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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2012-11-15 Leeward Exh D - Innovations LEEWARD PLANNING COMMISSION COUNTY OF HAWAI‘I HEARING TRANSCRIPT NOVEMBER 15, 2012 INNOVATIONS PUBLIC CHARTER A regularly advertised hearing on the application of SCHOOL (Amend SPP 1262) was called to order at 12:50 p.m. in the West Hawai‘i Civic Center, Community Center, Building G, 74-5044 Ane Keohokālole Highway, Kailua-Kona, Hawai‘i, with Chair Geraldine Giffin presiding. COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Geraldine Giffin, Lani Bowman, Brandi Beaudet, Thomas Hickcox, Richard Nelson, III and Thomas Whittemore ABSENT AND EXCUSED: Wayne Iokepa ALSO PRESENT: Ivan Torigoe (Deputy Corporation Counsel), BJ Leithead Todd (Planning Director), Daryn Arai (Planning Program Manager), Jeff Darrow (Planner), Maija Cottle (Planner), Kiran Emler (Department of Public Works, Engineering Division) and Noriko Sauer (Commission Secretary) And approximately 15 people from the public in attendance. APPLICANT: INNOVATIONS PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOL (Amend SPP 1262) Amendment of Special Permit No. 1262, which allowed the establishment of a public charter school and accessory facilities for up to 200 students between grades 1 and 6, on 5 acres of land situated within the State Land Use Agricultural District. The amendment is to allow the expansion of the school by increasing enrollment to a maximum of 350 students, expand the grades of instruction to kindergarten through 12, and increase the campus size to 9.298 acres. The subject property is located along the east (mauka) side of Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway, approximately 1,500 feet rd north of the Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway – Hualālai Road intersection, Pua‘a 3, North Kona, Hawai‘i, TMK: 7-5-010:001. GIFFIN: Commissioners, we are now on Agenda Item No. 4. The applicant is the Innovations Public Charter School. The Innovations Public Charter School has submitted a request to amend Special Permit No. 1262, which allowed the establishment of a public charter school and accessory facilities for up to 200 students between grades 1 through 6, on five acres of land situated within the State Land Use Agricultural District. The amendment is to allow the expansion of the school by increasing enrollment to a maximum of 350 students. Maija? COTTLE: Thank you, Madam Chair. Good afternoon, Commissioners. If I can direct your attention to the screen. The next application is a special permit amendment, and the subject property is located in the North Kona District. The property is shown in the middle of the slide, outlined in red. And you can see the Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway running in a north-south direction just makai of the property. You also have downtown Kona in this general area, and then Hualālai Road running mauka towards Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway; the intersection is just south of the school property. And then you have Hualālai Road running mauka from Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway in this area here. The subject property is zoned Agricultural-5 acres, and the immediately surrounding properties are also zoned Agricultural-5 acres that’s shown in the light green. The 1 EXHIBIT D closest residential development is the Kona Heights Subdivision in this area here that’s zoned Single-Family Residential-15,000 square feet, and then you have the Hualālai Colony Subdivision in this area here, also zoned Single-Family Residential. The Kona Heights Subdivision is about 1,000 feet from the subject property, and the Hualālai Colony Subdivision is about 300 feet to the east. The property is situated in the Urban Expansion General Plan designated area that’s shown in the crosshatch pattern; Urban Expansion allows for a mix of urban uses. And then this is the Kona Community Development Plan map for the area. You’ll see that the subject property is located in the Pua‘a-Wai‘aha Village Transit Oriented Development circle; this would require, if the property were coming in for rezoning entitlements, they would have to do various infrastructure improvements. But since they are requesting a special permit to expand an existing school, they would not have to do any transit oriented development improvements for the project. Then they also want you to know that the expansion of the school would support one of the policies of the Kona Community Development Plan, which is to support the creation of charter schools for the Kona community. The current campus was established in 2005 upon approval of Special Permit No. 1262. It is, they’re currently operating an elementary school for grades 1 through 6 on five acres, and the current permit limits the school enrollment to 200 students; they are currently operating at about 188 students. The