...but leaves door open for future amendment
Despite a sea of supporters dressed in bright-golden T-shirts who overflowed a public meeting in the Hauula Elementary School cafeteria on the evening of January 29 [pictured above], the City and County of Honolulu Department of Planning and Permits (DPP) denied a collective, last-minute request from three Latter-day Saint institutions in Laie to extend the five-year review period for the Koolau Loa Sustainable Communities (KLSC) Plan in order to study and recommend solutions to make the institutions sustainable.
DPP Chief Planner Kathy Sokugawa made the announcement at the beginning of the meeting, but also said the Planning Department will allow the Church institutions — including Hawaii Reserves, Inc. (HRI), Brigham Young University Hawaii and the Polynesian Cultural Center — to file a plan amendment when they're ready. She further clarified that "anywhere down the line" HRI could interject their plans into the process with the Planning Commission or City Council. Latter-day Saint Church leaders have tasked HRI, headed by BYU-Hawaii alumnus (and BYU Provo Law School graduate) R. Eric Beaver, President & CEO, to interact with government agencies in these matters.
The City and County started its general development plan process for all of Oahu in the 1990s. The process called for broad community participation in each of nine districts — our district, Koolau Loa (also spelled Koolauloa) covers from Kaaawa to Kawela Bay — to complete a conceptual master plan with a 20-year rolling horizon; and to open the respective plans every five years for public review and amendment. BYUH, HRI and the PCC have participated as members of the Public Advisory Committee (PAC) that has been leading the current five-year review.
Beaver explained having proposed projects included in the plan does not guarantee future approvals or permitting, but not being included in the plan could prevent future projects from moving ahead.
With support from the Church-affiliated institutions, the Laie Community Association and others, HRI completed a Laie Master Plan in time for it to be enfolded virtually intact into the 1999 KLSC Plan. A lack of funding and staffing,however, has delayed the City from conducting its first five-year review until now, and Church institutional leaders in Laie wondered if a similar situation might prevent future amendments "until as early as 2014 or likely as late as 2016," Beaver [pictured at right] said in an earlier meeting held for BYUH ohana [faculty,staff and students] in the Cannon Activities Center on January 22.
He added that the primary Envision Hawaii findings — just completed in December 2008 — showed the Latter-day Saint institutions "are not sustainable in their current form, and they need to be. They want to study what it will take to make them sustainable, but the question came up if we would have to wait six-to-eight years before the next [KLSC Plan review] window."
Beaver apologized for the timing of the extension request and explained the Envision Hawaii study would also include "affordable housing, drainage, traffic, and several other issues that are important to all of us." The First Presidency just recently approved the request to move forward with those studies.
BYU-Hawaii Vice President for Academics Dr. Max L. Checketts explained in the earlier meeting [President Wheelwright was off-island during the two meetings] that soon after President Gordon B. Hinckley passed away about a year ago, President Thomas S. Monson and the new First Presidency called for a review of all Church assets and plans in the area. He said this is one of the reasons that HRI's plans for housing in Malaekahana — the area between Laie and Kahuku — as well as a faculty housing development on Moana Street in Laie were put on hold last year.
Some in the meeting at Hauula Elementary, who are in favor of "keeping the country, country," applauded the Department of Planning and Permitting's decision to deny the request for an extension. However, the original, approved KLSC Plan already includes the concept of future growth and additional housing in Laie, which the upcoming Envision Hawaii Phase II study is expected to refine and revise.
BYUH, PCC and HRI welcome the City's invitation to submit needed changes to the KLSC Plan, and will work with the Planning Commission and City Council to insure that the already-approved housing for Laie can be relocated so that it does not lock the university from space it needs to expand the campus and and become sustainable. HRI will lead these efforts, which will include re-examining housing in the adjoining lands of Malaekahana.
"We are a bureaucracy and we don't move very quickly, or respond very quickly," Sokugawa said. "However, once that Laie master plan process is completed, we would be willing to review an application to amend this [KLSC] plan at that point in time. That would mean you do not have to wait another five years," which drew the applause of those in golden T-shirts.
During the question-and-answer part of the meeting, the PAC was asked if there was a mention of BYUH in the KLSC Plan. The committee pointed out that there was already a large section in the 1999 plan supporting the university as important to the region and "needing to remain the chief institution of higher education in the area." They went on to say there is no mention of BYUH in recommended updates to the plan, because "it didn't need any update or changing."
Speaking on behalf of BYU-Hawaii during the public input part of the meeting,Checketts [shown below with the microphone] made five points about the future of the university:
- "The current university model is not sustainable."
- "The current housing designations that hem in the campus on two sides are not workable."
- "We need the flexibility to grow incrementally, as needed, over the course of the future.
- "Thus, we need those housing designations moved elsewhere so that we can add the elements we need to make our campus sustainable."
- "We need to put a much larger percentage of our students into on-campus housing to provide the type of environment they need to be successful learners, and to relieve housing and traffic pressures in the surrounding communities."
Checketts also thanked everyone for supporting BYU-Hawaii, "and our efforts to support our future means to sustainability."
PCC President Von D. Orgill pointed out that the Center has been in the community for 45 years, with "a lot success and some ups and downs. We employ over 1,100 fulltime and part-time people, and we have some very significant challenges."He noted these include an aging facility, an increasing number of repeat visitors to Oahu "who have already been to the PCC," resulting in a "continuing decrease in the number of visitors to the Center, combined with the spiraling costs of utilities and just about everything else necessary to operate any kind of a business." He added that the Center has also had to reduce its fulltime staff over the past two years.
"We know that we must make changes if we are to be sustainable in the years ahead," he continued. "This means that we need to expand our offerings of what we are doing right now. We're going to need to enlarge our footprint, and we're studying how we can do that in appropriate ways. This also means that we need to find answers, along with all of you, to the affordable housing issue so we can keep local people here and provide them with good jobs."
Kekela Miller — a Laie Community Association (LCA) board member, and an HRI employee who was born and raised in Laie — said the LCA "voted unanimously to support the extension...and now we're very happy that we don't have to wait from five-to-eight years, and that the City will take into consideration finishing the plans that we have for Laie." She added that the Laie Kupuna [elders] Council is also in favor of the master planning process for the community.
Debbie Hippolite Wright, BYU-Hawaii Vice President for Student Development and Affairs, which includes oversight of university housing, pointed out BYUH is "studying ways to accommodate the housing needs for more of our students on campus. In order to do this, we need to have plans; and those involved in the planning need to have flexibility in defining the university boundaries." Wright, a 20-year resident of the community, added this would also help relieve, to some extent, "the critical need for adequate housing as well as through-traffic throughout the communities."
In an email message on February 4, the BYU-Hawaii President's Council indicated they were pleased with all the community support and the "good outcome"of the Hauula meeting. "We extend a big mahalo to those that sacrificed their time to attend; you definitely made a difference. We are also appreciative of the many people who emailed and faxed input in support to the DPP."
"Please remember that this is only the beginning," they said. "There will be other opportunities where you will need to make your voices heard."
— Photos by Mike Foley