Puna CDP

[Rob Tucker]

James,

In your post above you said: to my knowledge, not any of the three 5th District Council challengers were a member of any PCDP WG brings forth some PCDP issues that have been on my mind for a while now.

You, I know, logged many days and hours on the transportation Working Group (TWG). I was on the Land Use WG (LUWG). It was a long and arduous process which involved a lot of people.

At the time the WGs were formed at Pahoa High School in 2006 a couple hundred people (it seemed) signed up to participate. We were invited to select one of ten Working Groups to join. You went to the Transportation table and I went to the Land Use table. Each of these two WGs was fairly large.... 25+ people I’d say.

2006 was an election year and I noticed that the Land Use group included three candidates for office. Gary Safarik, Emily Naeole and Brian Jordan. I was elected to be coordinator for the LUWG.

I later ended up with the feeling that these candidates were at the PCDP WG launch primarily for a photo op because I never noticed any of them at any meetings over the next two years. But because they had signed up I kept them in the email loop for all meeting notices and discussions.

I understand that running for office takes a lot of time and energy. I suspect that Safarik and Jordan were emotionally drained from the election effort. I also suspect that Emily Naeole, upon winning office, was faced with a whole new set of challenges and demands on her time.

It may also be that they had decided to focus on other WGs and I was not aware of their choices or participation.

I bring this up now not to be gratuitously negative. But for this reason....

A number of people have made statements which imply that the PCDP is compromised by the lack of diversity in the make up of it’s groups and committees. Emily Naeole has made this point several times on the record and off the record. Kanaka Council members have said or implied this as well.

It is quite frustrating for those of us who did participate to be faulted for the lack of participation by others. Emily Naeole is one case in point. She signed up to participate and then did not.

I did attribute her lack of attendance to her new obligations as council member. However, the LUWG specifically invited her to speak with us more than once as our elected representative. Her signing up for the group in the beginning indicated an interest. She declined all invitations. So we were left to proceed without the benefit of her opinion and the diversity she could have afforded us.

Obviously many, many others could have (and by that I mean have the ability) participated if they so chose.

At this moment no one knows where Emily Naeole stands regarding approval of the PCDP. It will soon be before council. I would certainly hate to see it fail by one vote.

So to everyone who reads this and is interested in the passage of the Puna Community Development Plan I will say the same thing I told our LUWG in early 2007.

Please go talk to Emily......

I really mean this. In lieu of accepting or denying whatever anyone else says contact our council representative by email, phone or face-to-face visit and talk to Emily.

Emily Naeole <enaeole@co.hawaii.hi.us> 961-8267