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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMIN RDC 2011-10-01 PH-WAIMEA.tif2011 HAWAII COUNTY REDISTRICTING COMMISSION DISTRICT 9 — WAIMEA PUBLIC HEARING Saturday, October 1, 2011, 2:00 p.m. Waimea Community Center 65-1260 Kawaihae Road, Kamuela, HI 96743 CALL TO ORDER: CHR. SIRACUSA: Good afternoon everybody. Thank you for taking the time to attend this public hearing of the Hawaii County Redistricting Commission for the district of Waimea. The Commission consists of nine volunteer members, one from each Council district. I will now ask them to state their name and the district they represent, so you know who you are talking to. ATTENDANCE: Present: Mr. Joseph Carvalho, Commissioner Mr. Patrick Kahawaiola' a, Commissioner Mr. Dru Mamo Kanuha, Commissioner Mr. Jeffrey Melrose, Commissioner Mr. Mike Middlesworth, Commissioner Ms. Rene Siracusa, Chair Ms. Valerie Poindexter, Commissioner Ms. Linda Ugalde, Commissioner Absent: Mr. Craig "Bo" Kahui, Commissioner Also Present: Michael Udovic, Deputy Corporation Counsel Jeanette Aiello, Committees Supervisor Stephanie Tsunezumi, Committees Staff Maile David, Legislative Research Branch Karen Eoff, Secretary CHR. SIRACUSA: We have each shared our district's concerns with each other, so that we are all on the same page. Based on that, plus your input, we will decide the geographic boundaries for each of the nine council districts based upon census data as well as the criteria found in the Hawai` i County Charter and Legislation passed by the Hawaii County Council. Please note that we are only concerned here with County Council districts, and not State or Federal legislative districts. Copies of the Hawaii County Charter and the Laws relating to the Redistricting Commission are available for your review at the sign in table. Also on the table are the close -up insets so that you can see the actual boundary lines. The commission is first and foremost governed by the principal of one person one vote. We are required by law to adopt boundaries which make each of the districts approximately similar in resident population. Both case law and the laws applicable to the Redistricting Commission allow for a deviation of a maximum of 4.99% above or below the ideal resident population of 20,462 residents per council district. This is after extraction of non - resident military, dependants, and students. Therefore the maximum number of residents in any district can be no more than 21,483 and the minimum number of residents is no less than 19,441. The Commission has reviewed approximately 40 suggested maps showing various configurations of the district boundaries. We have received and reviewed maps submitted by members of the public, staff at the elections office, and those produced at Commission meetings. The maps that remain suggest possible_ district configurations. Some of the maps contain deviations in resident population which are not acceptable because they are either slightly too high or too low, but the Commission decided to keep these maps for review because it appears that it will not be difficult to remedy the population imbalances. The Commission rejected many maps due to major population imbalances but did keep others which addressed many of the issues required to be considered by the law, such as road connectivity and communities of interest. Some of these maps are more `friendly' to certain districts than to others. None of them are cast in stone. We may very well end up creating hybrids, combining the best of several. We welcome your comments about the redistricting process and your suggestions about the adoption of district boundaries. We have 6 maps showing possible configurations. You are free to comment on any or all of these maps or make any other comments you wish relative to redistricting. If you wish to see boundary details not shown in these maps, they are on the table. You will be asked to keep your comments to no more than 5 minutes. The green light on the timer will change to amber to alert you to the upcoming beep. The commissioners may or may not have questions to clarify your testimony at this public hearing, but please do not expect us to answer your questions or engage in dialogue, as our job today is strictly to listen to your mana` o. If you have not done so already and wish to offer testimony to the Commission please fill out one of the sheets at the sign in table. Mahalo for turning out in such wonderful numbers. Mahalo for giving up your Saturday afternoon. I will now call the meeting to order, and call up the first testifier. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC CHR. SIRACUSA: Our first testifier is Collin Kahole. COLLIN KAHOLE (At this time Collin Kahole came forward to address members of the Commission.) 2 MR. KAHOLE: Hello, I guess we're good to go. Good afternoon Commissioners, my name is Collin Kahole. I reside in North Kohala. From all the plans you have here before us, I commend all of you for the hard work and energy this commission has done to complete their test before us, the public. Now you are testing the public in support of a plan that we give testimony and why and how you should support a plan with testimony from all of us here. My plan, Plan_ 17, after looking at all the other plans; North Kohala, Waimea, Honoka` a only one district. No cutting of communities whereas Puako, Waikoloa move in with a portion of North Kona to create one district. My other reason is some of the council persons look too comfortable in their present district. We need change, in public support, to have the community agenda heard. As the economy stays in its present condition, loss of jobs, layoffs, high gas price the Hawaii State Government and the County decides to raise fees. One must look at the IBC (International Building Code) and the other one is UBC (Uniform Building Code), the only winner is the vendors who sell material. Home insulation, safe room and other mandate support the IBC's and UBC's. These add -ons are for winters and tornados, not here in Hawaii. