County Council - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our committee meeting today, September 2nd. We will start off with our planning committee. Mr. Boulafon.

Thank you. I'd like to call the planning committee to order. Let the record flag all members are present. Can I get the first item, please?

Minutes of the August 19, 2026 planning committee. Approved.

Second. Does it move and second? Any public testimony? Any discussion? All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion passed. Can I get the second item, please?

Bill number 2998, draft one, a bill for an ordinance amending chapters 15, 12, and 8, Kauai County Code 1987 as amended, relating to wildfire and wildland urban interface, county of Kauai applicant ZA2026-6.

Move to approve. Second. It's been moved and seconded. Committee members, I'm going to start with discussion. Then we'll suspend the rules and have administration respond. And if you have any questions for the administration, we can ask them. And then we'll do public testimony and back to discussion. And try to do as much work as we can in this bill in committee meeting. As always, we do the majority of our work in all our bills. with the intent to get it as best as possible so that way if we do pass today, we get the best bill possible for our second reading. So with that, we do have a presentation and discussion starting with Chair Raposo. I think he has a presentation if he can get that set up.

Thank you, Committee Chair. And I appreciate the opportunity to speak. I am a noncommittee member, but I did request the deferral at the last committee meeting because I did have some questions. Let me just start. This bill doesn't take effect until next year, July 1, 2027. So we have a year. So there's really no need to rush. And my concerns last week was obviously the cost. And we were presented with the cost estimates from the administration. The other concern I had was the impact, the financial or fiscal impact that would have on Department of Water. Because at $14,000 a home, that's a significant amount of money that the water department would not receive, which would have to be made up somewhere. And this stuff doesn't just come out of thin air. So what I did was I reached out to the Contractors Association of Kauai. which is made up of our local contractors and developers and an engineer to go over the bill section by section to see what the impact would be, what it would really cost for one of our local contractors that specializes in residential construction to As well as the building, and the testimonies are all attached on the packet that I asked staff to pass out this morning. I only received this yesterday, but Building Industry Association had some concerns as well that I would like to have a discussion on, which really pertains to the applicability to all construction. Whether you're in a hazard or not, hazard area or not, you're bound by these requirements. And I kind of liken that to the special laws that we have that pertain to homes that are in a tsunami zone or in a flood zone. Those requirements don't apply to all construction around the island if you're not in that hazard area. This one does. So that's just one of the concerns that the BIA had. and which I tend to agree with, is have we designed hazard zones which this should apply to? If you're in a zone that has no threat of wildfires, why would we be imposing these additional costs on the construction? So that's one of them. And then the Department of Water impact is something that I know the Department of Water is here, and I'm expecting them to come up and share with us what that cost would be. But my biggest concern right now as we all try to keep our local families in homes is the true cost. So I did ask. the Contractors Association, as I said earlier, to go through the bill one by one, section by section, and come up with their cost estimates. And the reason I'm bringing this forward is because it is so different from what was presented to us that I believe this body needs to validate what the real numbers are. And we shouldn't be rushed to pass this out today until we can and the administration has a copy of this and hopefully they can come up and explain why these numbers are so high versus what was presented. So with that, I do have a short presentation that I wanted to share. I'm not sure, I've never done this before. So this is, I know it's kind of small on the screen, I hope you guys can see it, but in the first requirement of roofs, the Contractors Association, people said there is actually no change, that the roofs are, they wouldn't see any increase. in cost but on the gutters and downspouts and this is based on a thousand square foot home a regular simple thousand square foot home that to implement these requirements would cost an additional three thousand dollars the flashing which is on the exterior walls they are estimating that the materials in labor to comply with that section would be $5,000. The post and pier, the stainless steel, the pier, the materials should be non-combustible. Anyway, in that section D, they're saying that estimate is $5,000 in addition to the normal construction costs. The flashing and decking for the post-imperial homes, what they're calling the underfloor enclosure, would be $2,000. And then on page five, the vents, they're not attributing any cost to that because that's standard and there would be no additional cost. The tempered glass requirement, they're estimating it to be $1,800. That is, again, materials and labor. The exterior door, $30. The address that is required, $20. Again, they went through each section that would require additional items to be put on that home. So that adds up to $16,850, which is $16.85 a square foot. And then they had two more calculations for concrete versus aggregate. And the concrete, again, around 1,000 square foot house, they're estimating it to be $90,000. And if you use aggregate hardening instead, which is the rock or the gravel, would be $40,000 instead. So as you can see, the price difference is significant. Now, I'm not a contractor. I'm not an engineer. I don't know anything about construction. But the difference in these numbers are so significant that I think it warrants this body to at least ask the questions. Again, these were estimates that were done from a team that was put together by Contractors Association of Kauai. And I just wanted to set the stage with that so we can at least get some information on what is that real number. That was my concern when I first saw it because I think the proposed bill and the number is $6 a square foot. And as you can see, it's significantly higher on the estimates that were given by the Contractors Association of Kauai. significantly higher. That's kind of where I'm hoping the discussion will go today. As I said, the Water Department is here. I'm hoping that they're prepared to come up. It's hard to say what the impact will be because you've got to know, obviously, how many homes you're going to build. Hopefully, with With historical data, we can kind of estimate what we would be looking at and how much that would impact our water department, which is already struggling financially. And again, when we take money away from the water department, it has to be made up somewhere. And their revenue source is simply water users. So that is always a concern. Again, I'll just say this bill, if passed, wouldn't take effect until July of 2027. That's a whole year. So there is no need to rush this through on two committee meetings. So my suggestion would be that unless we can clarify the numbers and applicability and all of that, that I would be asking the committee to once again defer. Thank you.

