Court Gets Forest City Appeal: The Queen Lili`uokalani Trust has appealed the decision of the state Land Use Commission approving the Kona project known as Kamakana Villages, to be developed by the Hawai`i Housing and Finance Development Corporation and Forest City.
The project needed the LUC to approve its petition to reclassify into the Urban district 272 acres of Agriculture land just mauka of the village of Kailua. The petition was approved November 9; on December 8, the trust, which sold the land to the state nearly 20 years ago and which continues to have large holdings in the area, appealed to the 3rd Circuit Court.
Among other things, the appeal argues (as the trust argued before the LUC) that the notice of the petition was deficient. It also notes inconsistencies between “conditions and representations” about future use of the land made by the state at the time it bought the land and current plans for it. The trust asks the court to vacate the LUC decision and remand it for further hearing after proper notice has been given – or to reverse the decision as being clearly erroneous.
Green v. Blue: The public comment period for the City and County of Honolulu’s Ko`olauloa Sustainable Communities Plan (SCP) ends on the 15th of this month. The plan is intended to guide development decisions for the communities along the northeast coast of O`ahu, from Ka`a`awa to Kawela, and was supposed to have been created through a community-based process. Instead, in collaboration with developers, the city, through its planning consultant Helber, Hastert, and Fee Planners, Inc., revised the community’s draft plan, releasing the revision last October.
Minutes of the October 2010 meeting of the Ko`olauloa Neighborhood Board describe, in part, how the process unfolded. The Public Advisory Committee (PAC), which includes about two dozen representives from the affected communities, spent nearly two years revising the plan. The minutes state that the PAC was “surprised” to find that the draft it had submitted to the city’s Department of Planning and Permitting in August 2009 had been substantially revised by Hawai`i Reserves, Inc. (HRI), a developer for the Mormon church, and Brigham Young University-Hawai`i.
The “backdoor” revisions were made to include HRI’s “Envision La`ie” plans and were approved despite a vote by the PAC to exclude the HRI/BYUH plans.
Testimony at a public hearing on the plan held last month in Kahuku focused almost exclusively on the proposed Envision La`ie development, which includes nearly 900 residential units in La`ie and Malaekahana, much of it on agricultural lands. The draft SCP refers to the units as both affordable housing and workforce housing and it was not made clear at the meeting exactly how those units would be divested.
Comments should be sent to Helber, Hastert & Fee Planners, Inc. at 733 Bishop Street Suite 2590, Honolulu HI 96813. They can also be emailed to colsonorr@hhf.com or faxed to 545-2050. The plan can be purchased for $10 at the City Municipal Bookstore, City Hall Annex at 558 South King Street, Honolulu or downloaded for free online at www.honoluludpp.org/planning
A final plan is expected to be completed early this year and must then receive approval from the city Planning Commission and County Council.
Volume 21, Number 7 — January 2011
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