Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout2015-08-06 Hearing Transcript - BWA LLC SPP 04-005 WINDWARD PLANNING COMMISSION COUNTY OF HAWAI‘I HEARING TRANSCRIPT AUGUST 6, 2015 BWA LLC dba BOTANICAL WORLD A regularly advertised hearing on the application of ADVENTURES (SPP 04-005) was called to order at 9:17 a.m. in the County of Hawai‘i Aupuni Center Conference Room, 101 Pauahi Street, Hilo, Hawai‘i with Chairman Myles Miyasato presiding. COMMISSIONERS PRESENT: Myles Miyasato, Donn Dela Cruz, Charles Heaukulani, Gregory Henkel, Donald Ikeda, and Raylene Moses. ALSO PRESENT: Duane Kanuha (Planning Director), Danny Patel (Deputy Corporation Counsel for the Windward Planning Commission), Daryn Arai (Planning Program Manager), Jeff Darrow (Staff Planner), Maija Jackson (Staff Planner), and Sarah Hata-Finley (Commission Secretary). And approximately 3 people from the public in attendance. APPLICANT: BWA LLC dba BOTANICAL WORLD ADVENTURES (Amend SPP 04-005) Request for a 5-year extension of time to Condition No. 2 (complete construction) and the expansion of operating hours (Condition No. 3) of Special Permit No. 04-005, which allowed for the construction of a visitor center, parking lot and related improvements on approximately 154,010 square feet (3.53 acres) of land situated within the State Land Use Agricultural District. The project site is part of the existing Botanical World Adventures situated on the north side of Leopolino Road between Highway 19 and the Old Māmalahoa Highway, Kamae‛e, North Hilo, Hawai‛i, TMK: 3-1-001: portion of 015. MIYASATO: Next item on our agenda is BWA, LLC dba Botanical World Adventures. DARROW: Mr. Chairman, if we could just give a minute for the computer to come around. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning— MIYASATO: Good morning. DELA CRUZ: Morning. DARROW: --Mr. Chairman and Members of the Planning Commission. Our next Applicant is BWA, LLC doing business as Botanical World Adventures. They’re requesting amendments to Special Permit No. 04-005. 1 EXHIBIT B For orientation purposes, this is the location map. We’re looking in the area of South Hilo, just north of Hakalau. So, this, the darker blue, yellow, and purple areas represent the Hakalau area, and the subject property is identified with a black outline. The white line running in a north- south direction is Hawaiʽi Belt Road or Highway 19. And, this particular parcel is adjacent to the highway. This is a, the County Zoning Map for the area, again for orientation, we have the Hawaiʽi Belt Road, Hawaiian—Highway 19. The subject property is identified with a black outline, and the different colors on the map represent the zoning for the area. This is zoned Agricultural – 20 acres. Some other zonings in the area represent residential, the yellow--Agricultural in the dark blue as well as some Industrial zoned land at the point of Hakalau. The property adjoins the Hawaiʽi Belt Road as well as Leopolino Road and the Old Māmalahoa Highway. This is the State Land Use Boundary Map. The subject property is identified in light green which represents State Land Use Agricultural District. This is the General Plan Land Use Pattern Allocation Guide Map. This, the subject property is identified as Important Agricultural Lands. And, this is an aerial photo. Again, we have the Hawaiʽi Belt Road running in a north-south direction. Access to the property is from Leopolino Road as well as Old Māmalahoa Highway. The Applicant is requesting amendments to condition, conditions of Special Permit No. 04-005 which include a five-year time extension to Condition 2 which is the construction timeline to complete the project, and also to extend the operating hours under Condition No. 3 to begin at 7 a.m. and end at dusk/sunset daily, including weekends. th Special Permit No. 04-005 was initially approved on June 5, 2005, by the Planning Commission to World Botanical Gardens to allow the construction of a visitor’s center, parking lot, and related improvements on approximately 3.5 acres of land. The subject property is actually 26.27 acres. The reasons for the request for Condition No. 2 include years of litigation to seize control over the board of the original applicant, World Botanical Gardens Inc., as well as the economic downturn beginning in 2008 which suppressed the visitor market and made it impossible to meet the June 8, 2015 construction deadline. The reason for Condition No. 3 is to allow flexibility in its program offerings by providing visitors with the opportunity to come earlier and stay later and take advantage of different program offerings including zipline operations, botanical garden tour and visits, visitor tours, as well as Segway tours. This is a copy of the original site plan. For orientation, on the bottom of the map, we have Hawaiʽi Belt Road, access from Leopolino Road on the left side of the map, and we have Old 2 EXHIBIT B Māmalahoa Highway. Access is provided through Leopolino Road as well as to the parking area off Old Māmalahoa Highway. The proposed area for the visitor’s center is in this general location, and you can see the identified parking area. The original proposal for the visitor’s center was a 2-story, 7,000-square foot property, as well as a 20,000-square foot parking area. These are some site photos. This is on Hawaiʽi Belt Road looking north with Leopolino Road on the left which would provide access. This is on Hawaiʽi Belt Road looking south with Leopolino Road on the right side of the