Thank you. Any initial discussion before we go to administration? Senator Conlon.

Thank you, Chair, for that outline. And then I'm happy to give a little bit of initial discussion. One, we had a letter from Habitat for Humanity that suggested that there might be some amendments. I don't know if I can mention what I read in Habitat for Humanity. So when we don't have a second road access in, I understand how that is very expensive, right, to put in another entrance. But I think that is one of the biggest fire hazards that we have. I want to speak about the plant challenge. I don't know if in the development of this bill how much conversation was put in with people who are specialists in soil management, but this is anything but a regenerative strategy of handling the soil. And so when I look at what puts in here, it's not realistic relative to the plants. When you separate all the plants out by as much as they do, it's pretty much grass to the fence line with maybe a few little trees in the property. And when I bought my house, that's basically what it was. And as I've put in regenerative agriculture in there, I haven't watered my yard in over probably 10 years because of the way nature manages plants. They grow in clusters. This doesn't allow for that. It doesn't allow for an understory, which is the natural way of having plants. So I think it's really important because one has to think about cooling the house, watering the yard, prioritizing fire prevention over food sustainability. And the more you allow your yard to be natural with having a healthy amount of leaves and stuff like that on the ground, that's what holds the water in the soil. That's what keeps everything really abundant. And before I planted my yard that I really had no idea how much it would grow into what it became naturally, it has like a forest floor in the yard. My house is a good 10 degrees cooler than it was. The house, which is a Hicks home with wooden single wall construction. I used to be able to put my hand on the wall when the sun was on the house. And it's warm almost towards hot to the touch. Like you wouldn't lean against it with a bare back. And the house was hot. In the daytime, always hot. with a natural, healthy yard around it, the house is fine. And I would never even need an air conditioner. So when you think about what the cost is when we're looking at affordable housing, the cost to maintain an unnatural yard when we're looking at a four-inch width of the tree base and all these design things that you have to do doesn't help plants grow. So the amount of landscaping, constant elements to keep the yard in an unhealthy, unnatural way of being is actually pretty extensive. And so I'll have a few questions to the fire department just about when you have a wet scape versus a dry scape. Because even we see the burn scars that happened with the Hanapepe Kalamakani fire, you can see it went right along the edges of where there was a wet scape in the agriculture. And I think that when you look at having concrete around the house and an absolutely exhausted soil, you're going to have a hot scape around that house as opposed to a wet scape. And again, I really appreciated the chair asking the questions about the districts. I know we had a fire in Wainiha. I believe it was almost 100 acres. When the fire come up, I'll ask a few questions with that. So there's an example of when a wet scape did burn. So I'll have some questions about what happened with that wet scape. But I'm in agreement that different rules would maybe apply. We still want to be careful. on how you create a burn area. But I think when you have stuffs like hanging wetsuits on the clothesline underneath an eave or whatever it is, there's all kinds of things that create burnable materials, a lot more than the plants. And a nice wet compress on the land of naturally maintained soil is going to be a lot less burnable. This asks for a hot, dry ground. And I think that that is problematic. And Los Angeles is not Kauai. If that's where a lot of these places came from, Texas is not Kauai. Arizona and Colorado are not Kauai. So the wonderful and important fire convention that happened that came up with these ideas conference it might be reflecting a very different landscape than what we have here. And I think we need to really maximize what we have, which is a wet community, especially in the windward side of the island, that maybe we would have different requirements. So I think those are things that I want to be able to look at. And I'm also going to really want to be looking at the shells in the maze.

