Developer seeks delay from county

A Waikoloa developer is asking the county’s permission to hold off another five years before starting its project.

California developer Waikoloa Mauka LLC, working Waikoloa Highlands, a 398-lot project on more than 730 acres south of Waikoloa Village, asked the county in August for the extension. A rezoning ordinance condition from 2007 required the final subdivision approval of the whole project be applied for before September 2012. The amendment request would give the developer another 5 years to complete the project’s first increment, or 50 lots, and finish the entire project within 10 years.

The Leeward Planning Commission will consider the request during its next meeting, 9:30 a.m. Nov. 15 at the West Hawaii Civic Center.

Previous iterations of the project included a golf course, which has since been removed, and lots that were expected to sell upwards of $1 million, as of 2008. According to a 2008 West Hawaii Today article about the project, Waikoloa Mauka LLC described the project as a low-density, rural subdivision on former marginal grazing lands that would provide a “logical progression” between urbanized Waikoloa and the vast undeveloped range southwest of Auwaiakeakua Gulch.

The commission will also hear a related item, an application from Hawaiian Riverbend LLC to reclassify 14.6 acres from agricultural to urban, and rezone the parcel from county agricultural to commercial-village.

“If approved, the applicant hopes to construct a commercial retail complex on the subject site,” planning consultant Sidney Fuke wrote in a letter delivered to neighboring property owners.

Next to the site is a 10-acre area developers plan to dedicate to the county for a park or community center, which will fulfill Waikoloa Highlands’ fair share obligation.