map. You can see that there’s a large berm that adjoins the property there. This is from Hawaiʽi Belt Road looking up Leopolino Road, mauka, with the subject property on the right. This is on Leopolino Road, for the first access from Leopolino Road. And, this is Old Māmalahoa Highway at the intersection of Leopolino Road, and we’ll go a little further down. This will be where the entrance to the parking area will, is, as well as the visitor’s center office. And, lastly, this is a picture of the parking area as well as the current visitor check-in center. The Planning Director is recommending the Planning Commission approve these amendment requests with conditions. If I might bring to your attention some late submittals that have come in. We have received a support letter which was, is dated July 27, 2015. This is from Percy Neel and Joan Neel. This morning, we have received a handout with pictures that was passed out to the Planning Commission, and that is from the Applicant’s representative. And then, lastly, the Planning Department received correspondence from the Department of Transportation regarding the issue of signage. In the Department of Transportation’s comment letter, they were concerned about the signage that was visible from the State Highway. In reviewing the section that they had quoted even further, we were able to get an agreement from DOT that the private signs are covered under one of their exemptions. And, so, we also received information that these signs have been permitted through the County, so what we’re gonna do in response is that, is request that Condition No. 7 be deleted in its entirety which was in response to the original DOT comment letter. And, so, if we could request that Condition 7 be removed, and that all the remaining conditions be renumbered. With that, that concludes our presentation. Thank you. MIYASATO: Commissioners, any questions for staff? I have a quick question. You know, this being an amendment, is it required to put that sign by your property that, for application and notify your neighbors? DARROW: Yes. 3 EXHIBIT B MIYASATO: Okay. For Condition No. 3, hours of operation, 7 in the morning till dusk. Is that kind of standard for an operation like this? DARROW: I would—a normal course of action that, that we seem to take as far as the, in past permits, is the Applicant proposes operations of hours, and we usually are okay with that. If there are concerns that we receive from adjoining neighbors or the public, then we will address those issues at this time, but it appears that there have been no, no concerns or oppositions raised at this time. MIYASATO: Okay, thank you. DARROW: Thank you. MIYASATO: Will the Applicant or representative please come forward? Good morning, could both of you— YEH: Good morning— MIYASATO: --please raise your right hand? Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth on this matter now before the Hawaiʽi County Planning Commission? YEH: I do. ROBINSON: I do. MIYASATO: Please state your name and residence. ROBINSON: Mark Robinson, actual residence is Spokane, Washington but my--have owned the Botanical Gardens now for a year and a half. YEH: Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Commission. My name is Thomas Yeh and representative of the Applicant. MIYASATO: Thank you. Do you have any comments or a presentation? YEH: You know, I was going to just say that the Planning Department’s Background Report is pretty accurate. Obviously, there’s some additional details that one can fill in. You know, on the visitor’s center design itself, it was kind of a larger project that’s being envisioned now, but is basically in the same location of footprint area. In addition to, you know, some of the litigation that was discussed, you know, the original applicant itself did file for bankruptcy. The current Applicant acquired the assets of the original applicant. Mr. Robinson is and was a principal of both entities. We did provide to you kind of a photographic depiction of some of the elements that are there on the premises. It’s not real sophisticated. There’s a brochure. But, it tells you kind of, some of the things that they’re 4 EXHIBIT B doing. They provide both the botanical garden experience, a rainforest walk, interestingly enough, a Segway tour that one can take, and then they have zipline on some other property. All of those really considered to be outdoor recreational uses or botanical gardens which are actually permitted out of Chapter 205 and the Zoning Code. The real issue for this permit is a visitor center itself. And, for the hours of operation, you know, I’m not sure anything is standard. As I understand, just north of the property, there’s another zipline operation with a visitor’s center. They actually have a 7 a.m. beginning time also, and the idea here was to allow not only if necessary, you know, visitors to the center, but also people in the vicinity, some opportunity to get refreshments, coffee—that sort of thing. And then, Mr. Robinson, you may want to talk about a couple of other issues. ROBINSON: I’ll just add a few other things. This was a, an odd corporation to begin with, and it was basically brought about as a, an interesting property for a botanical garden. It was, more or less, a failed objective from the beginning because the location is at a, at a place that you have to come by, by happen stance. It’s really, you know, the guests of the island come by there if they’re driving around to go to the Volcano which, since