The city Office of Climate Change, Sustainability and Resiliency likely will get most of its staffing restored while the Department of Land Management still may see its budget gutted following a meeting of the Budget Committee on Wednesday.

The committee is slated to resume hearing from the various city agencies this morning.

Budget Chairman Trevor Ozawa said Wednesday he is inclined to recommend that the Council restore most of approximately $556,000 that had been proposed be eliminated from the climate change office. That’s about half the total funding for the office, which was established through a 2016 City Charter amendment.

Chief Resiliency Officer Josh Stanbro testified that the agency’s budget for next year is higher because its office is ramping up its work overseeing and coordinating the city’s efforts to reduce and fight the impact of climate change at city facilities and on Oahu in general.

The eight-person staff is the minimum needed for CCSR to meet its duties under the Charter mandate, he said.

The agency has been focused on studies identifying the areas most vulnerable to sea level rise in order to formulate a priority action list, and finding ways to reduce emissions both within city operations and the entire island, Stanbro said.

The Council received nearly 200 emails from environmental advocates calling for the agency’s funding to be restored.

Land Management Director Sandra Pfund did not have the same backing regarding her 28-person department.

Ozawa has proposed that nearly $1.7 million from Land Management’s $1.95 million operating be chopped, leaving enough funding only for the director and an assistant.

Pfund said that, to date, her department’s focus has been on improving management of the lands the city owns, lands that previously were the responsibility of different city agencies, she said. Additionally, Land Management has been tasked with developing city properties and to date has created 169 units that have housed 572 adults and 120 children, Pfund said.

“There are so many projects and so many activities that we would like to pursue,” Pfund said.

Ozawa, however, said the department has been slow to meet its obligation to oversee the city’s Clean Water and Natural Land Fund. He pointed out that no one has submitted any application to use money from the fund to set aside lands for conservation.

Ozawa said he’s seen no progress on the purchase of a property at Paiko Ridge, in his East Honolulu district, even though money was set aside for it two years ago.

Pfund said the parties that previously sponsored the project no longer want to be applicants and that her agency needs others to take charge.

After the meeting, Ozawa said he’s likely to keep only minimal funding for Land Management until he can be convinced the agency’s positions are justified.

Also Wednesday, Ozawa made it clear he wants cuts to be made across the board for all city agencies to stave off using $44 million in borrowed bond money next year to cover a shortfall in the $9 billion rail project’s funding plan as proposed by Mayor Kirk Caldwell.

Ozawa stressed that the Council wants to assure the Federal Transit Administration, which has committed $1.55 billion for the rail project, that the city will meet its financial obligations for the project.