campus includes an administrative building, a pavilion, a restroom building and four classroom buildings, as well as unpaved parking areas and walkways connecting the various buildings. Current access for the campus is via a one-way paved driveway from the highway; it is limited to right-turn in and right-turn out movements, and I will show you that later. The proposed amendment is to expand the campus by adding an additional 4.298 acres for a total of 9.298 acres. They also want to expand the grades of instruction from 1 to 6 grade up to K to 12, and add additional students for a maximum enrollment of 350 students. So initially, the plans are to construct a middle school campus on the mauka four acres that would include various buildings, classroom buildings, outdoor play areas, a covered basketball court. And then their future plans are to include a high school program, if the middle school does well and they continue to expand; however, the 350-student cap would apply to K through 12, the entire campus. They are also proposing a new access driveway from Hualālai Road to the upper campus. They were not in this application proposing any vehicular connection between the upper and lower campus, but I’m also going to talk about that a little bit later as well. They are implementing staggered school hours between the intermediate and middle school so that traffic on the highway and Hualālai Road is reduced. This is an aerial view of the property; you can see the existing school buildings in the middle of the slide here. The area for the proposed expansion is in this general outline area here; it’s currently undeveloped land. You can see a little bit of the Hualālai Colony structures over here, and then, of course, the highway running on the left side of the slide. This site plan shows their existing access; currently they come off of Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway here, they travel along a one-lane paved driveway up to a large parking area here – there is also some parking on both sides of the road here – and then they travel up to the property just north. They have an access easement from the landowner to exit out onto Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway. So both of these accesses are limited to right-turn in/right-turn out only movements. But they are currently operating it as a one-way; so vehicles enter here, drop off students, exit here and go north. So you can tell that’s very limiting for the people, the parents who are traveling from the north and want to turn left into the site, they are not able to do that now. 2 EXHIBIT D This is the applicant’s proposed master plan; again, you can see the access off of the highway now. They are proposing two large parking areas here. Currently, the structures in red are the existing structures on the site, and then the expanded campus would be this area here. You see a basketball court, some play fields, and then some classroom buildings are shown in the blue color. Then the proposed access off of Hualālai Road would come up in this general area here from the south into this parking area. And again, this is Hualālai Road; so you see the proposed access, driveway access to the upper campus here. This is the current entrance driveway from the highway. And this is a view of the current entrance looking towards the south; you can see the no-left-turn sign, so people traveling from the north know not to turn left into the site. And then this is the current entrance from the highway, looking north. This is the exit driveway over the adjacent landowner’s access easement to the north. And then, this is again the access easement comes out in this area here, and then vehicles would turn right to go north out of the campus. This is a view of the exit driveway looking south, and a view of the exit driveway looking north. This is the Hualālai Road intersection; I just wanted to show you this so that you would see, by opening a new access off of Hualālai Road, parents traveling from the north will now be able to turn left. There is a left-turn lane. They will turn left and then go into the Hualālai Road driveway, and then parents can come out of the Hualālai Road driveway and again make a left and go south; those are the two movements that parents cannot do at this time on the campus. And this is the Hualālai Road near the proposed driveway, looking west, makai, and looking east; so you have some good sight distance in this area here. The Planning Director is recommending approving the amendment to Special Permit 1262. And I just want to add a few things: We did speak with the representative from Public Works right before the hearing, and he did mention some concern with not having the upper campus and the lower campus connected by vehicular access, particularly because the Hualālai Road area had some floodways going through that area of where the access easement would be located; so