the new highway went in, is very optional. That, that area has a small population, but a population of kids, locals that, that really have very few opportunities close by. A few of my partners and I that were on the Board of Directors with World Botanical Gardens, had funded the zipline in 2009 which allowed the gardens to, for a brief moment, flourish with, with revenue—hire more people, become vibrant. And then seven other ziplines realized how easy it was to put up a zipline. Most of them not going through the, the approval process that we did; going through the permitting process; and some of those were able to jump in as the first zipline and subsequently have gone bankrupt. We’ve been able to fund, by funding through a limited group, the three of us that are now the LLC that bought all the assets from the failed corporation, have continued to try to supply those jobs to those people that are local, continue the garden growing. We were responsible for bringing Segways to the gardens which if you haven’t tried them, they’re just marvel, marvelously entertaining, but mostly allow guests to the gardens to see how wonderful the collection is that’s there. The collection itself continued to grow by virtue of a, of a man who, Dr. Lanny Neel, who is a professor of some 40 years now, 23 years in, in at just the University of Wisconsin, River Falls, and he brought his knowledge to that location and really shared it with the gardeners that are there now, shared it with the, the staff. The staff does a marvelous job of imparting the knowledge about these plants that have, are numbered in the thousands and we’re cataloging those still and trying to make this a resource to the community as well as to the guests that visit and find out how marvelous this place is, and how magical that location is. So, we’re really just asking to continue the, what was the original vision that caused so many of us to become involved in the gardens in the first place, and to actually fund that and finish the vision. Unfortunately, the shareholders that were participants in the old corporation recognized the vision, but it just couldn’t be done through the structure that had been created with that 5 EXHIBIT B garden. With the small group that we have, we can execute it to its natural conclusion. Thank you. MIYASATO: Thank you. Commissioners, any questions for the Applicant? HENKEL: I have one. MIYASATO: Commissioner— HENKEL: --how many employees do you anticipate? ROBINSON: Well, currently, we don’t anticipate a large influx, but probably an additional five to ten employees could be employed there. Right now, we, we have 17 employed. HEAUKULANI: Just a quick question—good morning, Tom. YEH: Yes, good morning. HEAUKULANI: And I, you know, I think these are the kind of projects that we should support for a lot of different reasons, but I wanted to make sure—and excuse me if you’d already affirmed this—but your client has reviewed the revised conditions? YEH: Yes, we have, and subject to that proposed deletion— HEAUKULANI: Right, yeah so the- YEH: --from the, from the staff— HEAUKULANI: --about the removal of the signs, so they were--and aside from that, has approved—that’s okay with him? YEH: Yes, I think the five years that we have now are fine. We would perhaps have to come back but hopefully not at that point so— HEAUKULANI: --hopefully not, but if you do come back. YEH: Thank you. MIYASATO: Commissioners, any other questions? If not, thank you. We have no testifiers for this application. Is anyone wishing to testify on this application? If not, can I have a motion to close public testimony on this? IKEDA: Moved to close public testimony. MOSES: Second. 6 EXHIBIT B MIYASATO: Motion by Commissioner Ikeda. Second by Commissioner Moses. All in favor? COMMISSIONERS: Aye. MIYASATO: Any opposed? I call a close to the public testimony for this application. Commissioners, any discussion? If not, I’ll accept a motion. IKEDA: Mr. Chairman, I’ll make the motion. I move that the application to amend Special Permit, SPP 04-005, be approved pursuant to the Planning Director’s findings, recommendations, and proposed conditions which shall be adopted. MIYASATO: With the amendment, yeah? The deletion. DARROW: With the deletion. IKEDA: Oh, deletion, yeah, of condition. HEAUKULANI: I’ll second. MIYASATO: Motion by Commissioner Ikeda. Second by Commissioner Heaukulani. Any discussion on the motion? You can call the roll. DARROW: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If I also might mention that along with the deletion of Condition 7, if, that we go ahead and remove any reference of that in the Recommendation as well so it’s not confusing. There’s a small excerpt in the Rec that talks about condition of approval being added for the signage, and we’ll just remove that as well. So, the motion before us is to prove—approve this, these amendments request along with the deletion of Condition 7. With that, we’ll take the roll call. Commissioner Ikeda? IKEDA: Aye. DARROW: Commissioner Heaukulani? HEAUKULANI: Aye. DARROW: Commissioner Dela Cruz? DELA CRUZ: Aye. DARROW: Commissioner Henkel? HENKEL: Aye. 7 EXHIBIT B DARROW: Commissioner Moses? MOSES: Aye. DARROW: And Mr. Chairman. MIYASATO: Aye. DARROW: The motion passes six to zero. MIYASATO: You’ll be notified in writing. YEH (from audience): Thank you. MIYASATO: You’re welcome. The discussion ended at 9:38 a.m. Respectfully submitted, Sarah Y. Hata-Finley, Secretary Windward Planning Commission 8 EXHIBIT B