11-20-2007, 06:35 AM
quote:
The county should have never issused building permits in the first place...
KEEP PUNA RURAL
I agree with you in theory.
The county and state also can't tie it up so in essense the lot owners are "stuck" able to do nothing and no end in sight.
I am also talking about people who bought years and years ago, not in the last 2-3 years where the situation was already in progress and acknowledged the situation and now crying foul.
One of the things we are working on for the Waiopae maine conssrvation area is to get the lots on the ocean or where the ocean touches the lot into a land trust or state land as a park. Although these lots probably should be condemened, the county has already told me that there is not interest in that because they can't afford it.
There are many "new home" owners who oppose that because they told me specifically "we want to keep them (locals) out" but dont have a gate (yet). I about blew a gasket.
I know there are people who think all I do is try to get people to build, but we also work on how the current lot owners who have been tied up for years, yes years, able to do something with their land whether that is build, sell, donate or ?. Today I had a client on the phone that cant build, cant even put up a fence to keep people from pooping on her lot and containating the ponds on her unimproved lot. She agrees every holiday to allow the association to put porta potties up on the edge of her lot. She said she would be happy to have her lot condemned and become part of a park. She cant even donate it to the county because they have no money to take it. She cant sell it but still pays taxes. So we are working towards trying to acquire money from private foundations to set aside land like these lots for appropriate use for the tidal pools.
A wonderfully imformative woman at the DLNR told us about the Land Conservation trust that is privately funded and we have been researching that avenue. I am hesitant though because the one thing I DO NOT WANT to see happen is for access to be limited use of the area to the "haves" and not the "havenots". Our kuleana is to stay an island of inclusion rather than exclusion.
One other idea to start letter writing campaigns to people like Wizard Publishing http://www.oahurevealed.com/main/contactus.html to (politely) ask them to remove our delicate areas from the guide book.
Catherine Dumond
Blue Water Project Management
808 217-7578
http://bluewaterpm.125mb.com/index.html
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