04-01-2008, 08:47 AM
Puna Haku, Thanks for the info. I'm still confused over the issues. Let's see if we can figure out where it's going astray.
First, the issue over autonomy. What I've been told by everyone, including a federal DOE official is federal regulations has nothing to do with local code compliance of the physical facilities or zoning, that's the exclusive domain of the State, County or City where the school is located. They say nothing in any federal regulations has ever exempted Charter Schools from local zoning, building, fire or safety codes. It’s absolutely not a federal issue. The federal governed does have certain mandatory items with school buildings but it in no way removes the local government’s ability to regulate zoning or facility code issues. They said it’s a completely false argument.
Second; issues over zoning are a long standing misconception by people. According to a Hawaii State official, state owned land is one thing and land within a county is another. Private land within a county agricultural zoning is private land under county planning control. Although the State does have certain items that do impact or supersede County regulations, they are not your normal zoning/building issues as in this case. The crux of this is a non-conforming operation operating without the proper legal requirements. It’s compounded because the operation was not seeking a special use permit to operate; they started operating without that permit.
Cost of the special permit. According to my BIL, the cost to obtain a special use permit on the BI is not that big a deal. He believes this issue is less about the actual special use permit, but an issue that the physical facility is so inadequate for school operations, that a special use permit has to be denied. He also said that many of the items someone quoted as required for a special use permit are not always required. He looked at this and simple said the physical facility and attitude of the school is the problems. The zoning is just one of the items that are intertwined in all their problems so it gets the focus of attention.
Now, my BIL did say that there should be some consideration for the small community aspect of the school. What’s required for a large school should be proportionately adjusted for the smaller school. But that’s an issue generally ironed out in the planning stages. What he said went wrong was starting without planning ahead and now expects special treatment. They should have been working on this before the first student entered the class but went about this backwards and brought all this on themselves.
As for funding, I have to say there are only two types of schools, public and private. Charter schools are private schools on welfare. As my BIL stated, if they didn’t have the funds to do the preplanning, that’s their problem, nobody else’s. They knew what they were getting into (or should had) so to blame the funding is asinine.
As for your analogy of ADA requirements for private homes, please, that’s not even in the same ballpark of analogies. But let’s look at ADA. If I’m opening a business and ADA requirements comes into play, I have to do it. I can’t complain that I don’t have money, that’s nobody's problem but mine.
I think people are trying too hard to make the school look like the victim and using anything they can find to throw up as a smoke screen hoping nobody checks. Guess what, I checked.
One thing my BIL did raise was to the people this is just about a poor struggling school, but to a developer and their lawyers, it's a gold mine!
First, the issue over autonomy. What I've been told by everyone, including a federal DOE official is federal regulations has nothing to do with local code compliance of the physical facilities or zoning, that's the exclusive domain of the State, County or City where the school is located. They say nothing in any federal regulations has ever exempted Charter Schools from local zoning, building, fire or safety codes. It’s absolutely not a federal issue. The federal governed does have certain mandatory items with school buildings but it in no way removes the local government’s ability to regulate zoning or facility code issues. They said it’s a completely false argument.
Second; issues over zoning are a long standing misconception by people. According to a Hawaii State official, state owned land is one thing and land within a county is another. Private land within a county agricultural zoning is private land under county planning control. Although the State does have certain items that do impact or supersede County regulations, they are not your normal zoning/building issues as in this case. The crux of this is a non-conforming operation operating without the proper legal requirements. It’s compounded because the operation was not seeking a special use permit to operate; they started operating without that permit.
Cost of the special permit. According to my BIL, the cost to obtain a special use permit on the BI is not that big a deal. He believes this issue is less about the actual special use permit, but an issue that the physical facility is so inadequate for school operations, that a special use permit has to be denied. He also said that many of the items someone quoted as required for a special use permit are not always required. He looked at this and simple said the physical facility and attitude of the school is the problems. The zoning is just one of the items that are intertwined in all their problems so it gets the focus of attention.
Now, my BIL did say that there should be some consideration for the small community aspect of the school. What’s required for a large school should be proportionately adjusted for the smaller school. But that’s an issue generally ironed out in the planning stages. What he said went wrong was starting without planning ahead and now expects special treatment. They should have been working on this before the first student entered the class but went about this backwards and brought all this on themselves.
As for funding, I have to say there are only two types of schools, public and private. Charter schools are private schools on welfare. As my BIL stated, if they didn’t have the funds to do the preplanning, that’s their problem, nobody else’s. They knew what they were getting into (or should had) so to blame the funding is asinine.
As for your analogy of ADA requirements for private homes, please, that’s not even in the same ballpark of analogies. But let’s look at ADA. If I’m opening a business and ADA requirements comes into play, I have to do it. I can’t complain that I don’t have money, that’s nobody's problem but mine.
I think people are trying too hard to make the school look like the victim and using anything they can find to throw up as a smoke screen hoping nobody checks. Guess what, I checked.
One thing my BIL did raise was to the people this is just about a poor struggling school, but to a developer and their lawyers, it's a gold mine!