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Cameron Nekota grew up not far from where he now is overseeing the creation of a full-blown residential community — the Ho‘opili project on Oahu’s Ewa Plain.
It’s a large responsibility that the Mililani High graduate never saw coming — at least not until 2010, when he joined developer D.R. Horton Hawaii, formerly D.R. Horton-Schuler Division.
“For me it’s been a tremendous opportunity, and it’s not every day that you get to help contribute to building a new city, to help create opportunities for families and for jobs,” he said Tuesday. “I never dreamed I would have that opportunity, but it’s been one of the most rewarding things for me personally.”
Nekota is point man for the 20-year, $4.6 billion project, which when completed is envisioned to feature 11,700 homes, 3 million square feet of commercial space, five schools and 200 acres of farmland, all on 1,554 acres that for decades was planted with sugar, until that industry here started to collapse late in the last century.
D.R. Horton Hawaii, which has about 60 employees, bought the property in 2006 and soon moved forward with plans to build thousands of homes for a market starving for supply.
Groundbreaking for Ho‘opili’s first phase of 293 homes was last week. The project obtained its final approvals to proceed in May of last year, after more than a decade of navigating through often-contentious regulatory proceedings, community meetings and courtroom visits.
Nekota wasn’t always in real estate development. After high school he earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Hawaii, and a law degree from there as well, though he didn’t focus on any particular area of law. His first job after law school was as a city prosecutor. Next he joined Imanaka, Kudo and Fujimoto, a real estate law firm, whose clients included his current employer. In addition to overseeing D.R. Horton’s Ho‘opili project, he handles its land acquisitions and “property management opportunities” statewide as well.
Nekota, 41, said that when he isn’t working, he likes to “work out and play golf.”
He and his wife, Cheryl, have twin 5-year-old daughters and live in Kaimuki.
Question: Who’s idea was this anyway, the Ho‘opili planned community project?
Answer: Well, it’s obviously been on the books out there with the Ewa Development Plan for probably 40 years now. … So we as a company, as Schuler Homes, looked at it in the ’90s, then obviously D.R. Horton bought it in 2006. But it had been on the books to be developed for residential housing …
Q: But not like in the master plan that you guys dreamed up?
A: Yeah. So once we acquired the property, in 2006, we went through our own planning process to kind of figure out how to design the community. But … it’s been planned for a long time.
Q: And that point — that the area had been planned for residential for 40 years — was how you got around the argument that it was prime agricultural land, right?
A: Well, I think that what both the Land Use Commission and City and County of Honolulu City Council realized as we went through our plan and explained it to them is that it struck a nice balance between agriculture, needed houses, commercial development and the like. So I think while that was certainly something that helped bolster our argument — that it should be developed for homes — I think we had to dig deep in working with the community to figure out what was appropriate for there, and in the end I think that’s what we did.
At first Ho‘opili was in the Ewa Development Plan for 16,000 units and a lot less commercial and no agriculture. So I think we dialed that back quite a bit with the residential plan. We added the agricultural component, … to account for now almost 200 acres of commercial farms … and then added almost 300 acres of job-generating areas within the project, because I think one of the areas we heard a lot from the community was that obviously housing is a big need, but they also wanted services and they wanted jobs.
Q: Some folks complain about how legal disputes added to the cost of the rail project, especially by making it miss the period when construction costs were lower. Could you say the same thing about Ho‘opili?
A: Well, I think we look at things a little differently, in that we viewed the process that we went through, whether it was the Land Use Commission or the legal challenges after, not only … as just adding costs. We thought that it added a lot of value to the project. It forced us to really look deep at what we were doing and get a broader consensus from people, so actually, at end of day, all the controversy and all the opponents having the opportunity to voice their concerns in whatever way they did, helped to make it better.
Q: What would you say were some of the largest concerns that you had to deal with?
A: I don’t think there was any one issue that we felt like we needed to overcome. I think what we tried to do from the very beginning was make a whole-hearted effort to address all the concerns that we could within our power, within the community, as we planned it out to make it better.
Certainly, you will have three rail station stations within close proximity to all of the Ho‘opili residents …
Q: Is it three or two?
A: Well, there’s the West Oahu station, the Ho‘opili station, and then Kroc Center is off Keahomua Parkway, which is basically adjacent to Ho‘opili. So I think we’ve tried to work with the city and the state and HART (the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation) to address a lot of concerns that we could do when it comes to traffic. That’s obviously a big concern for people in the region, and I think rail certainly will be a big step forward and certainly be a transformative event for a lot of people to be able to have another option.
But we also have worked to help widen the freeway and have worked with state DOT (Department of Transportation) to add capacity there.
You know, if you think about everything that’s gone on in the Kapolei region, with the circulator systems, with the Kualakai Parkway being built, you have Kapolei Parkway now for Ocean Pointe all the way to Kapolei Commons, on the doorsteps of Ko Olina, and you have a lot of these regional types of projects that have gone and added capacity, whether it’s two lanes for the Zipper Lane the state did, and I think overall we just tried to be collaborative.