Great. Any other additional discussion? I'll just add, since we're in our second community meeting, I really appreciate the non-members and committee members providing all the information so that way we can look at all the pieces and make sure we provide something that is tangible and useful, but also does what it's intended to do, which is protect our community. I'll just mention that the group that came together on this was specific to Hawaii and specific to Hawaii and provided a bill with all the information necessary so that we make any proposed changes that will affect our community with regards to our community. So hopefully we can, in discussion, clarify these things and make sure that we are passing a bill that helps our community, but doesn't put a burden on them. So I'm going to suspend the rules and ask administration to come up, as we have a few questions from our members and noncommittee members. Council members will, as standard, raise your hand, let me know when you're ready for your question. But there is already a list of questions. So I'll probably start with Chair, if you're OK, once you have that presentation. Yeah, we'll start with your questions first. But if administration, if you guys have any opening thoughts, feel free to start first.

Good morning, Chair, members of the committee, council members, kind of on behalf of the planning department, joined by Chief Gibson and by Lance Delos-Reyos, some of the cost analysis for the bill.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah, I mean, I don't expect. They just got the material today. I just got it late yesterday afternoon. So, I mean, I don't know if they're prepared to respond to what we provided. So, I mean, like I said, I don't believe there's a rush. If they're prepared to answer, that's fine.

If not, I can wait. Some of the response by the Contractors Association, I can say looking at some of those numbers, definitely would be an agreement. Some of the numbers, though, are calculating things that aren't required, like the gutters and downspouts. That's not a requirement of construction. It's just that if you have gutters and downspouts, that they be metal. As well as, I didn't quite understand where they're going with the stainless steel on the post and pier. You don't necessarily make post and pier out of stainless steel. They're generally out of concrete, so those are already non-combustible. They also had some flashing at the base of the house on the slab on grade, which a slab on grade on a house wouldn't have flashing. It has a concrete band already that's in place. So just some of the things that they're analyzing.

I think that was for the post and pier.

No, they did. Sorry. The flashing and decking. Second page. No, no. It's just flashing. It has it. quoted on the base of the house for the slab on grade. So you wouldn't have flashing down there. You would have flashing at the intersection of a deck, absolutely, but not on the slab on grade example. And so there's just some areas that just, it seems like it would appear they're calculating numbers that aren't requirements.

Yeah, and I think that's where, again, I don't expect you guys to, to do a comparison today.

But I can also say that looking at their numbers for hardscape, and we specifically got five quotes from five different contractors, and we provided the names of those contractors at the last committee meeting. And it was between $4.33 a square foot and $8, depending on the contractor. So that's where I'm just like, wait, $40 a square foot for hardscape. I'm not going to say that there aren't contractors quoting that, but that's not necessarily reflective of the five quotes from five contractors that are willing to go on the record of what they're quoting.

Can you remind us what those were, those quotes?

The quote was unlimited, had it at about $5 a square foot.

Is that labor and concrete?

The material delivery is also something that has to be factored in, because moving the truck and labor. So we got two quotes for just the material if you're going to do a self-fill and pick the gravel up. And it was between $350 and $850 for the entire amount of gravel. It comes up to between $40 and $60 a ton. The house that we're analyzing requires about 13 tons for that five foot band. And so with labor, delivery, and material, Unlimited was quoting at $5 a square foot. Shioy Construction was quoting at $6.66 a square foot. Earthworks was quoting at $8 a square foot. Pacific Concrete Cutting and Corning was quoting at $5.33 a square foot. And Goodfellow Brothers was quoting at $4.33 a square foot.

