A plan to convert prime but mostly fallow Maui farmland into a largely rural subdivision with nearly 600 homes has been revised and renewed after being put on hold for several years.
The updated plan for the project called Pu‘unani on 208 acres in Wailuku was outlined in an environmental impact statement preparation notice published by the state last week.
Envisioned with 597 homes, the project is proposed by developer Towne Development of Hawaii Inc., a company called Endurance Investors LLC which involves Steve Goodfellow of Maui construction firm Goodfellow Bros., and a partnership called Association of II Wai Hui led by Lloyd Sodetani of Maui Realty Co.
The developers said the project would help satisfy needs for more housing on Maui where high demand and relatively low supply is pushing up prices, and still leave plenty of farmland for growing crops.
However, there are community concerns about traffic, water and the loss of prime farmland as the state tries to become more self-sufficient in its food supply.
Pu‘unani’s developers need approval from the state Land Use Commission to reclassify the land for urban and rural use from its current classification as agricultural land. A county zoning change also is necessary.
Towne and its partners initially petitioned the commission for land reclassification in 2006 and prepared a draft environmental impact statement in 2009.
The developers, however, stopped work seeking approvals to allow Maui County to update its general plan and establish growth boundaries in a new Maui Island Plan.
The Maui Island Plan was adopted in December 2012, and boundaries for urban and rural growth are close to what Towne and its partners were seeking for Pu‘unani. So now the project is being advanced again, with some changes.
In 2006 the project called for 240 townhouses, 90 single-family house lots and 220 rural residential lots of mostly a half-acre in size — for a total of 550 potential residences.
In the 2009 environmental report, the number of units was increased to 754 by raising the number of townhouses to 476, raising the number of single-family lots to 145 and lowering the number of rural lots to 133.
Now the project calls for 450 townhouses and 147 rural lots, for a total of 597 residential units. The revised project also calls for about 25,000 square feet of retail or office space.
The developers are seeking to have about one-third of the property converted to urban use for the townhouses and commercial space, and the other two-thirds to rural use for the residential lots.
Wailuku Agribusiness Co. grew sugar cane on the site until 1988, and was supplanted by pineapple cultivation by Maui Land & Pineapple Co. until 2003.
There is some diversified agriculture on the site, but it has not been not profitable, according to testimony Sodetani presented to the County Council last year.
Lucienne de Naie, a Maui resident and vice chairwoman of the Sierra Club Hawaii Chapter, said the Pu‘unani plan is too big and isn’t supported by a 2002 Kahului-Wailuku Community Plan that aims to maintain an agricultural buffer zone between Wailuku and Waikapu.
"This project proposes to fill in the buffer zone," de Naie said in an email.
De Naie said several former heads of Maui’s Department of Planning didn’t support a big project on the Pu‘unani site, though the sentiment has changed in the last few years under Mayor Alan Arakawa.
The Council approved a larger residential growth boundary for Pu‘unani despite what de Naie characterized as much public opposition and support for a smaller project from an advisory committee.
"The Council after much debate refused to listen to hundreds of residents who sent in comments opposing this change," she said.
The developer’s environmental report said the project is appropriate because the site largely borders other residential communities: Kehalani, Wailuku Heights II and Waiolani Mauka.
The report also said that Pu‘unani’s rural element will provide a transition between other farmland and Kehalani, and that there is an abundance of vacant agricultural land on Maui to accommodate farming.
Housing, by comparison, would create construction jobs, generate higher county property tax revenue and produce needed housing.
Sodetani told the Council last year that Pu‘unani would provide about 200 to 250 homes for older people which would include affordable housing and housing for veterans.
Maui County’s workforce housing ordinance would require that 25 percent of Pu‘unani homes be affordable to households earning between 80 percent and 160 percent of Maui’s median annual income if the homes are sold.
The income range equates to between $67,950 and $135,840 for a family of four. If the homes are rentals, the income range is lower.
The developer’s report cited a 2011 Hawaii Housing Planning Study prepared for the county that estimated Maui will need 5,544 new homes between 2012 and 2016, including 2,090 rentals.
"The increased supply will give the consumer a broader variety of choices, provide a better balance in the supply and demand equation, and should lead to more affordable housing for Maui’s residents," the report said.
De Naie countered that Pu‘unani isn’t necessary to balance supply and demand. "There are already several large projects that propose significant amounts of ‘affordable’ housing in the same immediate area," she said.
