Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 26, Number 10, 1 October 2009 — nīnauele q&a [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]
nīnauele q&a
lnterviewed by Lisa Asato Public lnformation Specialist The state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, the state's largest affordable housing developer is going green. Kaulana Park, its new direetor, explains how this will ehange the landseape and the day-to-day living for homesteaders. KWO: One of your first puhlie aets as DHHL direetor was to sign an energy eharter with the Hawaiian Eleetrie Co.'s operations on O'ahu, Maui and Hawai'i Island. Are all of DHHL's developments from here on out going to be green? KP: Yes, that's a requirement in our RFPs (Request for Proposals) when we go out to bid. KWO: In that vein, tell us more about the planned Kaupuni Village subdivision, whieh HECO will be eonsulting on, and whieh will inelude a community center, open space, aquaculture fish ponds, farming plots and a story/meditation garden. KP: It's in Wai'anae. It's only 18 hones. Our objective is to build a net-zero energy subdivision. The purpose of it all is to just do it and utilize what we learn from this ... for every future development. It specifically becomes the model that we would use hopefully in our Kamehameha Schools' Mākaha development. That's such an important part of what we want to do because it integrates the educational component in the community. . . . But it also incorporates lifestyle changes, whieh I think is like HOAP (Home Ownership Assistance Program), in whieh we build homes affordable; but it's not the home, it's the homeowner we have to focus on. With all the green things we're doing, it will boil down to (homesteaders) making those decisions to (follow through and) recycle, turn off the lights and use less air conditioning to cut their costs. KWO: What will DHHL's priority be for the next year? Fulfilling the strategic plan, continuing to do all of the things that are in the pipeline under eaeh goal in the strategic plan. And also implementing the energy policy as well, so there's a few projects that we already have in the hopper under eaeh objective. ... For example, our bread-and-butter land development goal is to take everybody that's on the wait list now and give them an opportunity for homeownership or land stewardship. Our goal there is to produce 1,000 lease awards a year. We've been on paee with that the last eouple years. . . . We still should be able to hit that goal even amidst the eeonomie conditions because thankfully we have now federal stimulus funds that are assisting us. KWO: DHHL is receiving $10 million in stimulus funds over two years? KP: Yes, $10 million sounds like a lot of money but at the end of the day the infrastructure costs eats up a lot
of that money. So one of the projects that is on there is our East Kapolei II project , and that's 1,100 homes. And the second I site that we're doing is in Waimānalo. J So between those two projects, again, " most of it is mass grading (to prepare the homesforverticalconstruction). j KWO: DHHL, through its former director Mieah Kāne,
has been a supporter of the Akaka Bill. Will that eonhnue under your leadership?
KP: Absolutely. . . . It's another mechanismthat makes it that mueh harder for those companies, organizations or individuals that are trying to take away our funding and our rights as ali'i trusts and that's the biggest benefit. Will it prevent it? No, but at least it puts up another barrier that makes it even more difficult for them to penetrate. But beyond that, it's another example of how we ean unite with OHA. OHA is obviously the lead on this. KWO: DHHL receives $30 million annually in settlement money from the state, and your department has been preparing for it to sunset in 2015. What's happening there? KP: This is a goal of our strategic plan ... to get up to that level of ineome, $30 million a year, by 2015. So it's utilizing 2 percent of our lands for commercial, for industrial purposes or even renewable energy purposes to maximize the amount of money to achieve this goal, whieh really goes to offset infrastructure costs, the HOAP program and administration costs because we weaned ourselves off the general fends. ... We're blessed that because of the ineome we create from our lands thus far, whieh is about $14 million (annually), that we ean utilize that funding to offset our administrative costs so we ean eonhnue the paee that we've set forth. KWO: What do you say to potential beneficiaries who might question why lands are being leased out to renewable energy companies, such as for the proposed wind farm on Moloka'i? KP: The renewable energy companies coming to us are going after lands that are remote and have no infrastructure, no nothing. Give you a quick history on this. When we were getting the 200,000 acres of land from the U.S. govemment, we didn't get oceanfront properties or downtown Honolulu lands, we got the worst of the worst lands. So what's ironic is that those lands that were remote, windy, hot are now lands that are attractive to these renewable-energy companies. So these are not places that you wouldlive; these are places that you don't want to live. On Moloka'i, the lands that we're talking about there are remote. The only stretch of lands that are valuable to our people, and we will keep that, is near the oeean. In fact, we visited there, Mo'omomi Beach. We don't plan to put any windmills. I'm sure
the energy company well. They're being of places that are appears as if there's views sometimes greater good. What island of Molokai? for the future genis the greater good So that's how they continue to dialog. KWO: On the planned Kapolei works? KP: Yes. Iniregional mall done the times as they DeBartolo Group) going to phase the ^ process of land■O, this side of
doesn't want to do that as very respectful of our culture, sacred to us. ... Right now it different views, but different ean be put aside for the is the greater good for the What is the greater good erations of Moloka'i? What for the future of Hawai'i? have to look at things and eeonomie front, is DHHL's shopping center still in the tially we wanted the whole ( (at onee). Obviously with are now, they (developer had to scale back so they're project. ... They're in the ] ing two anchor tenants on , this phase right now. ■
www.oha.org/kwo
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