I don't know if you would know this, but you probably don't necessarily track it, but of all the new bills of homes, happening on Kauai each year, do you have a sense of how many are slab on grade and how many are post-peer? I mean, like 50-50, 60-40?

I don't have a sense of that, quite honestly.

Because like what you were saying, clearly the flashing expense Wouldn't apply to the slab on grade, but it would apply to the post on pier.

Because there's no intersection combustible wall at the base. So post on pier is just elevated. You need that flashing.

What about what's on the bottom of page three? It says flashing for decking materials and labor, $2,000. Yeah, but doesn't that purple stuff go all around the bottom?

That's the mesh.

Mesh. So is the mesh part of that $2,000 probably?

Probably. That we would agree with. I'm sorry, I was just clarifying. That we wouldn't object to. The flashing, the bottom of page three, we have no objections.

Oh, that's a good .

That, yeah. And then also.

The other thing is, so if there's like that stairs, it's decking or whatever, the more of that there is, then the more costs would be.

The more deck you have, the more flashing you're going to have to have at the interface. Thank you.

I would like to start with Chief Gibson. So I want to talk about the different regions of the island. We have a map that we often look at that shows yellow and red in the more burnable areas. Can you just say for a moment which regions are the highest fire risk in a blunt way, and which are the lower fire risk?

Thank you for the question. Mike Gibson, Fire Department. Yeah, I would ask us to step back and get away from the map and these borders on the maps and concentrate on wind-driven fires. It's wind-driven. Those embers that were called by Derek Alconis, they can go miles, the size of baseballs, golf balls. They don't stop at the line on the map. They're going to just keep going, right? And although I'm not a scientist like one of you on this panel, climate change is real. The patterns in the world are shifting. We're seeing fires now that we wouldn't have seen 20, 30 years ago. And they're going to start shifting to the different areas or wetter areas, if you would. And it's not wildfire that I'm worried about. It's one house being on fire in the wind or a vehicle with these lithium ion batteries being on fire that we cannot put out in the wind. And then we get the 30 mile an hour winds or higher. They're going to start driving the heat, the flames, the embers. Anywhere, Analei, the wettest area, it's just got to go house to house at that point.

OK, so I want to talk about that. Thank you for bringing that up. So when we look at a wind-driven fire in an area, What other things than just plants and the house itself are burning? What are the hot spots? When you go to a fire in Kilauea or Hanalei or something like that, Kapahi, still yet, what are you looking out for for fire containment rapidly?

In the fires that we've had, we've been fortunate. They've been held to one structure or just to the adjacent structure. So we're able to get in there. And in the best of conditions, our firefighters are going to make the stop and put the fire out. But those things that can spread the fire are debris around the home, clutter around the home, just debris, the buildup of debris, right?

That's what I would think. So when I look at this, where it's very prescriptive, I mean, exhaustively prescriptive on the vegetation. Not all vegetation is the same, by the way, I would think. Like a wind-driven hot fire, it's going to be like a blow dryer. It's going to dry out even the wettest of plants. When we look at the debris, there's nothing prescriptive here on the debris. It's just about the plants. And so can you compare the difference between really very water-dense vegetation versus a big pile of books? I'm picking on myself. Boxes of books in the garage, propane tanks, kayaks, wetsuits, all kinds of things. things that might be in the garage, how would you compare those with wet scape plants?

I will not be able to do as good of a job as Derek or Elizabeth or some of you. But as I said about the climate and the patterns are shifting. So the well-intended green landscape today It may not look like that 10 or 15 years from now. We might have drought. We might have areas of the county with a deteriorating water infrastructure, sorry, Joe, that we have neighborhoods go out for weeks or months at a time without water. And then those plants that rely on the water, if we're not getting it from the weather, if the weather patterns change and our infrastructure is gone, those well-intended wet scapes could be a source for fire.

But when the wet scape isn't dried out, when you have a wet scape, what's the difference between that and a box of books? Or what's the difference between that and piles of fishing nets and all different kinds of things that pile around, and propane tanks? Like, probably when you light a fire, You're going to be careful around the propane tank. Would that be accurate?

