Article copyright by Honolulu Weekly, fair use.
by Ian Lind | Dec 26, 2007
A controversial proposal for a 12-home subdivision on the steep slopes at the end of Hao Street in the back of Aina Hainahas been stalled by community opposition and city concerns over unstable soil, possible rock falls, and other problems common to the area.
But community leaders say they are shocked that a subdivision is even being considered because the city council voted in 1999 to purchase the land for a nature preserve. The move followed several years of protests and public pressure against a plan to build a cemetery on two adjoining parcels at the same location.
The city budgeted $5 million for the purchase, more than ten times the tax appraised value of the two properties at the time.
‘Everyone thought the issue of development in that area would never come up again after the city agreed to buy it,’ said attorney Wayson Chow, president of the Aina Haina Community Association. ‘We all believed the city bought the whole property, but somehow it ended up buying only the 85 acres next door, leaving the smaller parcel with residential zoning in private hands.’
Nobody here realized the city had failed to follow through with the entire purchase until a survey of the remaining undeveloped pieces of land in the valley was done earlier this year, Chow said.
‘We’re stunned, and the neighborhood board is stunned,’ Chow said.
According to city records, the city paid nearly $1.9 million for the larger 85 acre parcel in 2000, which should have left $3.1 million for the purchase of the remaining 9.5 adjacent acres. For some reason not yet explained, the city failed to complete that deal. That smaller parcel was eventually sold in 2004 to Ko Olina Hotel #10 LLC, controlled by Ko Olina developer Jeffrey Stone, for $2.1 million, about $1 million less than the city had budgeted.
Stone’s wife, Honolulu attorney Lorrie Lee Stone, represented both the former landowner, Hong Kong-based Volumes Corporation, and National Housing Corporation, the company that pushed the cemetery plan a decade ago. She represented both companies during negotiations over the condemnation, city records show. Stone did not respond to telephone messages left with her law office last week.
Art Mori, community association treasurer and a veteran of the fight to block the cemetery, said he has been unable to find out why the city failed to complete the purchase, even with the assistance of two city council members.
‘They told me there’s just nobody left who remembers,’ Mori said. ‘It seems to be a real sell-out of the community. Personally, I feel that we’ve really been taken.’
In December 2006, the property was resold to Residences at Aina Haina LLC, another company controlled by Jeffrey Stone, for $2.37 million, still less than what the city had appropriated.
Hida, Okamoto and Associates, the consulting firm which submitted the latest subdivision application on behalf of the landowner, did not respond to an inquiry from Honolulu Weekly last week.
The city’s Department of Planning and Permitting shares the community’s worries about soil problems, landslide dangers, and risks of rock falls in the area, according to Mario Siu-Li of the subdivision branch in the city’s Department of Planning and Permitting.
A letter was sent in July 2007 notifying the landowner that processing of the subdivision application had been deferred until it responded to those concerns by providing additional technical information and engineering studies.
‘We haven’t gotten any response from the applicant,’ Siu-Li said last week.
If the requested information isn’t provided be a January 26, 2008 deadline, the subdivision application will expire.
‘If we don’t get a response, the thing is not going anywhere,’ Siu-Li said.
Dozens of homes have been already been damaged or destroyed by soil movement and slow landslides in nearby parts of Aina Haina, and the city has previously had to condemn several properties. Neighbors fear further development on the slopes above them will simply aggravate their existing problems.
One homeowner who lives within a block of the proposed subdivision says the city is liable for damages his home sustained in a landslide that began in early 2005 and continued at least through the beginning of this year, and has filed suit to recover the costs of stabilizing the property.
The suit alleges that broken, defective, or inadequate storm drains, sewers, and water catchment facilities allowed excess water to permeate the clay soil and trigger damaging landslides.
Several other suits stemming from damage and soil movement during the heavy rains in early 2006 are also rumored to be pending.
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