A North Kona developer will get another decade to start work on his project’s second half, but that new deadline won’t affect the project’s first phase, on which the developer has made only slight progress in nearly 30 years.
A North Kona developer will get another decade to start work on his project’s second half, but that new deadline won’t affect the project’s first phase, on which the developer has made only slight progress in nearly 30 years.
Kaloko Heights Associates purchased the roughly 408 acre Kaloko Heights project from Y-O Ltd. in 2004. Y-O received the project’s first Land Use Commission approval in 1983. The commission on Friday signed off on giving Kaloko Heights Associates owner Stanford Carr another 10 years to hold off seeking LUC approvals for the project’s second increment.
Carr and Kaloko Heights Associates were trying to complete infrastructure improvements to the property, which is mauka of the Kaloko Industrial Area and fronts Hina Lani Street in 2009, when disagreements between themselves and their lenders stopped construction on a loop road, project overseer Peter Phillips told commissioners. Those disagreements turned into litigation, which was only resolved via a settlement agreement in August.
Y-O did complete one major infrastructure task — it built Hina Lani Street as part of the conditions to proceed with the expected 1,400-unit residential and commercial project. Phillips said Friday the project’s first phase will have 770 residential units, both multi- and single-family — about 40 fewer than the initial project request. The second phase will have 620 single-family lots, he said.
Phillips told commissioners the developer would “absolutely” pick up construction again soon, first with work on the loop road and secondly with improvements such as gutters and curbs, along Hina Lani Street.
The LUC in its initial order required the developer to make substantial progress on the first phase before it could seek a boundary amendment for the second phase. So far, completed infrastructure includes a 1-million-gallon water tank, an electrical substation and $8 million paid for water rights for the entire project, Phillips said. The developer also secured the Department of Land and Natural Resources State Historic Preservation Division’s approval for a preservation plan for burial sites located on the property.
Hawaii County Deputy Corporation Counsel William Brilhante said the county did not oppose the request.
“This request for an extension is timely,” Brilhante said. “That’s important. The applicants and their predecessors have completed substantial infrastructure improvements. The applicant has done what it has been required to do up to this stage.”
The only significant change since the 1983 approval, in the planning realm, was the County Council’s adoption of the Kona Community Development Plan, Planning Director Bobby Jean Leithead Todd said.
Bryan Yee, an attorney representing the state’s planning office, said the state did not oppose the 10-year extension, but made sure Phillips understood the LUC could impose new conditions when it considered the application to reclassify the land in the second phase.
“Even though the project’s character might not change, there may be a variety of issues that change over this 40-year period,” Yee said.
Phillips said the developer still intends to bring a grocery store to the area and will also keep 5 acres as open space.