Yeah. Those are all fuels. They're all susceptible.

So what's the difference between them? Would you say wet scape is more? Because that's what we're just talking about, climate change. And climate change happens in part because of how we treat the soil, deeply. And it doesn't get addressed. Wet scape plants versus a box of books or piles of papers, what's more flammable?

We had the UL scientist here one or two weeks ago who could answer that brilliantly. So it's surface area, right? What is the material? A hard closed book has less surface area than a wet scape that could be dried out 10 years from now. And that wet scape is a dry scape that's going to burn quicker and faster than a book. But I understand your point. And there's two sides to look at it. In the best of conditions, wetter is better, right?

And then when you look at road design, when we possibly have an amendment that says, OK, we don't have to worry about a second route out. for the safety of the community and the safety of the firefighters. When I look at these closed neighborhoods like Wailua House Lots, who I really feel extra concern for is our firefighters, because they're going to be the last app. They're going to be the ones that are locked in. Does it make sense that we say no needed alternative route out? I mean, how does that impact?

I mean, if I could just say, there's a proposed amendment that doesn't say none is required. With the approval of the fire department, it can be waived. You may have a proposal that has only 20 units that immediately is serviced by an adjacent highway. Would it warrant necessarily two full roads into it? So it just says that on those that want to exempt out of it, they need to first get the fire chief's approval.

Including a large development.

A large government could ask for it. It could ask for it, but it would require the fire department's approval.

I have a question on going back to the wet scape. The Lahaina fire, did the wet scape survive?

I personally don't have that answer. I don't know.

If I remember correctly, that happened during an extreme drought, so I think the wet scape was dry.

And Lahaina isn't wet the same way. It's on the leeward side of the island. It's the dry side of the island.

The wet scapes were all removed. It was a wet land.

The wet scapes were removed just like they have been here. The wet scapes have been removed at the large scale natural level. But Wahaina is on the dry side of the island, drier side of the island.

Let me go further follow up. During a fire, a live wet tree is just as susceptible to burn as anything else eventually over time. I mean, it's not going to not burn because it's alive and wet, right?

So I have a follow up. When you have a canopy of very wet trees versus no large, wet trees, embers flying in the wind, are they likely to hit that large, wet tree? Are they likely to hit the house if there's no large, wet tree? What are they going to hit?

They're going to shower and force their way through every nook and cranny that they can. Nothing's for certain, right?

Nothing's for certain, but you have a defensible space on large, wet trees from blowing embers. It just depends. A very strong 80 mile an hour wind like happened apparently in Lahainer, maybe it wasn't quite that strong. But when you're getting plate-sized embers going, they're going to get anything. But I mean, it's common sense that a damp blanket is going to put out some of those embers that are blowing.

The problem of the vacuum. Sorry. Any more questions for administration? I have Chair Raposo, and then I'll follow up the questions. I just have a question, but back to the mic.

You said the gutters and downspouts are not required. You don't have to have gutters on a house.

But if you put the gutters, probably it doesn't have to be built.

The statute or the bill says, construction requirements for any newly proposed residential structures or additions to existing structures, the following construction requirements shall be met. And that's number one. And 1B is gutters and downspouts. Gutters and downspouts shall be constructed of metal material. It doesn't say it's optional. The material has to be metal, but it's on whether it's- No, but if I'm reading this, it's telling me that I got to have gutters, but you're saying it's optional.

The gutter itself is optional. If they put the gutter, it has to be metal.

Okay, so that should be fixed. It says if gutters are installed, then they should be. Because right now I'm reading that as I got to put it on. So did your estimate consider the $6 a square foot consider gutters and downspouts or not?

When I did the cost comparison. Please state your name. Oh, sorry. This is Lance with Unlimited Construction. When I did the original cost study, I assumed gutters on both the original build and the WUI build.

But was the gutters included in that?

Yeah, meaning there was no cost change because both models of my estimate assumed gutters.

Right, but it's an additional cost if you've got to do your gutter made of metal, right?

Which is, yes, standard on Kauai. Metal. Metal. You have aluminum gutters, K-style gutters.

Thank you. Are there any other requirements in here that are optional?