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you for your testimony. The next testifier is Sonny Shimaoka. SONNY SHIMAOKA (At this time Sonny Shimaoka came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. SHIMAOKA: Aloha Commissioners, my name is Sonny Shimaoka, I reside in Waimea and I'm in favor of Plan _17, in my opinion it makes the best sense with equal representation, and I am strongly in favor of keeping the Waimea district, Waimea; bringing back Lakeland, and would welcome Honoka' a, and turning that into a District 1. I also agree with Collin, I think that redistricting a lot of times brings in good change, at least change; and the whole idea about equal representation makes sense to me it looks now, so Plan_17. Thank you CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Joseph Kealoha. JOSEPH KEALOHA (At this time Joseph Kealoha came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. KEALOHA: Good afternoon Commissioners, everyone in the room, aloha. Excuse me for wearing my sunglasses, I hurt my eye. I was a police officer for 30 years in this district and retired after 30 years, and now a police reserve officer for the past 6. So, 36 years in one district. I've seen this district grow from a small community to what we have now. Lakeland was always part of Waimea, and then it changed because population changed; it changed. Now I'm like Sonny, like Collins we would like to see from White Road on down; we would like to have Lakeland, White Road back to Waimea, like Waimea was, because it's sad to listen to my friends tell me - -and I've been in this district forever - -you know we're Waimea, and then to vote we all gotta go down to Honoka' a. Our P.O. Box is P.O. Box, Kamuela. You know, they feel left out, it's not fair to them. And I'm not sure how the districting is done; stop me when my five minutes is up please, because I can wala' au. You know, in police sense, all those areas are Waimea. Now when we need man power, all the crimes happening in those areas become part of a statistic that 3 we need and use to fill man power. What happened in those districts; who handles those districts? OK, so we're in Lakeland, we're in Waikoloa, we're down on Waikoloa Beach Drive, but the Lakeland from White Road on, on paper is not our district. So when we go out for man power, what statistics do we use? So Waimea, let's keep Waimea. I like the plan. I know you guys all worked hard, you are, I believe, our representatives so listen to what we have to say, and take that into account. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next speaker is Larry Bryan. LARRY BRYAN (At this time Larry Bryan came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. BRYAN: Good afternoon, thank you for all of your efforts and all of your work. I'm sure that in the process of working through this issue, that you have done, and will do, a great job. It seems to be a very rational process, and we appreciate that. I just have a couple of things I'd like to say. I'm from Waikoloa, and I've lived many places around the world, and it seems to me that when communities are kept together it's a good thing, it's a better thing. So, whatever redistricting you come up with, I would recommend that one of the supporting principles be that logical, historical communities be kept together as much as possible, it works best. I would also like to suggest that you think about, you know, our government, a little bit. Over the last couple of hundred years, you know, our government has sort of grown, it's very complex, it has become very complex. We need to simplify it. If we're going be competitive in the world, we cannot have 18 layers of government overlapping each other with complicity, and making it so complex. So I ask that you step back and you know as an example, I understand that there are these community development districts so there's a lot of thought that's gone into those and what do they do and how should you relate to those districts? You know if I'm in District A for community development, District B for voting, and District C for this, pretty soon it gets too complicated. So as I was mentioning to one of the young ladies in the back, I said maybe we should just follow McDonald's. You know they do their demographics really well, and now and then you can have Big Mac. So, on a light note, thank you very much, and I appreciate you listening to my comments. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you, and thanks for the note of levity. Okay, our fifth testifier is Robert Green. ROBERT GREEN (At this time Robert Green came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. GREEN: Hi, my name is Robert Green, and I was born in Hilo, I was raised in Puna, and now I live in Waikoloa; so I kinda cover both ends of the islands. As I lived here, Hawaii has been, is not a piece of pie, or pizza pie, where we divide into nine equal portions and each portion has 2,100 and whatever it is. Hawaii is basically made of, of six individually different homo- genius areas. We have six of them; we've had them for five hundred years, and I think this is really what we need to do is look back and step back and look at our homogeneous areas that we have in these districts. As a second point, I am looking at the 4.99% variance rate. I think that we should make maximum use of that variance, not minimal. In other words, Waikoloa is right at the 12 maximum. If we push Waikoloa a little, making Waikoloa and North Kohala a little bigger, we might get in Lakeland. And what happens to Honoka` a? Well, that area, the Hamakua area, we should contract it. We should have 19,000 population so we can have a homogeneous group, rather than taking in people from the Hilo area and from the Waimea area. The same thing is, you look at Ka` u; you know Ka` u, as you all know, is very, very independent. But they're small, they've always been small and independent. So, I don't think we need to add another make 2,000 to their district, I think their district should have a smaller population. It's the largest district, but one of the smaller populations. And I think in another area that I think is Puna. Now I've gone through the different charts, and I've looked at each one, and I've said I've disagreed with them all. One of the first ones was Plan _10. Okay, I looked at Plan_10, and you split Puna. You got that road going right down in Pahoa, and you got the western part, belongs elsewhere; how do you get there? There are no roads? So, I think I look at plan _10, I said, got problems. Okay, everybody likes Plan _17. I look at Waipio, Kukuihaile; those belong with Honoka` a. They don't belong with Kohala; they never have. How do you get there? The closest way is to Mud Road, but then you gotta go through Hamakua. Also we got Pahoa is split again; so I reject 17. Plan-28, again Pahoa is split. Plan-28, Waipio again, and Waikoloa is split; so now you are splitting two areas. Plan _30, Waikoloa is split, and Plan _40, well Plan_40, that's the closest thing. I think, now I say Puna is split; not Pahoa, but Puna is split. You look at Pahoa and that seems to be one area. When you go through Kea` aola and Mountain View, so I was raised in Pahoa, that's what, number five? Well, Mountain View and `Ola`a should be in District 4. Puna should have two representatives; but that is just looking at the population growth that they've had. The second thing, the last thing I'd like to discuss, and that is with the census designated places. You know, all of the island had been broken down - -- CHR. SIRACUSA: Just wrap it up quickly. MR. GREEN: I will wrap it up quickly. I think that we should no split the census designated places, except for Hilo, and Hilo comes in at 43,000 and has to be split. Thank you CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Betty Green. BETTE GREEN (At this time Bette Green came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. GREEN: Hi, my name Bette Green. I just have a very brief comment; and I think you are probably are not going to be surprised. I'm concerned that when you split districts, split areas into districts, it constitutes the vote dilutions comment that's in all of your paperwork as something that you are not supposed to do, and not to encourage. So we need to keep our communities of interest together, and not dilute the votes. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Anika Glass. ANIKA GLASS (At this time Anilca Glass came forward to address members of the Commission.) 5 MS. GLASS: Aloha, thank you very much for eight of you, I believe, coming before us today, and for all the hard work you do. I know how difficult this is because I've tried to do it at the State level; and it's even worse at the County level, I think. I live in Waikoloa, I am representing Ma-lama Waikoloa Nightingales. I'm a member of several community organizations that would be impacted, but the one I founded, Ma-lama Waikoloa Nightingales, counts on community consensus from Waikoloa; and part of that is having a council person who is kept informed and is generally supportive, and knows what his constituents believe. We're trying to humanely re- home approximately 600 feral donkeys. This is a not a small task; it's taken all of South Kohala, and it's taken Waikoloa's community support. If we had to, if I even had to go through two council members every time I wanted their support for something, I could find them doing things like one saying, "Those donkeys are in the other council district," if you split Waikoloa right down the middle. We are Waikoloa; you can't just, we're a community, a town, a village if you will. We can't be split; nor can other communities. I can see them playing each other, off each other, go talk to that other guy. I can see going before some County administrative office and needing to work with them, and having one of them say well, your council member on the other side says something different; they're doing that. You may have people trying to play like a teenager, as a citizen, and do one where if mom says no you ask dad, and vice versa. So, it would take a lot of effort and require such close communication between the council members and for any community member to deal with the County Council if we were split in two. I think this is the same for any organization, any individual, and also you know, for the council people and the council. That's pretty much it, my favorite plan is Plan _40, because it keeps more of South Kohala as South Kohala, and we do have a sense of community in South Kohala, up and down the hill from half way up the mountain, at least to almost the ocean is South Kohala; it's not North Kona or somewhere else. Thank you very much for listening to my testimony, and I hope you will reconsider many of these plans, and do a better effort at finding one that keeps at least little towns together, if not districts and areas that historically are districts of this island, forever; you know, since unification of the island. I don't see how that can possibly meet the requirements that you need to follow. Thank you so much, aloha. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you for your input. Our next testifier is Matty Keith. MATTY KEITH (At this time Matty Keith came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. KEITH: Aloha. I would also like to thank all of you for all your work. I submitted my testimony via email through your secretary so you can have it; I'll just go over it briefly. My feelings are also leaning towards Plan _40. I am not in favor of splitting Waikoloa. In fact, I am not in favor of splitting any community whatsoever. Actually, I was surprised to hear, I wasn't aware that Waimea was split that way, with Lakeland, and that's unfortunate. I always thought of South Kohala as Waimea, Waikoloa. Waikoloa is a little different though; it's an association. It's not like Waimea, it's not like Kona. Then again, it's not like Pualani Ranch or Kohala Ranch; we're not gated. To split us in half is not something I'm in favor for because eventually I would like to see Waikoloa as a regular community; like Waimea, like Kona. The resort area, they may want different representation, because they might have different concerns. There's a lot of growth in that area, all along the Kohala Coast. They may not have the same concerns that we, as a 0 community in Waikoloa, or Waimea, may have. So, I would like to ask you to please reconsider some of these plans that you have. You may end up with something different, something like someone said where more communities will be together and not split. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Mike Price. MIKE PRICE (At this time Mike Price came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. PRICE: I'm Mike Price, I'm from Waikoloa; I want to thank you for being on this commission, because no matter what you do, you're going to end up (inaudible) somebody's (inaudible) and that's a tough job. I wanted to emphasize what you already heard in a lot of cases. Kohala is an historic district and the set up is an ahupua` a, and that included the ocean all the way. Many still live that way. We went through a three year process with the community development program developing a shared vision for the area. I hate to see all that lost by splitting communities and drawing lines and dibbing things up. Some of the people who have contributed some of the best ideas would get left out, and in the district they're going into, their plan that we covered won't deal with some of the issues that are important to them. Puako is a good example, Waikoloa is another one. I disagree with splitting any community. I'm involved with the South Kohala traffic safety committee, and over the years it's always been a problem with part of Waimea being in another district and expecting representation from that district on pertinent issues in Waimea. So holding communities together is utmost important. I think you have a historic district, and there is an issue of sustainability and connectivity. All the roads in the district either coming from Hawi down the mountain road tying in, or when you look at the Kawaihae road, you have got to be very careful about splitting jurisdiction over that, otherwise we will not get any improvements. The Kawaihae bypass has been in the works since 1968. You split the jurisdiction and I think you already heard that going to two different councilman to get support for even a State project, if it shows even an inkling of non - consensus in the area, someplace else in the State will be funded. That's my concern. But when look at the roads in Kohala, I don't think that you can start moving people and population into districts that they don't even have a connecting road to the area. I think that's really under representing those folks. How will they get improvements to their infrastructure? That's a big concern of mine. When I looked at all of the maps, I also thought about the fact that we've entered in a period of recession, and depending on who you read and in what newspaper, we may now not recover until 2013 at the earliest or 2018 at the latest. That means that where we're at right now, growth wise, in South Kohala it's stopped. Why not leave this district, or some other district, in other words; leave district alone. The water is coming from either the reservoirs of Kohala Mountains or else Mauna Kea and is distributed downhill. The same with the roads and what is actually printed out in the CDP, so please considerate it. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you very much. Our next testifier is Victor Morris. VICTOR MORRIS (At this time Victor Morris came forward to address members of the Commission.) 