Planning Commission Doesn’t Like Kanaha Medical Bldg Height

From the Maui News
by Harry Eager

A presentation on the proposed Maui Medical Plaza project to the Maui Planning Commission this week revealed a difference of opinion about where the core of the Kahului commercial district lies.

The site backs up on a bird refuge, but it also lies between Kahului Harbor and Kahului Airport. So is it core or fringe?

The question arose as the commission considered whether to grant a finding of no significant impact on the environmental assessment for the project’s planned six-story building and parking garage. The commission did approve it.

The commission could have forced developer Kanaha Professional Plaza to perform a more extensive environmental impact statement.

The finding may not, however, clear the way for the project to happen, although that would ordinarily be the case.

One among several issues is the height of the building. At an earlier meeting, the developers indicated that the project is not feasible in a smaller size. But they were advised that the finding of no significant impact does not commit the commission to accept the full six-story design when it comes back for further review.

Commission Member Ward Mardfin read from the Wailuku-Kahului Community Plan, which says that the low-rise character of the Kahului commercial district should be maintained, and that while zoning may allow six-story buildings, these should be placed in the center of blocks in the core area.

No way is the Hana Highway site anywhere but on the fringes, Mardfin said.

Planner Jim Buica said the Planning Department, on the contrary, considers the area between the harbor and the airport to be the core of the commercial district and expects it to become more and more dense as older properties are redeveloped.

Mardfin stuck to his point, noting that a summary list of tall buildings within the community plan area shows all are in Wailuku, with nothing over four stories in Kahului, although one five-story project has been approved.

The commission has wrestled with the request for a finding of no significant environmental impact, deferring a decision on April 26 when the project came before the panel then and time ran out.

One issue was apparently disposed of Tuesday. The proposed building height of 93 feet raised concerns about airplanes approaching Runway 5 (the light aircraft runway at Kahului Airport).

The developers brought in a Honolulu lawyer, Garrick Goo, who is a former Air Force pilot who often flies his light plane into Kahului. He walked commission members through a typical approach and assured them that a 93-foot building at the medical plaza lot would not cause any problem.

Commission member Warren Shibuya, also an Air Force retiree, said he was convinced that that issue, at least, had been disposed of.

Birds, though, remain a concern.

Kenny Hultquist, who videotapes commission meetings on behalf of the Maui Tomorrow Foundation for presentation on Akaku: Maui Community Television, said he was so concerned about testimony he heard while taping the April 26 meeting that he took his equipment to the site and spent three hours watching and taping.

Contrary to testimony that birds avoid the site, he said he saw herons flying through what would have been the fifth-floor of the office building.

He has put his video up on YouTube.

Maui Tomorrow Foundation Executive Director Irene Bowie also objected to building on the lot, which is not part of the wildlife refuge but is separated from it by a drainage canal.

“Kanaha Pond needs our help in a number of ways, and this project is just a slap in the face,” she said.

Dr. James Hansen, on the other hand, who hopes to move his gastroenterology practice into the building, warned that Maui has “a desperate need for physicians,” but they are being driven away because they cannot find adequate office space.

The Maui Medical Plaza is “an absolute necessity to bringing health care to Maui County,” he said.

Mardfin said it should be somewhere else. “By far, it will be the largest thumb sticking out of the ground in Kahului,” he said.