize that all individuals, communities, and organizations who have a stake in the future of Hawaiʻi County are considered part of the planning process. Q: As citizens, do we get to have a back-and-forth dialogue regarding what the County is presenting? A: Yes, as citizens, you absolutely have the opportunity to participate in discussions about the draft. Throughout the process, we have held public meetings, workshops, and open houses to gather input and ensure that community voices are heard. We continue to welcome feedback through written comments, public testimony, and direct interactions with Planning staff. As we move forward, we encourage you to stay involved in upcoming Planning Commission meetings. Your participation helps shape the future of the County, and we are here to listen and work together on this important plan. Q: What happened to the idea of private property in the constitution? A: The General Plan is designed to respect and uphold the constitutional rights of property owners while providing a comprehensive framework for future growth and development that benefits the community as a whole. The purpose of the GP is to guide long-term land use decisions in a way that balances the protection of natural and cultural resources, sustainable growth, and the health, safety, and well-being of residents. The plan is meant to be broad and sets the vision for the County’s future while working within the legal boundaries established by federal and state laws, including protections for private property and due process. Importantly, the GP does not override existing property rights. Any regulatory measures that may arise would go through transparent processes that include public input, consideration of property rights, and adherence to laws. Q: Does our public testimony matter? A: Yes, all public testimony and comments submitted (written and verbal) are important to informing the comprehensive review process. All comments and are treated equally. We are now in the process of preparing the Final Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 5 Recommended GP for the Planning Commissions. All public input received will be packaged and submitted to the Planning Commissions. Next it will move to the County Council. Both the Commissions and Council will hold hearings and the public process will continue. General Comments • I reject the General Plan 2045 and shall not give my consent to accept or implement such a plan. It’s vague in my opinion and there’s a lot of non-transparency. One of the things that caught my attention as a part Native Hawaiian, is that you talk about our culture and how to protect it but they don’t say anything about who’s going to do it. Theres no identification of what experts that exist today that would have the ability to do that. There are only two areas in the plan where we talk about Hawaiian culture and things we protect. This plan violates the international laws as Hawaiʻi is under US military occupation since it was overthrown in 1893. • I would like to see the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights included at the beginning of the plan. As it stands, I reject the General Plan until it includes cannabis hemp as an agricultural economic engine and First Amendment spiritual sacrament. I watched the County destroy a very sustainable economy here. Marijuana eradication was proven to destroy the economy, eradicate cannabis and the people that grew it, and substituted meth and crime which still exist. The local culture has been harmed severely and newcomers are moving in. God bless everybody. I reject the UN and globalism and support local ideas. I think cannabis is why the best, safe, natural, and sustainable economic stimulus in 120 days we can have a multi-million dollar world famous cannabis harvest year like we used to. • I think General Plan 2045 is part of the Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. There’s a global ruling class that creates global problems so they can pedal global solutions that gives some power and wealth while making a [?]. • I thank you for your service in protecting our health and safety by guarding against federal overreach and corporate interests that seek to supersede those of your constituents. I have come to inform you that the approval of the Hawaiʻi County General Plan will constitute collusion with the dictates of the UN, the WHO, and the World Economic Forum and their unelected officiants. These are global agendas that far exceed their jurisdiction and do not address our dire local needs, best interests, or authority. The plan as an offshoot of set agendas runs contrary to and exceeds the bounds of our protected rights under the Constitution of the United States and the State of Hawaiʻi, the Bill of Rights, and the Hawaiʻi County Charter. Your approval of this plan would thereby be in breach of the public trust. Another reason to object this plan is because it will require all county departments to collaborate with the County Office of Sustainability, Climate, Equity, and Resilience (OSCER) as the lead agency to ensure the integration of the county’s goal of sustainability, climate, resiliency, and equity into all county operations and planning initiatives thereby possibly rendering null and void powers you all have at the present time or those of the lead agencies that we already have in place. The corporate interests and outside control Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 6 measures that permeate both the content and language of this top-down UN plan are in breach of said constitutional rights. The use of deceptive terms like onsite, affordable and workforce units, buffer zones, clusters, or smart cities, stakeholders, climate change