emiller@westhawaiitoday.com
BY ERIN MILLER | WEST HAWAII TODAY
Mayor Billy Kenoi’s upcoming budget, to be unveiled Thursday, will reflect property value revenues at their lowest level since he took office in late 2008.
Kenoi told members of the Kona-Kohala Chamber of Commerce Tuesday next year’s budget will have less than $200 million in property tax revenues, down from about $220 million the first year he took office.
Tailoring his comments to the crowd of business owners and executives, Kenoi reiterated his attempts to reduce the cost and size of county government and work with reduced revenues without cutting subsidies to tourism promotions for the Big Island.
“We need airlift,” Kenoi said he told the Big Island Visitors Bureau. “We’ve got to get people here.”
The tourism industry has been continuing to offer incentives for private charters directly from Japan, in an effort to keep Kona International Airport’s international designation, he added.
“If we lose that designation in Kona, we lose our capacity to grow in the future,” he said. He cited several direct charter flights in March from Japan as supportive of that end.
The mayor also reiterated his goal of seeing Hawaii County using 100 percent renewable energy within three years. He said he met last week with Ormat Technology officials to discuss geothermal energy. Ormat developed the Puna Geothermal Venture plant.
Kenoi said he asked those officials, “with all your scientists and surveys, where is your more productive spot in the world?”
Their answer, Puna.
How, Kenoi then asked the crowd, can the island have the most productive geothermal hotspot in the world and not use it?
“It’s not intermittent,” he said. “It’s cheap, renewable, clean power. How can we not have this opportunity to encourage investment and fully develop the island of Hawaii as a 100 percent renewable energy island?”
He said with excess geothermal electricity, “we can have hydrogen to power buses.”
On both the renewable energy issue and keeping Kona’s international airport designation, Kenoi said he is also working with Sen. Daniel Inouye’s office, seeking federal assistance.
Kenoi also revisited his move to streamline the county permitting process.
“It’s gone from six months to a year (to get permits) to as quick as 30 days,” he said. “We want to create an environment that people feel comfortable coming to and (where) they trust county government to be trustworthy and responsible.”
Kenoi kicked off his remarks by hitting some of the highlights of his first three years in office — getting vertical construction on three West Hawaii emergency and transitional housing projects and the impending completion of the midlevel road, praising his department heads and their associated accomplishments.
emiller@westhawaiitoday.com