Well, like, so the flashing on the decking, right? Like, if you don't have a deck, then you don't have flashing on the deck. Obviously. And then for the same, the flashing where you have roof intersections. If you don't have roof intersections, then you don't have a flashing requirement there. Yeah.

Over on the costs, I had a question on the glazed windows. I'm trying to find it, the page. Tempered glass materials and laborers, $1,800 by CAK. Okay. Is that, I mean, the labor for a tempered glass is harder to install, or it's the same, so that's just the difference for the tempered versus regular?

Yeah, and when I did my study, I got actual quotes from HBM for a standard Milgard window, and then I asked for the WUI requirements, which is a single or dual panes with one of the panes being tempered. So I think, and that's pretty much in line with what I found when I did my study. The material increase was around $1,200.

Okay, thanks.

I got a new question. Following up the discussion and community input, the requirements on yards, so I think a lot of people are putting what is required in this bill for five feet and then translating that for the entire yard. Can you reiterate what this bill does for the yard?

The yard defensible space requirements concerning tree maintenance are only for larger subdivision projects. It's not for an individual home. proposals, so larger subdivisions that often come with landscaping conditions in their subdivision application. It just is those landscaping proposals that are pre-standard subdivision applications need to take into account wildfire resiliency now.

Just following up on that, so I just want to be really clear. If it's not in a subdivision, it's an individual home, and outside of the five foot, there's no mandate.

There's no mandate.

So there's no control over what vegetation or how you plant your vegetation. It's just the five feet surrounding the home.

Surrounding a proposed new home.

New home.

So follow up on just that.

I have a clarification on that. So if it's an addition, like an additional unit on an existing home,

Just that portion that's being added onto the home would have the home hardening requirements and the five-foot hardscape, but the existing part of the home that's already there would not have to be updated. Council Member Cotten.

So just to be clear, because that helps me feel a little better, is this 30 feet from the house, if you just have a house and it's not a new subdivision, they're not going to say you can't have an avocado tree?

Absolutely not.

This would be prohibiting avocado, ulu, mango. Most food-bearing trees would not fit the definition of what's in here. So a planned subdivision. Is this for the common area, or is even any house can't have avocado, ulu?

You can have trees in a planned subdivision. It just would have to be maintained in a manner that doesn't have ladder fuels, if you will.

Doesn't have what?

Ladder fuels. The way the fires climb up trees.

OK.

Councilmember Holland and Councilmember Moser.

Thank you. Can we just go back to the maps of the hazard areas? Because we started to talk about that. If I remember correctly, on those maps, it kind of showed most of Kauai as being hazard. What was the?

Were these the CWPP? I don't remember.

I thought that when we looked at those, it really identified most of Kauai as a potential risk for a fire. There were certain areas that were a little bit lower. But then we saw a fire in Wainiha last week, which I usually consider a pretty wet scape. I'm wondering, can you clarify a little bit more about the delineation of those and why it's island-wide? I know that's supposed to be the other guy.

I will not have that scientific answer like Elizabeth would. I would say it's island-wide just because of the wind-driven aspect of it, yeah.

OK. And so further to that, talking about the wet, to Council Member Collins' point, if there's a wet tree, you've probably experienced it. But would you say that it's true that if a fire is approaching, that it quickly dries out wet trees prior to the fire hitting?

I have to follow up on that. I asked about embers. I have a follow-up. I asked about embers blowing.

Yeah, but what I'm saying is, Councilmember, if there's a massive fire and we're dealing with a fire, the heat of that dries things out in advance about a quarter of a mile. So you're dealing with a wet scape that's dry before the embers get to the house. That's the science of how wildfire works.

Chair Raposo?

Yeah, I wanted to go back to the If you build a new structure, like an ADU, then everything applies. What if you, because this is any new construction or additions, so if I wanted to add a bedroom to my existing house, how would that calculation be made? Would that require me to now?

So it's just the addition part. So if you're just doing a bedroom within, like you're not even going to expand the walls? No, no, if I'm going to expand. If you're going to expand the walls, that portion of the structure that's been expanded would be subject to the home hardening requirements? Yeah, but not the entire structure.

I wouldn't. How would I do my five foot?

It would just be on that portion.

Just like a little one Audi?

Yes.

Does that help that house from being far safer?

It helps that portion.

