About 40 cars are scheduled to be towed away from the site of the old Kekaha Sugar Company mill site. “It looks like a business, like someone has taken the cars in after taking out what they needed and dumped
About 40 cars are scheduled to be towed away from the site of the old Kekaha Sugar Company mill site.
“It looks like a business, like someone has taken the cars in after taking out what they needed and dumped it there,” said Lihu‘e-based attorney Jonathan Chun, a representative of the new owners of both the Kekaha Sugar and Lihue Plantation mill sites.
Chun said he hoped to have the cars out of there as soon as possible.
Chun represents owners of the Seattle-based company who recently purchased the former Kekaha Sugar mill and Lihue Plantation mill sites from leaders of what’s left of Amfac.
He said Monday he had solicited bids from two towing companies, and was awaiting a third bid.
He said he hoped to forward the bids to new owners, Pacific Funds LLC, as soon as possible. While not revealing the cost of removing 40 cars, Chun said “it was not inexpensive.”
Chun said he was told by the towers the job would probably take a few days to complete.
Chun was at the site last week, and took pictures of the cars, adding he was somewhat surprised at how neatly lined up the cars are.
Kekaha resident Romang Tumbaga Peake also took pictures, and said the dumped cars are “an eyesore to locals and tourists alike. It’s disgraceful, hazardous, and not healthy.”
Chun said once the cars are removed, he hopes the mill site will stay free of junk cars.
He said it was impractical for the new owners of the mill to install 24-hour security.
He said if the community is concerned about the dumping of cars there, they could help prevent future dumping incidents.
Chun said earlier Pacific Funds had no definitive plans for the site.
He said the new owners were still waiting on reports from state Department of Health officials concerning soil toxicity levels at both the mill locations.
Since both sites were industrial most of their productive lives, there is the potential that either or both of the sites may contain hazardous materials in the grounds. Once the cars are removed from the Kekaha site, they will be crushed and sent off-island for recycling. Since the Kekaha Sugar mill site is now a Westside vehicle-dumping ground, there is also the distinct possibility that hazardous fluids from the abandoned vehicles (oil, gasoline, anti-freeze, transmission and power-steering fluid, etc.) might have leaked out of the vehicles and into the ground, too.
