11-20-2010, 04:23 PM
I'm not sure Pahoa is in such a precarious delicate position anyway. The actual danger of a destructive lava flow (in Paho) is arguably diminished by the influx of tourist spending generated by the current flow. And forget about tourist money for a second... the population of Puna has been steadily increasing for years. There are tens of thousands of unoccupied lots sold decades ago that are continually being built out and occupied. The last redistricting effort carved parts of Puna away from District 5 precisely because the population has been steady growing, while that of the surrounding population centers has been diminishing. And Pahoa is more central to Puna than Keaau. If I were a developer or a big box, I believe I'd jump at the chance to get in early on what seems to be a good thing moving forward. The fact that we all seem to be determined not to rock the boat of commerce by insisting on a few mandates about design, building style, signage, etc., is just icing on the cake for those guys. They're not doing us a favor by building here. If they want to, it's because they see a chance to make money. If we, by insisting on a few quality of life issues, diminish that amount of money, I'm sure they'll grumble, but what's left over will still be plenty green, so I'm sure they'll still go after it. Let's make sure we get ours...