Communication No. 2018-13- Janice Palma-Glennie CDP Amendments

Home

Communication No. 2018-13 Aloha Planners and KCDP AC members, Mahalo to everyone who worked on these amendments, particularly the subcommittee, Roy Takamoto, and Nancy Pisicchio. I implicitly trust the intentions and commitment of Nancy and Roy and their continued desire to make the KCDP succeed, and I appreciate them taking the time to attend the last AC meeting. It was especially enlightening to hear from Roy how certain changes could be devastating to the community's desire to have infrastructure in place before more development continues, and I'm grateful to see a reversal of that proposed change. It was also inspiring to hear Nancy reiterate the idea of reaching out to community members for assistance to help get parts of the plan implemented, as she's seen done successfully in places like Oahu. I'm also very relieved to see that the "shall" related to maintaining 1000 foot shoreline setbacks has been retained. Encouraging for-profit development isn't AC's kuleana It's not my fear, nor the fear of any of the people I've spoken to in the community over several decades, that North and South Kona are lacking or will be lacking development. North Kona is a deja vu mess of insufficient infrastructure. As has been noted in testimony and public comments, our waste disposal situation is archaic and damaging our nearshore waters and reefs (i.e., damaging public health) at the same time that people sit in wasteful lines of traffic. This won't be alleviated anytime soon, despite Queen Ka'ahumanu Highway being widened as the bottleneck at the south end will continue in foreseeable future. If finishing the new stretch of Queen K highway is used as an excuse to build more dwellings in North or South Kona, it will have been a negative rather than a positive for our region. Protect and create affordable housing North Kona is already bursting at the seams. The only place where lack of development is a concern is for truly affordable housing. As can be seen in recent Oahu headlines and used as a lesson for our County, housing that reverts back to the general real estate pool in10, 20 or even 30 years in the future isn't sufficient to help the region's people survive and thrive in the longer term when people continue to depend upon that housing for them and their Keoki. The affordable housing crisis has been exacerbated by short term rentals in residential neighborhoods. That growing situation can and is being addressed by the county council and mayor. Perhaps language that supports a limit to vacation rentals in all but resort -zoned areas should be added to the KCDP. "Shall" vs "May" or "Should" As much as some of the changes from "shall" to "should" or "may" make sense, others could have damaging affect on the KCDP and our region in the long run. That includes limiting the legal ability to grow our regions in a way that embodies the qualities of Smart Growth (i.e., protection of the land, culture, and social health of the North and South Kona regions) which the community assumed would happen under the ordinance. For example, I have reservations regarding these and other proposed amendments: • Changes to Policy TRAN-1.2: proposes switching "shall" to "should" regarding Ane Keohokalole being the main trunk road for transit. This would remove the Transit