Mayoral Candidate Victorino and Makena Resort discussion with Alliance

#kihei #community #maui #mayor #makena
Monday evening, 7/17/17 at 6:00 PM, this month’s Alliance of Maui Community Associations (Alliance)  commenced with KCA in the minority for the first time this year with a single rep, while Haiku had a covey. Additionally the overall attendance was greatly reduced from June (when Kaniela Ing and Shan Tsutsui appeared as possible mayoral candidates).

The first half of the meeting was devoted to explaining the process which resulted in an environmentally and culturally superior Makena project from what had initially been approved by the County Planning Commission when they accepted an Environmental Assessment (EA) for a portion of the entire build out plan. You may recall that KCA called for a full Environmental Impact Study (EIS) of the entire planned build out,

In a joint presentation, Sierra Club Maui and Maui Tomorrow – who were able to achieve a settlement by arbitration of a last action lawsuit which resulted in numerous improvements too lengthy to list here – explained their success.

The second half was the continuation of presentations by announced mayoral candidates for 2019, this one the recently termed-out Councilman Mike Victorino. He seemingly crafted his talk to a Community Association (CA) perspective, with such points as requiring all department heads of his administration to meet monthly with all CA’s, and all developers required by law to bring proposed projects to CA’s.

Victorino characterized the mayor as a figure head, with Council having all the power and offered he could get the state government to work with the county, seemingly because he could use his power of persuasion. The implication that attacking them for not doing more was counterproductive, as we presently observe from the 9^th and often 8^th floors.

He mentioned many of the same needs that the community always seems to hear but not realize, like improved infrastructure (he mentioned a Kihei-upcountry highway, which we view as a very low priority), speeding up the county permit process, following community plans and achieving more workforce housing by getting land owners to donate land for housing and establishing a new department of human resources.

The August meeting is expected to bring two other prospective candidates: Council Members Elle Cochran and Don Guzman.