Q: So run it by me why adding 11,700 new homes over the next 20 years won’t be a problem for commuters between the West side and Downtown Honolulu?
A: I think obviously you’re going to add some cars to the freeway, but what we have tried to do with our plan, and what’s happening in the broader region, is provide more people more opportunity to live in and work in Kapolei.
If you think about what’s gone on now for the last three years, there’s been the “Hire Leeward” campaign, to promote job opportunities in the region, and as Ho‘opili builds out, I think you’re counting about 7,500 permanent jobs when you count the five schools. And then with Disney opening over the last 10 years, and now the Four Seasons, the state Judiciary, the FBI headquarters in Kapolei …
Q: So basically there’ll be more reason for them to just stay in that area?
A: Oh, absolutely. Not just from a job perspective but from an entertainment perspective. … You have the Ka Makana Alii Shopping Center opening in a month. The Kapolei Commons is continuing to build out, providing solid entertainment value for people. And there’s Ko Olina Resort …
Q: So we won’t need rail after all; is that what you’re saying?
A: Well, certainly there’s going to be jobs continuing to be in downtown, and some people are going to have to do that. But what we’ve done, and what HART and the state and the city have done is to provide people options, right? If they have to commute to downtown, they can ride rail, or if they’re going to work in the region, in Kapolei, they’ll have a job there. I think that’s going to be the best thing for people.
Q: So what will D.R. Horton be doing to help mitigate the extra traffic? You mentioned the freeway widening. What did you do for that?
A: We agreed to widen a portion of the freeway from the Waiawa interchange to the Fort Weaver Road interchange.
Q: And that was on your dime?
A: Yes. It’s not been done yet, but we agreed to do that.
Q: What if rail for some strange reason isn’t completed? Would that be a problem?
A: Well, I think first and foremost, outside of rail and outside of widening the freeway, creating more jobs in the Kapolei region is going to be the No. 1 traffic relief for people, because, if you can give somebody the opportunity to live and work in the same area, that’s going to be the best thing to do. So we’re constantly focused on that, trying to bring job-generating entities to not just Ho‘opili but to people who live across the spectrum. Bringing more jobs to Kapolei is certainly the No. 1 thing that anybody can do.
Q: Who do you think will be the likely homebuyer for Ho‘opili?
A: Generally speaking, we’ve always targeted the first-time homebuyer market.
Q: Those would be young people with kids, perhaps?
A: I think you will see people along the spectrum, including starter homes with younger families. We also have thousands of City & County affordable homes that will be built at Ho‘opili.
Q: I read that the homes will range from the $300,000s to the $600,000s; does that include the affordables?
A: Yes. We don’t have pricing yet for Ho‘opili but they’re going to be in line with our other communities that we’re building currently.
Q: What are some of your other major projects in Hawaii?
A: The biggest one we’re doing now is our Mehana community: 1,100 homes right in the city of Kapolei.
Q: Your selling points for Ho‘opili include promises of multiple 1-acre, open-space parks, and acreage devoted to farming. Are these promises that you could find yourselves getting sued over if you didn’t deliver those things?
A: We are legally obligated to provide all those things. They were imposed on the plan when we got Land Use Commission approval and City and County zoning approval. … If we’re not in compliance, the city has the ability to enforce that against us.
Q: I know people were saying, “Oh yeah, we want you to have farms out there,” but how realistic is that? I mean, we all know that farming, even just simple gardening, can be pretty grueling at times. How do you think that’s going to work?
A: We have a layered approach to our agriculture program. At the top level of it we have about 200 acres of commercial farms, to lease out to smaller farmers, to give them the opportunity to grow their business.
Then we have our community gardens that are going to be placed throughout the community, obviously in more higher-density areas, for people who don’t have access to backyards, and want to grow things. So we’re going to have about 8 acres of community gardens.
And then something that’s new to Hawaii is we have what’s called our steward-lot programs, where people when they buy their single-family home from us can have green options layered into that. It’s basically like a home garden program, and can basically have an aquaponics system installed in their house.
Like I said, we heard loud and clear from the community that they wanted an agriculture component, and I think we worked very hard to address that need at various levels.
Q: Considering how long it took for D.R. Horton to obtain its approvals for Ho‘opili, are there any land use laws or regulations that you could recommend for elimination or reform?
A: No. I think the process works. I mean, we went through a prolonged process that took us roughly seven years to finally get through, but the process itself provided ample opportunity for people and community members and whoever at every level to provide their input.
Q: But at such an expense. I mean, you guys had the capital to ride that out. Is that part of the deal? You think that’s reasonable?
A: Well, I think, obviously, what we heard loud and clear is that land is precious, right? And how land gets used is important to people. So I think, at the end of the day, we don’t view the process in any way but as something that helps to make the community better, because it provided people the opportunity to give their input on Ho‘opili and say their piece. So I would not be in favor of shortening that process. I think it works well. Does it take a long time at times? Yes, but these are tough decisions that need to be made.
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