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Several community activists are speaking out against state Senate and House bills that aim to streamline private and public construction projects by providing exemptions to regulatory and environmental review requirements.
"The community has to pull together, and the government and the legislators and the developers need to realize that everyone’s united and the development has to stop," Brian Shimokawa of Friends of Kewalos said at a news conference held Monday at the state Capitol. "I don’t think we can handle much more (development) on this island."
Senate Bills 755 and 2927 and House Bills 2398 and 2819 — which are supported by a majority of legislators in the House and Senate — seek to speed up the regulatory process for public and private development projects that would purportedly have minimal negative effects on the environment.
"Let’s be clear: I think most people are fully in favor of the idea of streamlining," Robert Harris, director of the Hawaii chapter of the Sierra Club, said Monday. "But what’s being proposed today is not streamlining; it is attempting to fundamentally exempt the government from having to comply with its own laws."
Other groups at the rally were Hawaii’s Thousand Friends, the Kakaako Makai Community Planning Advisory Council, the Save Sunset Beach Coalition and the Koolauloa Sustainable Planning Community.
"I think the thing that stands out is the hypocrisy of the Legislature and the state in trying to tell other people what they should do and then trying to exempt themselves," said Senate Minority Leader Sam Slom (R, Diamond Head-Hawaii Kai). "The community, each community, should have full access and full input to determine what’s best for its citizens and its community, which is unique from all the others, and these bills do not allow that."
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