resilience, etc. reveal the UN stand in the authorship of Hawaiʻi’s General Plan. To approve this plan will justify our call for your immediate removal from the offices you hold to be replaced. We demand your due diligence and request the continuance of the public comment period. • Pg 111, policy 17.4. If this plan goes through and you fill out a land use application to build something on their property, you will have to identify if your property has an existing or potential active living corridor that should be incorporated into the county open space network. To me that’s taking away land. That needs to be rejected completely, this is wrong. The Constitution and Bill of Rights protected our property. We need checks and balances right, please read this and read precisely things are not labeled, they’re not titled, and the director is asking why more power. • My comments are on agriculture. I didn’t see in reading the plan that actually talks about promoting self-sufficiency. I also want to comment on plan B. This plan assumes the economy is going to be just like it was and there’s no plan B in here. Reading the specifics of the plan, I didn’t see anything that encouraged people to grow their own food. All I know is the law just passed last year that no one knew about until they got a notice from the tax bureau that said their ag taxes and the exemptions that they’ve been enjoying on their ag property for self-sufficiency will no longer apply. So, I think that should be front and center on this plan – how this island should grow food for food sake and security not for money. • I think everyone should object. We have serious issues with the General Plan. The property tax thing I think that pretty well woke a lot of us up that something happened a year ago that’s going to result in like all over the country 30-40% increases all over the country in property taxes. That’s not sustainable for us, that’s not helpful for us, that’s not in the best of the people that live on the islands. We’re all going through this “scamdemic” thing since 2019 – lockdowns and massive economic impact. We have the price of food doubling in our stores and the County Council has the audacity to say we should pay more taxes. I got an issue with that and I think everybody should have an issue with that. We have a crisis here of people not being heard. We don’t feel like we’re being heard. Not that they haven’t met the deadlines [or] that it hasn’t been out there. I only got my copy of the General Plan a month ago to review. There’s a lot going on. I’m trying to feed my family too and a lot of us are working our butts off trying to, but we have major issues. I’m offended that our input and all the input since July – I get it- there’s been input allowed prior to this time – my input hasn’t been allowed. This directly affects my life, it affects everybody in here and if all these public hearings since July have no impact on the final General Plan, then what are we doing? I move that there be an extension at this time for public input and that other versions of the plan be seriously considered because a lot has happened since 2015. • The plan doesn’t sound like it has been authored here. At least the majority of it sounds a lot like Montana’s General Plan, Idaho’s General Plan, General Plans all Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 7 over the country and that’s not okay that global interests are dictating what happens, what’s best for us in Hawaiʻi. We need our time to have meaningful input on this plan. Please – we shouldn’t have to say please – we the people, all the power comes from the people. • This plan should be entirely rewritten. Terms like “stakeholder” and “clustered housing” are not appropriate and should be replaced with “homeowners” and “farmers”. • Page 118, “reduce vehicle miles traveled”. You told me this isn’t going to take away from rights, but reduce vehicle miles traveled – you can’t – we have the right to travel. It’s part of the Constitution and this is in our General Plan telling people that you’re going to reduce their miles traveled? That’s very concerning. The other thing is incentivize private land management practices that protect and enhance natural resources. So you’re telling us, this is about the possibility that you’re taking people’s land – you don’t tell us exactly you know where you’re going to be doing this. There are other things in here that are also extremely concerning and partly it’s about climate change. I want to know which one of you has researched climate change regardless of the fact that what is being said by the mainstream media. Did you know that almost 2,000 credential scientists, meteorologists, climatologists, geologists from around the world have signed a world declaration that you can look up. It states there’s no climate danger. Is Hilo underwater right now? Did you know there’s a patent for a hurricane direct that actually moves hurricanes and tornadoes and it is under US Patent [?]