In Our View for Sunday — December 12, 2004

• A&B’s Port Allen project

A&B’s Port Allen project

Alexander & Baldwin have picked an interesting location for a proposed affordable housing project. Their parcel of 17.5 acres of land mauka of the small boat harbor at Port Allen offers close proximity to the Pacific Ocean and likely ocean views from many of the units.

The housing would be nearby A&B’s Kauai Coffee operation and in an area where the McBryde plantation began operating over 100 years ago, giving the project a tie to the beginnings of one of Kaua‘i’s biggest sugar companies, and a sugar company that was once owned by A&B.

While some may say the project once built will provide just a fraction of the number of units planned for A&B’s luxury resort development mauka of Lawai Beach Road in the Po‘ipu area, this new affordable project will help to turn the tide in the battle on Kaua‘i to give working people a place to live and own.

The location, too, is a plus, and in a spot where local residents will feel at home, in fact likely feel blessed for being able to live so close to the sea.

Plans call for three, three-story, multifamily buildings consisting of 75 condominium units, and 60 single-family homes. That, along with Habitat for Humanity’s plans for the Hanapepe area, should put a serious dent in the backlog of requests for affordable housing, at least on the Westside.

Help is going to be needed with keeping planning and infrastructure costs down on this project so the units can be made affordable as possible. Thankfully just hearing the word possible in relation to affordable housing – as opposed to the more commonly heard impossible from those looking to buy or own a home on a working person’s income – is encouraging.

Hopefully this project from A&B will be a model for affordable housing construction elsewhere on Kaua‘i.