Blood bank sues over city push to take land for rail

The state’s lone blood supplier is pushing back in court against the city’s efforts to acquire the land fronting its Dillingham Boulevard offices for rail.

In a countersuit filed Thursday, the Blood Bank of Hawaii accuses the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation of acting “in bad faith” and “recklessly subjecting Hawaii’s blood supply to grave but unnecessary risks.”

It further questions the benefit of taking the parcel when the city still lacks the funds to build the full 20-mile line to Ala Moana Center.

It’s a response to the city’s eminent domain lawsuit filed May 15 in state Circuit Court against the blood bank — and the latest development in arguably the most high-profile condemnation proceedings for rail. The suit asks the court to dismiss the city’s case and to award the blood bank damages.

At the heart of the dispute, a saga that has stretched several years, HART says it’s willing to pay for the stretch of land outside the blood bank’s Dillingham office but not the full building. But the blood bank says that running the rail line so close could threaten its accreditation and will require it to relocate offices entirely, so the rail agency needs to purchase the full building.

HART has countered that it can’t justify spending those added millions of dollars based on the case that the blood bank has made.

In the suit filed last week, the blood bank states that it has not been able to find a suitable space to replace its Dillingham office headquarters, including a laboratory and rare-blood repository.

Honolulu City Council members have expressed concern since the dispute involves a key community health resource. In 2015, Council members denied HART’s first attempt to proceed with condemnation.

Nonetheless, the blood bank’s countersuit notes that the Council abruptly reversed course in 2016. Its members changed a resolution that originally opposed HART’s next effort at condemnation so that it supported it instead before taking a final vote.

The blood bank’s suit contends that the city didn’t provide the proper notice when it changed the resolution.

In an emailed statement Friday, HART said that it’s offered to provide more noise and dust mitigation during construction, and that it further offered to purchase an extra blood mobile to help during construction.

“HART agrees with (Blood Bank of Hawaii) that this should be a very simple real estate transaction, especially as HART has offered a fair price for the appraised value of the small strip of grass and sidewalk needed to widen Dillingham Boulevard,” the rail agency’s statement read.

The agency added that it’s still open to a negotiated settlement.

However, the blood bank suit says it’s the “heavy steel-wheeled trains (running) 20 hours a day, seven days a week” after the line is built that “could subject the public’s blood supply to safety, licensing and accreditation risks.”

Blood Bank Counterclaim by Honolulu Star-Advertiser on Scribd