HomeMy WebLinkAboutIndividual Comment - S. SteinerCamero, Tracie-Lee
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From: Sara Steiner <pahoatoday@gmail.com> R'T
Sent: Thursday, October 13, 2016 8:21 AM n(Di , . i ;;II
To: PlanningInternet Mail; Mayor's internet email;letters@hwaiitribune-herald.com;
letters@staradvertiser.com;wht@aloha.net;Tiffany Edwards Hunt;Ilagan, Greggor, ..,
Paleka, Daniel; Russell Ruderman; Rep.Joy San Buenaventura; Roberta Kim; David
Corrigan;copsysop;Governor Ige;jen@jenruggles.com; Eileen Ohara;jon olson; Luana
Jones;skeliihoomalu@gmail.com; Robert Petricci
Subject: Hawaii County General Plan Comprehensive Review
Dear Planning Department, cc Others,
I participated in your general plan meeting and voted in Pahoa in August. I have issues with the
squirrley way you worded questions and also how you talk about the planning department's role in
the the substandard subdivisions in Puna. Here are my comments:
1. The questions regarding the new County acquisition of the Parking Lot and Farmer's Market
behind Luquin's Mexican Restaurant are cruel and misleading. We need and will get
paved community parking, lights, covered pavilions/Farmer's Market, toilets and showers. Not just
one or two of those items, but all of them. You all in Hilo and Kona have multitude of beaches, parks,
sports complexes, and lighted streets. Should I count them for you? We have a couple parks and a
community and senior center which are fenced and locked to keep us out. The County of Hawaii has
been taking our tax money and using it not to our benefit for decades now. WE WANT OUR FAIR
SHARE, AND WE WANT IT NOW.
2. When you start a question off by saying you have only limited funds, you scare the
people. Then you ask where the people want to spend the limited funds by giving them the choice to
keep money in established areas or improve impoverished areas, how do you think the majority of
folks are gonna vote? Of course they want to keep money in their area, not to help someone on the
other side of the island. The Planning Department shouldn't get to ask the people of Hawaii to help
them discriminate against Puna by holding a vote then saving it's what the people want. We in Puna
deserve a modicum of respect, that includes potable water spigots at each subdivision, sewers in
Pahoa, and development allowed in HPP/Orchidland so we can have more services and not have to
drive to Hilo all the time. An actual secondary access from Nanawale through Hawaiian Beaches
through to Shipman land all the way to Hilo, without using Highway 11, is very crucial to the well-
being of lower Puna, in fact you need to focus on this road immediately as Highway 130 is packed
with phone poles on both sides of the road which are only rated for Category 1 hurricane, and the
impassible if the poles come down, not to mention lava.
3.Regarding all the sub-standard subdivisions that the Hawaii County Planning Department tries
to make people believe they had nothing to do with, I call bull. Hawaii County planners permitted
Royal Gardens and Vacationland in 1955-60 in the exact place the lava was actively flowing as a
scam to make money off vacant land. Massive subdivisions were permitted all over Lava Zone 1
without even thinking about the lava or emergency access or basic services for any of the people
living out here, because you didn't think people would live here.
In closing, Puna has woefully inadequate phone and internet service, we are shorted on police, and
the majority of people have to commute hours a day just to work or eat, all because the planners of
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the past refused to allow us basic services here. You current planners (and the rest of the County
and'State politicians) need to own the past's greed and move us forward equitably. You can remedy
these past deficiencies so all of us on the Big Island of Hawaii can sail together into the Age of
Aquarius, with our basic human needs met and in love and caring harmony with each other!
Sincerely,
Sara Steiner
P.O. Box 2011
Pahoa, Hawaii 96778
PahoaToday@gmail.com
808-936-9546
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