Again, right, we're trying to be practical here. If we're making people do things that's not going to help, it makes no sense.

if i may i'm not talking about the stuff you got to do on the house itself but i'm talking about this five foot yeah our i mean the bigger goal is we get our firewise communities every neighbor every person wants to implement these codes voluntarily and just getting that idea that zero to five foot clean up the clutter i mean yeah that shows that one piece of the house but we're trying to get but it do that anyway.

I understand. I understand. But now we're mandating. We're not asking them to voluntarily do it, and we're adding costs. I will say that Maui Council, I called Maui and I asked, how come you guys didn't do this? You guys were the ones that got nailed with the fire, and it was the cost. And what they've done is they've created vegetation requirements.

So I will say that the Maui administration absolutely is pursuing a wildfire ordinance. It's in the works.

Yeah, well, the council got to pass it.

No, I mean, the council does have to pass it.

I'm just telling you what the legislative branch is telling me. And I believe Council Member Holland spoke to another council member, and they're just sharing the same concerns. Because every one of us is trying to put people in homes, and we're adding costs. Just wanted to put that out there. Voluntarily, yeah, education is key.

Council Member Cowne and then Council Member Howell. No, I think he was first.

Council Member Howell. Just to follow up on clarification again on the ADU part of it and explain it again.

So if it's a brand new ADU, it is subject to the home hardening and five foot hardscape requirements. If the ADU is attached to another structure, that portion of the ADU is subject to a home hardening and 5-foot hardscape. It is not subject to the 0-30-foot standards. It's not subject to that.

Council Member Canascio?

Yeah, just going back to that hardening around the house, like how do we get a better footing on the difference between these two. I mean, I think I got to go back to CAK and see where they got their estimates from. I mean, the numbers are so way off, you know.

I'm not saying that contractors aren't doing that. And I was mentioning to Lance that a couple months ago, my wife and I were putting in a backflow preventer, which is required. My first quote was $27,000. So my wife said, we're not getting a backflow preventer. And I said, well, let me get another quote. I got another quote. It was $3,000. We put the backflow in. I'm not saying contractors aren't out there quoting $40 per foot. But there are a number of contractors. And of the ones I contacted, not a single one came close to that number. And so I'm not saying. I'm not saying there might be quantification.

How much is concrete now? How much is per square foot? I know they go by yards or whatever, but what is a per square foot cost of concrete?

If I just wanted to buy concrete. Yeah, around $300 a cubic yard right now.

So what does that equate to a square foot?

Depends on the thickness of the sidewalk. If I recall correctly, looking at the numbers that was flashed up on the screen, I did a whole slab on grade price for the house that I did. And I came in at $45 a square foot for the entire house. For concrete? With concrete labor material. And I'm using union rates. And oftentimes, we use off-island contractors because we have labor shortages. And those guys come in at around $50 a square foot. So I was surprised to see $90 for concrete. And maybe there's certain assumptions being made by CEK that I'm not making.

Yeah, I don't know.

And that's probably what's going on. We have different baselines on how we're pricing things.

No, it could be exactly that, just the depth of how thick of the concrete. But I'm wondering if it's $40 a square foot. But that's not what you said earlier. It's $5, $6, $8. Concrete versus gravel.

So I think CKA had $90 a square foot for gravel in this testimony and $40 a square foot for gravel. And so I think what Unlimited is saying is that they're at about $45 to $50 for concrete, but they're at $5 a square foot for the ground floor.

For material and labor. Yeah.

Council Member Cotten?

Okay. Mine, if you don't mind pulling it, do you have the copy of the bill in front of you?

Yeah.

So I just have some... specific questions. So on page one, in the first paragraph, in the section one with the purpose, this purpose is in order to enhance public safety, reduce property loss, and protect lives from wildfire hazards. So enhance public safety. That would read to me that 201H does not apply, right? Because we don't care whether people are wealthy or working. I'll just separate it that way. 201H. Would any of this bill, 201H, would not, and for people who don't know what, why don't you say what 201H is really quick.

201H is a state process that is a vehicle for affordable housing to exempt out of county requirements, regulatory requirements.

So because this is public safety, it wouldn't exempt out of that, correct? This would apply to affordable housing as well as any housing because it's a safety issue?