7 MR. MORRIS: Good afternoon, and thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to say a few words to you and I'm going to keep this really quite short. I live down in Waikoloa Village and I am very concerned about some of the plans that want to split our community in half. I cannot support that. We want to have a homogeneous group that reports only to one council member. Looking at the various maps, Plan _40 basically preserves the existing South Kohala area. This is the one I'm in favor of, and I hope that you will support that. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Lonnie Cole. LONNIE COLE (At this time Lonnie Cole came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. COLE: Aloha, thank you for spending your Saturday; because it's such an important job and it has to happen every ten years, you're doing a great job. My name is Lonnie Cole, I'm President of the Waikoloa Association and since Pete Hoffman had a meeting, talk story, Thursday evening, my phone has been ringing off the hook and my computer is about ready to catch on fire from emails. By a wide, wide margin Waikoloa Village wants to stay homogeneous and we do not want the village divided and they sent a very strong message. There is about 6,000 of us down there, and about 3,200 homes and condos and we really appreciate your consideration and we're thanking you in advance. Thank you very much. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Margaret Wille. MARGARET WILLE (At this time Margaret Wille came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. WILLE: Aloha, and good afternoon, I am Margaret Wille. The difficulty here are those 5% deviations. I struggled with these maps, how do we preserve each of the communities; and it's clearly impossible. I worked on Plan _40 and how does get, at least the northern portion of the island, and still you need to be dealing with Hamakua and Ka` u being the lower populations, how do you deal with them? The issue there really is to go into Hilo and cut into Waimea. Do you incorporate North Kohala? If you start at the river, and don't make Hamakua a portion of urban Hilo, then you come up to Waimea, and where do you draw the line? With Lakeland being such a large population, how do you do that? Then if you put Lakeland in, you're splitting Waikoloa basically. I went and talked to people in Honoka`a, and as I talked to them and some on the eastern portion of Waimea, and one thing that they talked to me about was the water sheds. So I got us some water shed maps, and really, this could be critical over the next ten years. If you look at the districts, it basically runs Hamakua Coast together as one unit, which would be from Lakeland to the river in Hilo, Wailuku River. I stress water and express I prefer the same thing here with Waimea and down to Puako, and Waikoloa, as one water shed in Kawaihae. If you looking at Puako as a small community but it's critical to the bay and protecting the bay, and that's something we have been working on a lot from Kawaihae. What do we do in the critical issues around that. I took Plan _40 and tried to work out some of the issues that Rene had brought up and others in the community and I just want to mention that I submitted some testimony trying 0 to address those issues. I'm just going read through them quickly. One is that there was a little bit of Hilo that was in the Hamakua District; I corrected that. That District 2 should be really extended upward into the mauka area, it doesn't affect population but it gave them that mauka /mauai connection. Three, with regard to Volcano Village, it's large, and wants to be part of Puna. Basically, as I adjusted this Plan _40, it gave Volcano and Fern Forest, Mountain View a whole solid block out of District 6; so that you extend from the National Parks there over just to stay out of the urban area of Kona and over to the National Parks on that end. So you sort of have the entire park range, but basically you get 3 Puna districts, and one being a Puna /Kea` au rather one being a Puna /Hilo district. The last comment was that District 8, District 9 line should be Saddle Road, and that Saddle Road should be in District 8. So I tried to adjust Plan _40 to accommodate and address some of the issues that you all and others have raised. Thank you very much. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you, and thank you for your hard work to try and make this all happen. Our next testifier is Scott Carter. SCOTT CARTER (At this time Scott Carter came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. CARTER: Hi there, I am Scott Carter. Thank you very much for all your efforts, it's a lot of work. I've looked at the plans; none of them is flawless. I wish you put a lot of work into every one of them. I live in Waikoloa Village I lean more toward Plan _40, but it's got flaws too. I just want to stress that it's real important not to break up any communities because there is a block of individuals who have a lot in common, and the term homogeneous applies. That's just a main concern. Try not to separate the communities which affects the representation too. Try your best, it's not an easy job, but I lean more toward Plan _40; and it's got issues too, but keep trying, and with all the input you're going to do a lot of them over the next month or month and a half I believe. Do your best. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Yes, we have our work cut out for us. That may be the understatement of the year. Gail Jackson. GAIL JACKSON (At this time Gail Jackson came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. JACKSON: My name is Gail Jackson, Waikoloa. We have a good Waikoloa contingent up here today. One thing, looking through the Ordinance and the rules and stuff on your procedure, communities of interest or community or common interest shall be respected and kept together in a plan if practicable. I know that's one thing that you're really dealing with. I was on the South Kohala CDP, the Waikoloa Focus group, and I've just been here nine years. It was very interesting working with people; it wasn't just Waikoloa, but the whole district with Waimea, Puakb, and Kawaihae, and also realizing that we all have a common vision and values and needs. but we also have individual area same thing, especially the needs. I'm just, of course, very much against dividing Waikoloa and again towns and areas, that's really hard. I really support maintaining District 9 boundaries because of all the good reasons other people have brought up, 9 and I do like Plan-40 the best. Thank you very much, and I really appreciate the hard job you're doing. CHR. SIRACUSA: Our next testifier is George Robertson. GEORGE ROBERTSON (At this time George Robertson came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. ROBERTSON: Aloha folks, I just want to thank you for the good work you do; this is a really tough job, and these maps are just impossible to deal with. I've been on committees with Rene, with Patrick, I've worked with Jeff; and it's really great to see you folks, and Valerie, good to see you; you will represent us well. I represent the Puako Community Association. We, to a man and woman, want to stay connected with Waimea and South Kohala. We don't want to be shuffled off to North Kona, and we support Plan _40. We liked Plan-32, I know it took Waikoloa off but, that protected Waikoloa and kept Waikoloa intact. I know Waikoloa folks may not think it was good for them, but it made sense when I first looked at it. Waikoloa should be kept intact. Map 40 does that and I think that's good. You might go back to Plan-32, Puako does not want to become the Lakeland of this redistricting. We want to stay where we are, we are a community. Reverend Lyons established a church there in the 1850's. We were connected with Waimea from way back when. Father Damien, Saint Damien, served the people of Puako when he was here, so we want to stay with the district we're connected to, and we don't want to be, much as I love Kona, we don't want to be part of Kona. Thank you. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next person to testify is Jennifer Lienehart Tsuji. JENNIFER LIENHART TSUJI (At this time Jennifer Lienehart Tsuji came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. LIENHART TSUJI: Aloha. I come to you today as a parent in Waikoloa. I live mauka side of Paniolo Drive. When it first came to my attention that there were maps out there splitting up our small community, our connected community, it hit hard, it hit my home. I've had the opportunity to speak with many of the younger families in Waikoloa with small children, and this is definitely not the solution. As you know, our schools are on the makai side of Paniolo Avenue, as are all of our amenities for our Association, which might create conflict if that map were to be taken. I can't imagine paying Association fees after 10 years of living there, I know we've paid well over $6,000 worth of Association fees and to watch it go into another district at this point would be slightly disappointing, to say the very least. Our only business, functioning business development, in Waikoloa is on the makai side, so if there were to take place, the only voting power that would come from that are those three entities which would not be in the district in which I live. However, I do pay taxes for all of those things, so I think that I would like to ask you, beg you, plead with you to please not split our community. With that said I have to reiterate some of what many people have said already and the fact that Waikoloa is connected to Waimea in many different ways. I don't represent any one specific group or organization, but our church is up here, our children's activities are in Waimea. The cost, and someone was speaking about economics, the cost for young families to go to Kona is quite high compared to Waimea. So we 10 support this community financially, and in other ways, and I would like to see them stay connected. Mahalo. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Our next testifier is Pete Hoffman. PETE HOFFMANN (At this time Pete Hoffmann came forward to address members of the Commission.) MR. HOFFMANN: Good afternoon Commissioners, I am not going to repeat what I think that everybody has said. I did want to extend to you, though, my deep appreciation for the tough job you have to do, and perhaps more than most of the people here, we've had the pleasure and the honor of watching you guys and gals in action through videoconferencing in my office for the past several months. So we've watched this whole process, if you will, mature a little bit. We know how difficult it is to do this. Obviously, living in Waikoloa, and understanding, for the past seven years, as the representative for the North and South Kohala district, the importance of trying to gain new unanimity and some type of consensus on a number of