should there be flooding, we want to make sure that there is a way for the students on the upper campus to get out of the campus. So we’ve discussed it with the applicant. And the Planning Director is recommending Condition 3 be modified, and I’d like to read the addition to the condition. At the end of Condition 3, we’d like to add, “The applicant shall provide a 15-foot wide emergency vehicular access between the upper and lower campuses.” And then we would also like to, on Condition 7, there is a sentence that says, “The driveway shall include all-weather crossings over the Waiaha Drainageway since this driveway will serve as the primary access for the campus,” we would like to add a comma and say, “if required by the Department of Public Works.” That’s kind of in the middle of Page 10. Those are the two changes that we are recommending. And that concludes my presentation. Are there any questions? GIFFIN: Commissioners, any questions of Maija? Lani. BOWMAN: Can we just look at the site plan? Okay. So the access from upper campus to lower campus would be, where is it proposed or they are not? COTTLE: They are not real sure right now; maybe when the applicant comes up, they can let you know what their concept is -. BOWMAN: Okay. So the access from Hualālai Road is in the upper right hand -. COTTLE: It would be -. 3 EXHIBIT D BOWMAN: Lower right hand -. COTTLE: Right in this area here -. BOWMAN: Okay. COTTLE: Or right in this -. BOWMAN: So it would be right there. COTTLE: Yeah. BOWMAN: Okay. Because if there was access, then if – and I’m just trying to figure this out – then parents who dropped elementary school students out coming from the whatever wrong way could actually go out and, go out the Hualālai way. COTTLE: Yeah, and the concept that the school had was that I guess quite a few of their students, quite a few of the parents have students that would attend the intermediate and middle school; so they would drop their students, their children, off at the upper campus because that access isn’t limited to right-turn in/right-turn out movements, and then the elementary school students would walk down to the lower campus. BOWMAN: Okay, thank you. GIFFIN: So they are not going to keep the other entrances and exits open? COTTLE: Yes, they will. GIFFIN: Okay, so conceivably a parent coming in the proper direction could drop off an elementary student and then go on and make that turn with the existing, and still drop off a child at the middle or high school and come out through Hualālai, right? COTTLE: They could do that, if they wanted to. Yeah, all accesses will remain open; this one will continue to be limited to right-turn in, this will be right-turn out, and then Hualālai Road will be full movement. GIFFIN: Brandi. BEAUDET: Is there a slide with all three access points? COTTLE: There is not. I don’t have one. I’m sorry about that. BEAUDET: Can you go one, can you go forward on the slides? Okay, so the red section includes current location and the additional location -. COTTLE: Correct. BEAUDET: Right, the expansion area. So the top of the red area is, to the right, the mauka section, the mauka section of the red area is at what point on the previous slide? 4 EXHIBIT D COTTLE: Are you asking me what part is the expansion area? It’s generally right here and then mauka of this line. BEAUDET: And those are the blue-roof buildings, right? COTTLE: Correct, yes. So the red buildings are existing, and this area right along here and mauka would be the expanded campus; so the play fields would be new, as well as these buildings and the parking lot. BEAUDET: Thank you. GIFFIN: Any other questions of Maija? Hearing none, thank you, Maija. Will the applicant please come forward. Will you please raise your right hands? Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth on this matter now before the Leeward Hawai‘i County Planning Commission? APPLICANTS: I do. GIFFIN: Starting with you, sir, please state your name, and I trust that you are the applicant. RAPOZA: Actually, I’m a -. My name is Edward Rapoza. I am a foundation board member of the Innovations Charter School. And the applicant is Jennifer Hiro, who is -. Would you like her to go first? GIFFIN: Yes, no offence, but -. RAPOZA: Sure. GIFFIN: May I please hear from you first? HIRO: Sorry, we sat backwards. My name is Jennifer Hiro. I am one of the founders of Innovations Public Charter School, and I am currently the director. I am also a parent of a recent graduate of Innovations Public Charter School. Do you want them to each give their name? GIFFIN: Sure. HAUANIO: Hi, my name is Ramsey Hauanio. GIFFIN: Thank you. DONALDSON-SARGIS: Hello, my name is Ocean Donaldson-Sargis. GIFFIN: Thank you, Ocean. RAPOZA: Edward Rapoza, a foundation member. GIFFIN: Thank you. Ma’am? 5 EXHIBIT D HIRO: So, good afternoon. Thank you very much for this opportunity to address the Commission regarding the special use permit application