A more than 100-year-old family-owned business has requested the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation pause its plans to condemn the company’s large automotive servicing center property in Kakaako.
HART claims the eminent domain of a Servco Pacific Inc. property at 616 Keawe St. will be for the benefit of completing the over-$10 billion Skyline project into downtown Honolulu by 2030.
But at the HART board of directors meeting Friday, Servco Chief Investment Officer Peter Fukunaga opposed the government’s taking of the property until further discussions with the rail agency could be held.
“We want to figure out how we can find a good solution for all of us,” he added.
Saying discussions with HART over this property originally started more than a decade ago, Fukunaga said that “leadership and staffing changes” at the agency derailed discussions in recent years.
“There’s been about a five-year period where there hasn’t been any conversations, and then recently … we were notified that HART needed to take a significant, large portion of the property,” he added. “About triple … than what was initially discussed.”
“And then we were informed that the land has to get turned over to the contractor by January,” Fukunaga said. “So a very short time to prepare, that’s about seven months from now.”
Via a resolution, the rail agency seeks to notify the Honolulu City Council of its intention “to acquire by eminent domain a fee simple interest and a temporary construction easement over, under, above and through a portion” of that commercial property — which features an 8,580-square-foot building where automotive repairs occur — for Skyline.
HART claims the building conflicts with the station platform for the Civic Center Station and with the “constructability” of four straddle bent columns, which will be in the public right of way immediately adjacent to the building.
A straddle bent column and electrical facilities to power the station will also be located within the acquired property. And an additional temporary easement is necessary for use during the removal of the building from the property. The business is still eligible to receive relocation benefits, rail staff assert.
HART claims it presented a formal offer to Servco in April.
“The owner has been given a reasonable time to consider the offer,” Krista Lunzer, HART’s director of transit property acquisition and relocation, told the board Friday. “To adhere to the CCGS construction schedule, it’s necessary to begin the condemnation approval process now.”
“Efforts will be made to continue negotiations with the owner, with the goal of reaching an amicable and reasonable settlement,” she added.
According to the city’s Real Property Assessment Division, the commercial property at 616 Keawe St. has an assessed value of more than $21.2 million.
If the eminent domain occurs, Fukunaga — grandson of company founder Peter H. Fukunaga, who started the business in 1919 — said Servco will “need to relocate one of our busiest service centers.”
“So this facility supports nearly 50 jobs, tens of thousands of customers every year,” he told the board. “You know, seven months to get permitting, move equipment, retrain staff, potentially find a new location and figure this all out without disrupting … that’s the only spot down there that we’ve got.”
Fukunaga requested Servco “would like to step up the amount of conversations and engagement to figure out alternatives” to condemnation. The main alternative, he asserted, is full closure of the company’s Kakaako service center.
Fukunaga said the eminent domain “jeopardizes the long-term redevelopment plans for this site and leaves us with very few practical options going forward.”
But the future of Servco’s property was hampered by circumstances at HART’s board meeting. On Friday the board lacked a quorum — the minimum number of board members to legally conduct public business on the city rail project — and therefore could not vote on the condemnation or any other items on the meeting’s agenda.
Although it could not vote, board Chair Colleen Hanabusa explained the panel could receive testimony and that board members could ask questions.
To that, board member Roger Morton asked Fukunaga whether Servco “recommended alternatives that you would like us to consider.”
“Yes,” Fukunaga replied, adding his company wanted to set up a future meeting with HART to discuss options. “But certainly, if there’s a way that the amount of property to be taken permanently could be much smaller … and maybe some of the property could be leased for the build process.”
Hanabusa asked about Servco’s business operations on that Keawe Street site.
“For service, that’s our only Toyota location in the area,” Fukunaga replied.
“And you said (the planned taking) changed, about triple the size?” she queried.
Fukunaga replied, “It was supposed to be about 5,000 square feet, and … I think it’s up to about 19,000 (square feet) at this point.”
Board member Anthony Aalto asked whether Servco would “temporarily move and then, after HART’s done its business, move back in … (to) that huge site you have there.”
Fukunaga said, “To your point, if there’s a way that much less can be permanently taken, and during the build … if a portion is leased or borrowed for a period of time … that would certainly be a step in the right direction.”
“I can’t speak to the details of that,” Aalto replied, “but obviously, looking forward long-term, we want to see that site fully integrated into the station, and potentially see your business there on a permanent basis but in an integrated fashion with the station.”
Later, Lunzer said the request for the Servco property’s condemnation will return to the board for a formal vote, likely at its next meeting in June.
In April the HART board voted for rail-related condemnations on three other Kakaako properties. Those include:
• 560 Halekauwila St., owned by architecture firm Design Partners Properties No. 5 LLC.
• 609 Keawe St., owned by Bank of Hawaii, trustee for the Katherine McGrew Cooper Trust.
• 576 Halekauwila St., owned by Goodwill Kakaako Center LLC and Big Brothers Big Sisters Hawaii Properties LLC.
At the same April 25 meeting, the board also voted to condemn a fourth property in Kalihi — at 1956 Dillingham Blvd., owned by Gerald Je Chul Kang and Kloe Sookhee Kang — to allow easement access for placement of Hawaiian Electric equipment.