issues that we face here in the County; I think is most important. To split up the Waikoloa community as one of the focal points, one of the three major communities in that district is really quite difficult. I recognize under any circumstances your difficulties in trying to ensure that those population densities are distributed as best possible, but I suggest to you that one of the major purposes here, if you must change Waikoloa, and move it to another district, another council district in some way shape or form, please remember to keep Waikoloa together. The one thing that's different about Waikoloa, which I think sometimes is overlooked, is that fact that many of the other large communities that you are looking at, like Waimea, Honoka` a, Hilo, and Kona, have commercial and business entities attached to them. They are a full grown community. Waikoloa is not. We sit in the middle of a lava field if you will twenty miles distant from Waimea, thirty five miles from Kona, and we're really a bedroom community. Don't destroy it, the unanimity that we need in order to continue the development that is so important, not only to our community, but to the County as well. I think you do ourselves, we would do all ourselves a good favor if we recognize that it's not simply where we have historical or traditional lines. The County's changing, and we must change along with it. At a minimum, keep Waikoloa together, and remember, that as we look ahead at trying to do the planning that's so important with our land use issues, with our community development plans that have been so frequently mentioned here today, I think you have to recognize that we spent considerable amount of time and effort over the past ten years in making sure that this occurs. Now, I can't run for office again as you all know, in this next election, but I do feel as a resident of the Waikoloa community, that we'd be best served by retaining our identity as a community politically, economically, and as a vibrant community in the North Hawaii area. Please consider, as you look ahead, the impact it would have on us as a community on the area, but also on the County in general; and once again I take this time, and it's true, I really do appreciate the time and effort that you've taken to make this happen. I know it's very difficult and I appreciate the members of the community who've shown up today. And Lonnie, I'm sorry if your computer went off the record. But I do think it also reflects the fact that good media coverage would have, I think, also allowed more people to understand the importance of what you are doing; and I'm happy to see the turn out. Thank you. 11 CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you, Pete. Our next testifier is Patti Cook. PATTI COOK (At this time Patti Cook came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. COOK: Good afternoon, and thank you. I cannot believe how much time you've put into this. I am supporting not splitting Waikoloa, having lived with Waimea being split for the last ten years, has really been unfair to the Lakeland community. I wanted to add just one thing, and that is thank you for excluding non - residents; from starting from the right place in the beginning, and doing this the right way. We are going to be appealing the State Reapportionment Commission decision, but thank you for doing it the right way. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you, Patti. Our last testifier, unless somebody has gotten all inspired and wants to fill out another sign in slip, is Representative Cindy Evans. CINDY EVANS (At this time State Representative, Cindy Evans, came forward to address members of the Commission.) MS. EVANS: Aloha. First of all, thank you very much for making the trip to our community. Sometimes where there is hearings you always wonder why they're down in Kona and not up here, and vice a versa, so to actually come into the community and ask for our mana' o is really appreciated, so thank you very much. And thank you for the community to come and to watch the process, and also those who have spoken and participated in the process; I wanted to thank the community. From my perspective as a Representative, I see coming across my desk things that come from the Federal Government, from the County Government and from the State Government, and what you find is what's good for the community is when the partnerships come and the messages come, and the consensus gets built and people start seeing the priorities. I think for Waikoloa and for Waimea's individual communities, it takes that grass roots discussion as what's best for our community, and then they kind of work it out, and then they kind of work it out, and eventually you get your priorities set and then you start working the system. You talk to the County, the Council, the State Representatives, you talk to the Congressional Delegation, and you start working those issues. There are some things in play right now, and I wanted to mention this because it hasn't been brought up; but that is the Saddle Road Extension, clearly now, the new head of the Pacific for the Army has decided that he's going to get Saddle Road in while he is here, and he is going to do everything in his power to work with our Congressional Delegation, and we're going to have Saddle Road all the way probably down to Queen Ka` auhumanu Highway probably within six years. That would be South of Waikoloa Road and that would a logical place