Castle & Cooke Hawaii’s 3,500-house Koa Ridge project will either bring much-needed homes and jobs, or unmitigated traffic and the elimination of valuable agricultural land.

Perhaps the one thing in the long-fought fight over Koa Ridge that both supporters and opponents agree on is that the 576-acre project sandwiched between Wai­pio and Mili­lani will have a huge impact on Central Oahu and the island at large.

The Honolulu City Council is scheduled to hold a final vote today on Bill 48, allowing the agriculturally zoned land to be developed into commercial, residential and industrial uses for Koa Ridge Makai, one of three original parts of the Castle & Cooke plan. The project was divided into Koa Ridge Makai, Koa Ridge Mauka and Wai­awa. The Mauka section was never approved by the Land Use Commission, and the Wai­awa portion was conditionally approved by the LUC but has not come up for rezoning.

Councilman Ron Menor, who represents the area, said he continues to have concerns about traffic impacts and the pricing of the homes. He said Tuesday he wants to see the project deferred.

However, he conceded, “the votes are not there to do such an action.”

Menor wants his colleagues to consider requiring the developer to put in more traffic improvements, and on an accelerated schedule. He also wants Castle & Cooke to be required to provide more homes at prices that are within reach of lower-income families.

Such changes can be made only in a unilateral agreement, Menor said, but the Koa Ridge unilateral agreement has already been recorded and cannot be changed on the Council floor. The only way changes can be made to it, at this point, would be to defer the vote and have the bill sent back to the Zoning and Planning Committee.

Menor is also unhappy that two resolutions he introduced calling for the city’s affordable housing policies to be revised to make homes more financially accessible to lower-income families have been festering while the Koa Ridge rezoning has moved along. The legislation would have had an impact on zoning changes for future housing developments including Koa Ridge.

“I think the city lost a golden opportunity to substantially increase the amount of affordable housing on Oahu,” Menor said.

For Castle & Cooke officials, some of whom have been working on the Koa Ridge project for well more than a decade, any delays at this point would be unacceptable and would hurt no one but potential buyers facing a depleted housing inventory.

Harry Saunders, Castle & Cooke president, said in a statement, “Koa Ridge has experienced
regulatory delays since our first Land Use Commission in 2002. Since then, the price of both single family and condominium homes on Oahu has doubled.”

Castle & Cooke has successfully warded off additional requirements on the types of affordable-housing units it would be required to build, arguing that the market should dictate how much homes cost.

Koa Ridge, in various forms, has been before the LUC, which makes major land use decisions, three times in the past decade, and appeals by the Sierra Club have been successful in shooting it down twice. A court ruling nullified the first approval on the grounds that developers had failed to conduct a full environmental assessment to the commission. The second vote was nixed because one of the LUC members who put the project over the top was ruled ineligible to vote. That issue is still being litigated at the Hawaii Supreme Court.

The last LUC approval, issued in 2012, was challenged by the Sierra Club and state Sen. Clayton Hee. The developer won a decision in state Circuit Court, but the matter is now pending an appeal before the Intermediate Court of Appeals.

The Sierra Club Hawaii chapter and the Sierra Club Oahu Group, like Menor, have also been calling for a final vote to be delayed, warning that the Council should hold off on a decision until the two court cases are resolved.

Anthony Aalto, chairman of the Sierra Club Oahu Group, said the Koa Ridge site is miles away from the city’s planned $5.26 billion rail project and would sabotage the success of the most expensive public infrastructure project in the state’s history.

Aalto said the Sierra Club wants the city and state to take the time to identify vacant land they own along the rail line that can form a package that could be swapped for the Koa Ridge property, which could then be kept for agricultural use.

He pointed to the vacant parcel at Kapiolani Boulevard and Pensacola Street next to McKinley High School as one possibility.

Castle & Cooke officials have offered up $100 million in off-site traffic improvements and said they are amenable to other improvements if deemed necessary by state and city officials as the project comes online.