for Innovations Public Charter School. As you can see by our application and hopefully your involvement in our community, there is tremendous support from our parents, members of the Kona community. Our school is quite a success story. In a time of public schools are at risk of being put under federal restructuring for unsatisfactory student achievement, Innovations students perform on statewide testing consistently outperforms both district and state scores. As we’ve seen more public students transferring to home schools, private schools, or even moving out of the state, Innovations has a wait list of over 600 families hoping to enroll their children. As welfare of children in our community is a concern, satisfaction rates among our students and our families are very high, with students excited to come to school and eager to learn. Innovations wants to continue to provide the excellent academic program it offers to families in the Kona community. With its well-rounded approach to education, focusing on integrating arts into its academic program, Innovations is proving that students can achieve academic excellence, take risks, and enjoy learning. Innovations is a model for the education system and an asset to the Kona community. Recently named Charter School of the Year, and recipient of State Senate Recognition for Excellence, Innovations continues to exceed expectations and academic achievement, and has been a Hawai‘i Distinguished School for several years. I urge you to support this vital part of our community in education system. Everyone is looking for ways to improve the education system for our children, and produce future leaders who are effective, productive problem-solvers. Innovations is proving the positive change can take place. You can support Innovations’ efforts and encourage its continuance by approving the special use application before you. And as you’ve seen this morning, we bring some of our clients and our products, some of our citizens of our community and future leaders of our community here just to share a little bit with you about the school’s impact and what it brings to us as a community. GIFFIN: Great. Honey, could you please say your name first? HAUANIO: My name is Ramsey Hauanio. I’m in second grade. I’ve been in the IPCS for two years. Right now in my class we are learning about the water cycle: evaporation, condensation and precipitation. One of my favorite parts of our IPCS is Interest Groups. Right now I am in Pottery. Pottery allows me to go to Donkey Mill Art Center. We get to make all different kinds of pots there. We even got to try a spinner. Also, there is Music Class. We get to play all different kinds of instruments. My favorite instrument is the flute. GIFFIN: Thank you. Ocean? DONALDSON-SARGIS: Hello, my name is Ocean Donaldson-Sargis. I am currently in sixth grade. I’ve been going there for, since first grade. The school has had a lot of change since I’ve been there. One thing I really like about the school is it has a unique approach; it, like, it’s really hands-on, so there is like a lot of great programs like, Gardening is one of them, and the kids actually get to go out into the garden and get dirty and down on the dirt. And they get to learn things in a unique way; they actually get to not only just see the visual of the things, but they get to do it and ride it and hear it and feel it. So it’s very unique. Also, there is great teachers; so they are really nice, and there isn’t really, as you can say, a war going on with teachers, as there is within some schools or in famous books and stuff like that. So that is a bonus because the kids actually get along with the teachers, and that is really awesome. 6 EXHIBIT D GIFFIN: Good. Ocean, I have a question for you: How many students do you have in your class? DONALDSON-SARGIS: My class, we split into two -. My grade? GIFFIN: Uh huh. DONALDSON-SARGIS: So my grade has, we combine two grades, the sixth and seventh, and there are 48 students in all in my grade. GIFFIN: Okay, and how many teachers do you have for the 48 students? DONALDSON-SARGIS: We have four teachers, main teachers, and we have a bunch of other programs like Music and Fencing, who have teachers of their own. GIFFIN: Okay. And in addition to the Art, is there any other class, and I guess your Gardening, too, is there any other class that is out of the classroom? DONALDSON-SARGIS: Yes. There is Music Class where you get to go and learn music and you get to take field trips, and all this other really fun stuff. There is also Fencing that, where you actually get to like learn how to fence, and you get to fence with your friends. There is cross training. And so we have these things, electives, which are these things, and we get to go outside and just play around and learn these certain tasks and things that we get to do that you usually don’t really learn in school. GIFFIN: Right, right. Thank you very much. DONALDSON-SARGIS: Thank you. GIFFIN: Ed, did you want to speak as well? RAPOZA: Gees, I don’t know what I can say to top that, so I would just say to the Commission we’d appreciate the positive recommendation, and if you have any questions, we’ll be happy to answer them. GIFFIN: Thank you. Commissioners, any questions of the applicants? BOWMAN: I do. GIFFIN: Lani. BOWMAN: How do you feel, Ms. – I’m sorry – about the requirement, potential requirement for the road to go, to connect the -. GIFFIN: Public Works -. BOWMAN: Yeah, the Public Works recommendation for the road to connect from upper to lower? HIRO: I definitely see it as a positive recommendation -. 