to maybe split the district, because you have a road boundary there, so it's something to think about, but there's other things that are in play. You know, our State Department of Education for example, they have deeply looked at all of the people that are in the permitting process that have whatever process they are in the permitting process, they have been projecting out what the population is going to be for Waimea as well as for Waikoloa. And then also we've got Department of Hawaiian Homelands that are building out projects that are going to be in Waimea and down in 12 Kawaihae; and so there's all these people working with a bigger vision of what's going to happen on the Big Island and I think that visionary piece is something that maybe needs to be in the mix of the whole discussion. What will the Big Island look like in ten years? And how does the decisions today, kind of support whatever the Congressional Delegation, the State is doing as well as the County is doing, because there's all this stuff in motion. I remember when I first got elected and I went to the State Legislature, the Speaker of the House said well what's your interest area and what was really big in your district and he says well I'll put you on the Committee, and he said, Cindy, got to tell you one thing, the train is moving down the track, all you do is jump on the train and you just move with it because it's just going; and that's what you find. We've got all these initiatives that are clearly going and to tag on what other people have said, that community development plan that the County paid to have done and got the consultants out there and worked just like you, I mean you've worked so hard on this; these communities of Waimea and Waikoloa and Puako, and Kawaihae work so hard together to try to build that grass root vision. What I'm kind of hoping is that whatever we do, whatever decision you make, it is supportive of the vision, it doesn't break the momentum of that vision, because the train's moving. It's been moving; this community is moving forward, this is an awesome community. Just from my perspective, having talked to Governor Abercrombie, he truly believes that the Big Island is where it is happening. He sees that this is where initiatives, he really believes in this island. He thinks the renewable energy, what we are going to do with schools, what are we going to do with our harbors? If you look at Oahu they've been dealing with their second city out in Kapolei, well his opinion is, West Hawaii is going to be the second city of the State of Hawaii. He just sees that there is so much potential and we got a University hopefully coming in the next four years, we're going to have a great University, and NELHA and all the stuff that we've got in place. And in Hilo is awesome, but whatever you do, it's got to be, and hopefully is, cohesive with the bigger vision; so thank you very much. CHR. SIRACUSA: Thank you. Thank you for coming out. Is there anyone else who would like to share with us before I call the meeting adjourned? There is not going to be another one in Waimea, we're going around doing one meeting in each district, each of the current council districts. And then after that we go back to the drawing board and try to put together something that incorporates the input that we've gotten from all over the island. Like for example, a lot of you like one map, and it may be great for this area, but it may not be so good for the other side of the island. So we have to try to get what's best for everybody, which isn't easy, because we have to deal with the rules and the numbers. And those have to be the number one priority, whether or not we like that, and a lot of us may not. But that's where we're at; we have to follow those rules. I do want to ask you if you, haven't done so, the Ordinance is there, and everything that we had to work with to know what the various criteria are that we had to take into consideration. Communitys of interest, not splitting them, is only one of the many criteria, and that makes it a lot harder because you have to balance everything out. You still can submit written testimony, this is not the end and you can turn out later on. There is a schedule over there that's also going to tell you when we're going to have two more meetings after we go back to the drawing board, after the series of nine hearings in each district. Then we'll go back to the drawing board, try to come up 13 with something that hopefully will make everybody happy and then we're going to go out to more public hearings - one in East Hawaii in Hilo, and one in West Hawaii in Kona and so you'll have an opportunity to turn out for that, or just submit written testimony to either or both of those meetings, okay? MR. CARVALHO: I want to thank everyone for coming out; this is a terrific turn out. We didn't have anybody turn out on the other side this morning, so thank you guys for coming. I like your input. ADJOURNMENT There being no further business, at 3:00 p.m., Ms. Ugalde moved to adjourn the meeting. Seconded by Ms. Poindexter and carried by the following vote: Ayes: Commissioners Carvalho, Kahawaiola` a, Melrose, Middlesworth, Poindexter, and Chair Siracusa. Noes: None. Absent: Commissioners Kahui, Kanuha and Ugalde. CHR. SIRACUSA: Motion carries. Thank you. 14 Respectfully Submitted, Karen Eoff, Secretary Approved on November 3, 2011: Ms. Rene Siracusa, Chair Hawaii County Redistricting Commission 15