The County Council yesterday heard overwhelming favorable testimony from business leaders who spoke up for Grove Farm Co.’s request for zoning amendments. The Puhi-based company’s proposals include reconfiguring and expanding the Puakea Golf Course by the Kukui Grove Shopping Center,
The County Council yesterday heard overwhelming favorable testimony from business leaders who spoke up for Grove Farm Co.’s request for zoning amendments.
The Puhi-based company’s proposals include reconfiguring and expanding the Puakea Golf Course by the Kukui Grove Shopping Center, building fewer homes and realigning a road to Nawiliwili Road.
The subject of a public hearing at the historic County Building, the proposal also calls for commercial use of a 12 acres by Nawiliwili Road.
If the zoning amendments are approved, Grove Farm can implement plans drawn up more than a decade ago, enhancing the value of the company’s properties, as well as other properties, located in Lihu’e and Puhi, said Grove Farm’s attorney Michael Belles.
The plans have been “tweaked” and streamlined to meet changing economic times, Belles said.
Mike Furukawa, vice president of Grove Farm, said the company can now move ahead with its development plans now that Steve Case of AOL-Time Warner is on the scene and can provide sustained funding.
As owner of Grove Farm and Lihue Land Company, Case owns 40,000 acres in Lihu’e, Puhi and parts of Koloa.
The proposal drew support from Kris Nakata, executive director of the Kauai Economic Development Board, Jerry Nishek, president of the Contractors Association of Kauai and John Wyatt of the Kauai Nursery and Landscaping Inc.
Puhi resident Annie Leighton said road improvements would encourage people to exercise and would help alleviate traffic on Kaumuali’i Highway and Nawiliwili Road.
Kaua’i resident Ray Chuan raised concerns that the 12-acre site, on which a former plantation manager’s home sits, could be used as a visitor destination area project, unnecessarily raising density in an area geared for residential use.
He was given assurances no such designation existed for the site.
Some of the major zoning changes proposed by Grove Farm include:
– To convert three parcels of land from residential to golf course use to create a full 18-hole golf course. The Puakea Golf Course currently consists of 10 holes, but the remaining holes weren’t developed in the past due to the lack of funds.
The reconfigured golf course will result in a loss of 104 residential units, mostly multifamily.
The reconfiguration will mean homes will not be built beyond the Pu’ali Stream, avoiding environmental issues, Belles said.
– Refurbish the plantation manager’s home on Nawiliwili Road and possibly convert it into a golf course clubhouse or a bed-and-breakfast operation.
– Extend and reroute Nohou Street so that it ends up on Nawiliwili Road and closer to the shopping center.
Councilmen Randal Valenciano and Jimmy Tokioka said the Council, as a way to ease traffic on Kaumuali’i Highway and Nawiliwili Road, wants Grove Farm to construct a connecting roadway to run behind Chiefess Kamakahelei Middle School and connect to Nohou Road.
The Council’s Planning Committee will take up the zoning amendments next week.
The Council also approved a $30,000 grant to the Kapa’a Business Association to build a new pavilion at the Kapa’a Park along Kuhio Highway.
The small project was characterized as one that would help bring back a sense of community to the Kawaihau District, the district with the largest population on the island.
The project was compared to a pavilion Rose Bukoski helped to coordinate and build at Annie Knudsen Park in Koloa several years ago.
Today, senior citizens and youths use the south Kaua’i facility for sporting and community events.
The Kapa’a project also would involve the donation of $120,000 of volunteer work by Kaua’i contractors, members of the Kapa’a Business Association and East Kaua’i Senior Softball team, which uses the park for ball games, as well as area residents.
Eddie Sarita, manager of the Kauai War Memorial Convention Hall and coordinator of the Ho’olokahi parks beautification program, said Ray Sam Fong, a member of the senior softball team, and volunteers hoped to start work in May and complete the work in four months.
The pavilion, which would total about 1,500 square feet, could accommodate up to 20 tables, Sarita and Sam Fong said.
Council Chairman Ron Kouchi and councilmembers Bryan Baptiste and James Tokioka praised the upcoming work undertaken by Sam Fong and others.
“I think it is great that people come out and work to help,” Tokioka said, adding people from Kapa’a will benefit from the project.
Sam Fong said he decided to take on the project to help the community. “The county doesn’t have the money to build the pavilion,” he said. “So, this is the best way to do it.”
Numerous community projects have been developed across the island through the Ho’olokahi project, a brainchild of Mayor Maryanne Kusaka. The program helps to stretch government dollars and uses volunteers.
Staff writer Lester Chang can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 225) and mailto:lchang@pulitzer.net
