Kailua affordable-housing plan voted down

The Honolulu City Council voted 8-0 Wednesday to reject a developer’s plan to add a four-story low-income apartment building to the edge of a single-family neighborhood in Kailua.

The unanimous decision followed the developer’s formal withdrawal of its project application Tuesday, but city attorneys advised that the project would have been automatically approved if the Council failed to act on the application Wednesday because of a 45-day deadline under a state law governing the process.

Two of three Council members who supported the project at a committee hearing vote last week — Ron Menor and Brandon Elefante — changed their position Wednesday and voted to reject the plan with reservations.

Councilman Joey Manahan also voted to support the project last week, but did not attend Wednesday’s meeting.

Five other Council members — Ikaika Anderson, Tommy Waters, Ann Kobayashi, Kymberly Pine and Heidi Tsuneyoshi — took preliminary votes against or declared their opposition to the project last week, so a rejection was expected. On Wednesday, Councilwoman Carol Fukunaga added a vote to reject the plan.

Kailua-based affordable-housing development firm Ahe Group led by Makani Maeva sought to produce the 73-unit complex with estimated initial monthly rents from $521 to $1,412 for 68 units with one or two bedrooms reserved for tenants earning no more than 60% of Honolulu’s median household income. Affordable rents tied to incomes would have been in place for 61 years.

Ahe proposed building the estimated $37 million project on a nearly 1-acre site zoned for single-family home use under a state law that can provide zoning exemptions for predominantly affordable-housing projects subject to Council approval.

The developer argued that approval was appropriate because affordable housing is badly needed in the community and because the site at Kawainui and Oneawa streets on the edge of Kailua’s Coconut Grove neighborhood is across the street from an auto parts store, a gas station and a 7-Eleven store that are part of the community’s commercial core.

The city Department of Planning and Permitting, affordable-housing advocates and some Kailua residents endorsed the plan. But public testimony mostly from Kailua residents was overwhelmingly against the project called Kawainui Street Apartments.

Some project opponents held rallies with signs at the proposed project site, created a petition and waged a social media campaign against the developer’s plan.

At two Council committee hearings last week, people spent roughly eight hours testifying.

“Coconut Grove is the heart of Kailua,” Kaui Akana, told the Council on Wednesday before the final vote. “We must keep what little we have left from our memories of old.”

Bill Hicks, chairman of the Kailua Neighborhood Board, reminded the Council of the board’s 17-0 vote in July opposing the project after receiving testimony that was 80% against the developer’s plan.

Hicks encouraged the Council to protect zoning and the community from what he called a large-scale commercial project in a residential neighborhood.

“This was the wrong location,” he said.

Maeva said on Tuesday that she couldn’t say what she might do with the property, which contains seven single-family homes and is owned by an affiliate of Ahe.

Kathy Sokugawa, DPP acting director, said state law prohibits a similar plan from being proposed for the site within a year.