{"id":11813,"date":"2019-10-01T18:07:40","date_gmt":"2019-10-01T18:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.environment-hawaii.org\/?p=11813"},"modified":"2019-10-01T20:17:04","modified_gmt":"2019-10-01T20:17:04","slug":"new-noteworthy-aina-lea-and-draft-eis-for-emi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/?p=11813","title":{"rendered":"New & Noteworthy: Aina Lea and Draft EIS for EMI"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u2018Aina Le\u2018a Stumbles: <\/strong>On August 26, Robert Wessels, who heads up \u2018Aina Le\u2018a, Inc., forwarded to the Hawai\u2018i County Planning Department an environmental impact statement preparation notice (EISPN), prepared by Christian Renz, a Waikoloa landscaper. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the decade since Wessels first appeared before the state Land Use Commission as the developer of a project known as the Villages of \u2018Aina Le\u2018a, sandwiched between the Mauna Lani resort and the Village of Waikoloa, in the Big Island district of South Kohala, the preparation of an acceptable EIS has been one of the biggest stumbling blocks to development of what Wessels now calls the Town of \u2018Aina Le\u2018a, consisting of 20 residential villages over the next two decades. Infrastructure and building lot preparation alone are\nprojected to cost $246,867,500, Wessels\nhas claimed.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wessels anticipated publication of\nthe EISPN in the September 8, 2019\nEnvironmental Notice <\/em>and accordingly\nscheduled the required public meeting\nfor September 26 at the Waikoloa Beach\nMarriott hotel.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But on September 9, Planning Director Michael Yee notified Wessels that the department had rejected his EISPN. Yee cited numerous problems with the draft EISPN, including zoning designations, claims that a previous, 2010, EIS that was deemed inadequate described the current project, and an increase in the number of units over what had been previously approved by the county and the Land Use Commission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Undaunted, Wessels still had the\nscheduled meeting on September 26.\nNo one from the Planning Department\nattended.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

East Maui DEIS: <\/strong>The draft environmental impact statement for a 30-year license allowing East Maui Irrigation Co. (EMI) to continue to take water from East Maui streams has been released. And, at 2,700 pages, it is as lengthy as it is long awaited. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The action proposed in the DEIS is a continuation of the status quo, subject, however, to the state Commission on Water Resource Management\u2019s order in 2018 to restore flows to ten of the previously diverted streams and increased minimum flows in several more. Also, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands holds a reserved right to some of the water. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alexander and Baldwin no longer\nowns the lands in Central Maui that were\nthe rationale for the development of the\nEMI system, starting in the 1870s. It sold\nthose lands to Mahi Pono in December\n2018. But it retains an ownership interest\nin EMI. According to the DEIS, A&B\nand Mahi Pono are co-owners of EMI.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to serving Mahi Pono\nlands, the DEIS states, the diverted water\nwill supply the Kula Agricultural Park\nand the Maui Department of Water\nSupply\u2019s upcountry system.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is estimated that at full operation of diversified agriculture, approximately 85.22 mgd [million gallons a day] of water will be directed to the fields of Central Maui,\u201d the DEIS states. \u201cOf this amount, approximately 22.7 percent, or approximately 19.34 mgd, is estimated to be lost through evaporation and seepage in unlined ditches and reservoirs located in the Central Maui agricultural fields. …. The remaining 65.87 mgd would be used for irrigation…..\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A link to the DEIS is available on the\nOffice of Environmental Quality\u2019s web-\nsite. Comments are due November 7.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘Aina Le‘a Stumbles: On August 26, Robert Wessels, who heads up ‘Aina Le‘a, Inc., forwarded to the Hawai‘i County Planning Department an environmental impact statement preparation notice (EISPN), prepared by Christian Renz, a Waikoloa landscaper. In the decade since Wessels … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8831,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[459],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-october-2019"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11813\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}