7 EXHIBIT D ARAI: Microphone, please. GIFFIN: Your mike. HIRO: Oh, I’m sorry, not used to using a microphone. That’s something we can definitely comply with. BOWMAN: Could we have the site plan again? Just, I’m just curious where it would go. It looks like -. Any comments about -? I’m just curious where you think it would go from the parking lot down? HIRO: You know, I’m not sure that I have explored it enough. Ed, do you know where we are thinking -? I know that we’ve, we’ve explored different options; I’m not sure that there is one that we’ve set on. RAPOZA: My understanding is that it is a one-way proposed connection in the event of emergency for, basically, we are contending with some flood issues along Hualālai Road to the upper parking lot; so in the event there’s a flood occurrence, that we would need to get a vehicular access from the upper parking to the lower campus so that people can exit. And that’s a valid concern. We would have to take a look at where that would be, but maybe along the, I would say, the mauka side of the site plan could be an option. You know, it is just an emergency access. We don’t want a vehicular access through a campus, of course; that would be not desirable. But I think we can accommodate some sort of an emergency access, and we’ll work with our engineer, who is here, Bruce Wicher, to accommodate the request. BOWMAN: Okay, so there is not going to be a problem. I think Geri and I both kind of alluded to that the traffic problem with the left-only; so that’s, I guess in my scheme of things, I was thinking if you had a connection, then people could go out the other way. But that wouldn’t be a problem, if you foresee with another 150 students. RAPOZA: Well, with the staggered, you know, events as well, no, we don’t see any traffic issue. BOWMAN: Okay, thank you. GIFFIN: Commissioners, any other questions? Hearing none, do I hear a motion? BOWMAN: No testifiers? GIFFIN: No. Commissioner Bowman. BOWMAN: I me, excuse me – I should go to your school and learn how to talk – I move that we approve the amendment of the special permit, No. 1262, with the conditions as proposed by the Director. GIFFIN: Do you want to be specific? BOWMAN: Do I want to be specific -. GIFFIN: Yeah, there was an -. 8 EXHIBIT D BOWMAN: Oh, okay, with -. GIFFIN: Agenda Item, I mean, Condition No. 3, Lani. BOWMAN: Condition 3 which – and I did not write down the exact wording, sorry. GIFFIN: That’s okay, that’s okay, the staff can help us with that. I think if I’m not -. BOWMAN: Condition 3 -. COTTLE: Would you like me to read that? GIFFIN: Sure. COTTLE: Okay. “The applicant shall provide a 15-foot wide emergency vehicular access between the upper and lower campuses.” GIFFIN: Right. And that was the only addition to the conditions, correct? COTTLE: Condition 7 -. GIFFIN: Sorry, you are right. I have it -. BOWMAN: “If required by Public Works -.” COTTLE: It in the middle would be, “The driveway shall include all-weather crossings over the Waiaha Drainageway, if required by the Department of Public Works, since this driveway will serve as the primary access.” GIFFIN: Correct. All right. Do I hear a second? Tom. WHITTEMORE: Second. GIFFIN: All right. It’s been moved by Commissioner Bowman and seconded by Commissioner Hickcox, no, Whittemore – I’m hungry – that we approve the expansion, to allow for the expansion of a public charter school and accessory facilities by us, along with the conditions as stated in Condition No. 3, as stated by staff, and Condition No. 7, as stated by staff. I think that that’s it, right? Okay, good. All right, Maija? COTTLE: Thank you, Madam Chair. Commissioner Bowman? BOWMAN: Aye. COTTLE: Commissioner Whittemore? WHITTEMORE: Aye. COTTLE: Commissioner Beaudet? 9 EXHIBIT D BEAUDET: Aye. COTTLE: Commissioner Hickcox? HICKCOX: Aye. COTTLE: Commissioner Nelson? NELSON: Aye. COTTLE: And Madam Chair? GIFFIN: Aye. COTTLE: Okay, the motion passes, six-zero, to approve the amendment. GIFFIN: Congratulations. DONALDSON-SARGIS: Thank you. GIFFIN: You’re very welcome, Ocean. HAUANIO: Thank you. BOWMAN: You’re welcome. GIFFIN: You’re welcome, honey. The discussion ended at 1:20 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Noriko Sauer, Secretary Leeward Planning Commission 10 EXHIBIT D