Next mayor must grapple with a crowded Honolulu

More than most, this year’s Honolulu mayor’s race is important. No matter who gets in — Mayor Kirk Caldwell or challengers Charles Djou or Peter Carlisle — Honolulu will be drastically changed by the decisions forced upon them.

The reason why is the city has simply run out of both money and room.

Rail’s rising costs will force the city to search for more money, and the mounting homeless problems will launch new calls to build more high-rises in urban Honolulu, meaning a denser, more crowded urban core.

In meetings last week with Honolulu Star-Advertiser editors and reporters, the three candidates laid out the problems and, while not providing many solutions, they at least touched on the options.

Caldwell spelled out what’s wrong with his rail project: no more money.

“We should have enough money to get to Middle Street,” Caldwell said. “We don’t have the money to get the rest of the way and we need to find that money.”

Caldwell said about $1.5 billion extra will be needed to build the route to Ala Moana.

“You ask what has changed. What has changed is we need more money.”

To get that money, Caldwell is dashing from developer to developer asking them if the city has anything they want.

“We have talked about it. We can give you height bonuses, density increases, we can give you development rights that you can sell. You can sell them and use the money to build our transit system,” Caldwell said, adding, “I said everything is on the table.”

Former Mayor Carlisle had little specific to recommend, saying, “You either slow down, which you don’t want to do, or you plow forward until the money has run out or until you find other funding sources.”

To Carlisle, one solution would be to use the general excise tax to pay for rail. The 4.7125 percent that Oahu residents pay on almost all money exchanges is an unseen tax, Carlisle said.

“How much did you pay (in excise taxes) last year? Nobody knows. That is what is great about it — it is painless,” Carlisle said.

What is not painless is Honolulu’s agonizing homeless crisis. The solution, said candidate Djou, is more housing, because by building more houses, supply will start to match demand and soaring real estate prices may level off.

Djou says Honolulu’s urban core needs redevelopment. McCully and Moiliili’s three-story walkups are not efficient and should be replaced with high-rises.

“I feel we need to add 3,000 housing units every year. Either let the affordable housing crisis get out of whack or you got to go up. You have to accept more development in the urban core,” said Djou, adding that he understands that development only comes after the city has put in bigger sewers, roads and sidewalks.

“As a general statement, if I were elected mayor, I would be more receptive to variances with infill in the urban core,” Djou said.

So the vision of Honolulu in 2026 may be one with a new, expensive train. But most likely it is going to be a more crowded, denser and much more urban Honolulu. Living with neighbors on the 37th floor may be the new normal.

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.