Honua'ula makes halting progress

The Maui News
Friday, March 16, 2007
By MELISSA TANJI, Staff Writer

WAILUKU - After more than six hours of discussion Wednesday, Council Land Use Chairman Mike Molina put the Honua'ula project district on hold for three months, giving committee members until June 15 to prepare comments on conditions proposed by the planning staff and developer.

Molina said on Thursday that he expects the Land Use Committee to continue its review of the 670-acre residential development in late summer or early fall. His schedule appeared to be timed in part to allow the council members to focus on the 2007-08 county budget presented by Mayor Charmaine Tavares on Thursday.

The representative for Honua'ula, former Public Works Director Charlie Jencks, said he was encouraged that there was movement on the zoning application that has been pending for years.

"It was rewarding to get to that point with the committee. There are a lot of conditions they need to consider many of which are going to be beneficial to the

people of South Maui and Maui County in general," Jencks said on Thursday.

"It's a step-by-step process. We take it one day at a time."

Listed on the Kihei-Makena Community Plan as Project District 9 (Maui Wailea 670), the project mauka of the Wailea Resort would involve development of up to 1,400 housing units and an 18-hole golf course. It is before the council for zoning that modifies its original project district plan that had included two 18-hole golf courses.

"I think we have made significant progress," Molina said of the discussions on Wednesday. The council review has been "inching along" since the application was submitted several years ago, he said.

"In my opinion sooner or later the council has to make a decision," he said.

During the discussions that dragged into the evening on Wednesday, the Land Use Committee focused on two concerns raised by council members. One involves the plan for the project to have a private water system, including use of a well developed by Haleakala Ranch, until Maui County is able to develop new water sources for the Central Maui system.

The other issue was traffic and what highway improvements will be provided by the developer.

Council Chairman Riki Hokama said he could not support a private water system and suggested that the county should buy the water sources to be utilized by Honua'ula.

"It's the people's water," he said.

Jencks told the committee that he has an agreement with Haleakala Ranch for water from a well the ranch has developed. If the county wants to take over that system, it could talk to Haleakala Ranch.

Additional water for the development will come from a well within the Honua'ula site. Any private water system will be regulated by the state Public Utilities Commission and would have to be constructed to state and county standards, Jencks said.

But he said he would take the council member's concerns back for discussion by the development group.

Hokama suggested the Honua'ula developer would need to comply with any conditions imposed by the county regarding dedication of a water system to the county.

"They better work it out with Haleakala Ranch," he said.

On traffic, the discussion involved the adequacy of the Piilani Highway, which is just a two-lane roadway between the Maui Meadows subdivision and the Wailea Resort leading to the Honua'ula project district.

Jencks said the developer is taking the lead in widening the highway to four lanes, at a cost of $15 million, from the Kilohana Drive intersection to Wailea Ike Drive. He said Honua'ula also is working in partnership with Wailea and Makena Resort owners and the highway improvements will include traffic signals.

The Makena Resort, which was recently acquired by a Hawaii investment group, will need to develop a primary access road to the 1,500-acre property as an alternative to the two-lane Makena Alanui that runs from the Wailea Resort.

Hokama questioned having additional traffic signals along the Piilani Highway, saying they will add to traffic slowdowns.

Maui police officer Brad Hickle said he agrees with a Honua'ula traffic impact study, which calls for more traffic signals. He said traffic signals will make it easier for residents to get onto Piilani Highway.

But he also agreed with Hokama that the ideal would be another highway through South Maui that did not have traffic signals, to provide freer traffic flow.