Developers of a planned 65-lot single home project on 11 acres in Kapalaalaea were given an extra assignment Thursday, as the Leeward Planning Commission deferred the oft-delayed project until an updated cultural impact assessment could be produced.
At issue is a five-year extension for a rezoning and special management area permit for the proposed subdivision off Alii Drive that expired in February 2019.
The project is directly to the south of established residential subdivisions of White Sands Beach Estates and Keauhou View Estates subdivisions to the north, and existing single and multiple family residential zoning to the south as part of the resort community of Keauhou.
Hawaii One1 Investors LLC, formerly Kona Heights LLC, is also seeking a change to the permit’s drainage requirement to allow the drainage improvements to be secured by a bond or other surety rather than be constructed prior to final subdivision approval.
“The bottom line — does this project check all those regulatory boxes?” said developer’s land-use consultant Daryn Arai. “We do think it does.”
Since acquiring the project in 2013, the new developers had fulfilled a number of requirements for development approval, including securing a planned unit development permit in 2016, finalizing and securing approval from the State Historic Preservation Division for an archaeological data recovery plan and burial treatment plan in 2017, securing tentative approval for phase one of the subdivision in 2017, working with the Department of Parks and Recreation to locate a suitable site for a three-acre neighborhood park, completing an environmental Assessment and receiving a finding of no significant Impact for the park’s development, the Planning Department said in its report.
More than a dozen testifiers spoke in opposition to the project, many of them passionately, including Native Hawaiian practitioner and writer Lamaku Mikahala Roy. Roy interrupted with frequent questions during the developer’s presentation, forcing the commission to call a recess as the board plowed toward the end of a seven-hour session.
“The whole community is not in support,” noted Commissioner Clement “CJ” Kanuha.
Testifiers were concerned about cultural impacts, displacement of locals through the loss of affordable housing, traffic impacts and other strains on the area’s infrastructure.
“So much development took over and we have so much chaos, disaster after disaster,” said Setsuko Morinoue. “The same old way to build. … People came here and take and take and keep on taking. Every time, the same old thing.”
Roy and other testifiers voiced concerns that developing the area will desecrate or destroy the Great Wall of Kuakini, a stone barricade over five miles long that traces its origins back to Kona’s early years.
Testifier Ann Eshibar was sympathetic.
“I don’t have to be Hawaiian to want to protect it. I don’t have to live near it to want to protect it. I could live on the moon and I’d still want to protect it.”
Kailua-Kona Realtor Edward Rapoza, the only testifier favoring the project, said the development conforms to the county general plan and the Kona Community Redevelopment Plan, which he said he volunteered to help craft over five years with much input from the community.
“There was input from every aspect of the community,” Rapoza said, adding that the CDP pinpoints areas for urban expansion and for infill, and the project fits those criteria.
“(We showed) where we wanted to see the growth and that document stands today,” he said. “We all participated and we have a plan that many people seem to forget. … We all indicated where we wanted the growth to be.”