In 1961, the Hawaii State Legislature determined that a lack of adequate controls had caused the development of Hawaii’s limited and valuable land for short-term gain for the few while resulting in long-term loss to the income and growth potential of our State’s economy. Development of scattered subdivisions, creating problems of expensive yet reduced public services, and the conversion of prime agricultural land to residential use, were key reasons for establishing the state-wide zoning system.
“To administer this state-wide zoning law, the Legislature established the Land Use Commission. The Commission is responsible for preserving and protecting Hawaii’s lands and encouraging those uses to which lands are best suited.”
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The words above, taken from the Land Use Commission’s website, state clearly its reason for being.
So it goes with good intentions.
Previous decisions notwithstanding, the commission’s actions over two days earlier this month were astonishingly contrary to its duty. In approving more than 2,000 acres of important agricultural land for urban development, it failed to carry out its responsibilities and the mandates of the state Constitution.
Instead of “preserving and protecting,” the commission dampened hope for increasing local food production to balance imports, and for curbing suburban sprawl and traffic congestion. It allowed “short-term gain for the few” to prevail once again.
However, as the panel this week adopts orders that give Castle & Cooke Homes and Texas-based developer D.R. Horton permission to blanket good farm land with a total of more than 16,000 houses and other structures, a handful of opponents will turn to other authorities to counter the commission’s mistakes.
They will argue that best suited use for agriculture land is agriculture and that state regulations say that land being farmed intensively for two years prior cannot be reclassified otherwise.
The commission has not substantiated the claim that reclassification, particularly for the so-called Ho‘opili project, will not impair agriculture when the land has been among the most productive in the state. The commission also failed to demonstrate that urban growth on the parcels are necessary.
Developers and some commission members say there is plenty of land for farming, but those other places are encumbered by lack of infrastructure such as irrigation systems. Agriculture advocates whose heads haven’t been turned by the developers’ polished public relations campaign say the commission claim that building houses is the use best suited for the Ewa land needs to be challenged.
So, too, the construction industry needs to adjust to new priorities, much like plantation workers had to find other employment when sugar and pineapple companies shut down.
If built out, the two projects will have a radical and profound effect on Oahu. Besides altering lifestyle and atmosphere, people and their aggregate need for resources and services will push hard on this island as well as its neighbors.
So far, opposition to the projects have been largely subdued. It seems that save for the tangible problem of traffic, people haven’t fully grasped what the loss of agriculture land will mean for Hawaii’s future.
Developers, their investors and their proponents constantly preach about jobs and their generous altruism in building houses so that younger generations will have a place to call home. The generations to come may have four walls and a roof, but little of what their ancestors enjoyed about living in Hawaii.
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Cynthia Oi can be reached at coi@staradvertiser.com.