. It’s a US patent that literally states it can control the weather. They’ve been able to control the weather since the Vietnam War since the ‘60s. • The Earth is cooling down and if you want to know why this is happening, the reason why is because the stakeholders that run this country are invested in renewable energy. Do not put this plan through because this is not written by anybody on the Big Island. • I only recently found out about the General Plan and read it online. I was really disappointed that only a handful of people commented from our island of about 200,000 residents, which show very little awareness. I’m all for self sufficiency, food security, and taking care of the ʻāina. But I do not consent to this plan, as it’s just a few of you who are unelected making plans for all of us. Words used like cluster, stakeholder, sustainability are also used by United Nations Agenda 21 or 2030 and other general plans across the mainland and the world. I thought this was a non- binding agreement by the way. • Goals such as to acquire land and incentivize compliance through real property taxes for example are sneaking communist UN global governance to Hawaiʻi where the government owns all the land and propaganda and taxes are used to manipulate our behavior. This means our government is no longer working for we the people but working for the UN. Let’s educate ourselves on climate change by weather modification and geoengineering – these are real, you can look them up Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 8 • Our current Big Island mayor is a member of ICLEI. It means International Council of Local Environmental Initiatives. The “I” stands for international so that is not local. The global UN agenda is being adapted at a state local and county level. People are now being aware and being hurt financially and emotionally by this plan and this plan is unconstitutional in my opinion. This plan should be rejected in its entirety. Come up with your own organic local based plan for our island. • The definition of sustainability, which is on page 32, how do we calculate the balance that is included in this definition? Is there a practical tool that you use to establish that balance? I’ve seen some formulas for that give voice to environmental concerns and kind of balance. • I live in Laupahoehoe and on page 92, the Traditional Neighborhood Guidelines, when I was reading the characteristics there was nothing that reminded me of my own community. I was very involved in the community development planning process and I think the overwhelming sentiment about that was for at least for Laupahoehoe area to retain the rural character of the community and I just wasn’t seeing that in the traditional neighborhood character guidelines. For example, I don’t even know what a junior department store is. I’m concerned about honoring the hard work that people did in the community development process and their desire to maintain the rural aspect of the community and I’m not really seeing that. • Just recently this year Governor Green put out a desire for half of the food eaten in Hawaiʻi comes from Hawaiʻi by 2035 and those farmers would love to do that. We would love to support [that] we’d love to grow food. Keep the plan simple. It’s really hard right now with 250-page General Plan and Heather Kimball’s three new bills and with the County Council raising our taxes. With the new UN amendments coming to the building department, which is really going to change how we build things here. We just need the government to get out of the way and then we’ll do it. I feel like farmers need a lawyer just to sort out all this simplicity and it’s driving us into poverty. It’s time to overthrow the government. • A lot of good work has been done, I think that all of us in this room can agree on a lot of what’s in this plan. This is what we all want – we want a more livable place, we want less expenses, lower taxes, and we want to work together with government. I have three comments I’d like you to consider adding to the plan. First, there should be a section under the introduction, something like public private partnerships that talks about existing property rights. I really appreciate you sharing that if you have an existing property that’s zoned a certain way, that you can keep doing what you’re doing. I think that would take a lot of the charge out of people’s perception that this is some kind of a thing that came out of the UN, which we all know the UN’s been talking about this our whole lives. We all know we need to reduce our expenses and different things but nobody wants to be told how to live. • An important thing to add is a section that talks about the Hawaiian Kingdom’s property rights, the United States property rights, and the Bill of Rights. You’ve got Hāmākua General Plan Community Meeting Page 9 some recourses, due process. This is a General Plan and most of us are going to be gone while this thing continues to be implemented and other people that come after us are going to look at this and say well we’re going to change the zoning here because we can, it’s in the general plan. • The idea of and word “equity” should be stricken from this plan. It’s antithetical to meritocracy. The people who work for a living in this community are the people that need to be supported. Equity is a gray area. • There should be some comment made on if there are negative health consequences for microwave radiation which has to do with when you’re building urban areas they’re now blanketed with 4G and 4G LTE. 5G is not as bad as 4G and 4G LTE but we all have cell phones right, so we’ve all kind of given our consent that we want to have this ability with Wi-Fi. But the future for some people who are hyper electrosensitive is 2G and 3G talk and text only. So there’s no real comment about it. • Define the term “stakeholder” because it seems like outside stakeholders are determining and changing our quality of life. It seems like the people who live here do not have a say in their quality of life. • What happened to the idea of private property in the Constitution? Looking at an island with limited resources, we should be focused on self-sufficiency, growing our own food, sustainable agriculture, and animal husbandry. I’m concerned about all the regulations related to small farms. The regulations tend to put a ceiling on upward mobility so it just seems like the pressure is coming from above to squeeze out any creativity.