Yes.

It would. OK. So I just wanted to know.

I'm sorry.

Yes, what? It would apply to on each project. OK.

Yeah, so 201H does not exempt that. So just wanting to be very clear, which means affordable housing has to be held to the same standard because we need to keep those people equally safe. That's the mindset on that.

Yeah, the mindset being that some of our most vulnerable communities also needs to be protected from wildfire impacts.

Correct. And then on page two, and I won't go through all of it, though I did go through all of it. On page two, in section A, general provisions, item one, all lands on which a residential structure is proposed to be constructed. And it breaks down these pieces. But all improvements to this article shall comply. So shall means it has to. And the interpretation is, interpretation of this article, all provisions shall. be considered as a minimum requirement. So that says anybody building a house, they shall, meaning they have to. It's mandatory. And I went through and went through all the different shalls in Mays. And there's a lot of shalls. I didn't count them all, but those shalls almost all apply to the land itself, the house builder. And then there's a lot of Mays. So I went through the maze. And the maze, which means they count and they count. It's up to whoever's in admin. The maze all were to the admin. So when I see these maze, I'm just wondering, if it's at the discretion of administration whether you have to comply or you don't have to comply, if you had a different fire chief or planning director, does that mean things would change?

I don't think so. I guess I'd ask, which maze are you referring to?

All right. Because there's a lot of maze in here. I'll find one here. Here is one. In consultation with the fire chief and where all respective property owners provide written consent, the planning director may reduce minimum distances between structures proposed on a property for shared wall construction. If the abutting walls are shared walls, the respective structures or structures are construed with non-combustible materials. Makes sense. You have a cinder block house. Maybe you don't have to stick with all of this. So it's may. It's up to you whether they do have to or they don't have to. But if they have non-combustible walls, there's less of this that applies.

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't have any objection to it. As long as all the property owners consent, I, as a sitting plan director right now, would have no objection to doing it. I mean, if there is a concern that that should be turned into a shell, I wouldn't have an objection to that either.

I'm not trying to put it into a shell. I'm just trying to point out the difference. Because it takes a lot of freedom away from the homeowners, though maybe not one by one house.

One person builds their house. Well, I would say, and some of the architects that we spoke to were actually excited about that option. Because right now, you cannot build to the property line. That's a new liberty. That actually provides more freedom and options to the property owner.

Right. And then I talked to property developers who felt like if they were forced into having to build Duplexes for their affordable homes that they probably wouldn't be able to sell them. I had that conversation also Because of the lot lot size there was definitely some friction on it. So I'm just looking at that and then I will look at the bottom of page 11. This is about the periodic review. It says, at least once a year following the effective date of this article or more frequently as deemed necessary for the planning director, county engineer, fire chief, planning director, county engineer, and fire chief shall review the requirements of this article in consultation with wildfire subject matter experts. So anyway, it has a one-year piece in there. I look at all these reports that we need to have, and it's curious to me that even when it's every 10 years or even every 20 years, we rarely get those reviews done in that time period. How likely do you think it is that we will keep reviewing this every year?

Well, for the building code section, that report is required to be given to the mayor. And then for the other sections, like chapter 8, that's required to be given to the planning commission.

I see that it's required. So is updating our general plan. So is updating our water use and development plan. So is so many of the reports that we're required to do, and they don't happen.

I can say the planning department is updating all of its plans and did update the general plan.

But how many years went in between? I mean, we've done it, I think, twice since we started, and it was supposed to be done every 10 years. So you did one of them. Thank you so much for doing an excellent job. But it doesn't always happen. Point well taken. My point is when we can't even usually get an every 10 year or every five year, when we say every year, and it's moving forward, we might really mean it right now. So I'm just looking at there's these flux pieces. And I will stop asking questions at the moment because I went through this whole thing and I had a number of things that I looked at.

Thank you.

Any additional questions, council members?

I don't have any questions. I know there are a few amendments, so.

Well, then before that, I have questions for water and housing.

Council Member Holland, do you have a question?

No, I was just going to mention that I think some of my suggested amendments will address what's being talked about right now.

I have one question, and then I'll go to Council Member Cowden. And actually, I just blanked out, so Council Member Cowden.

Well, that would take a change. I want water and housing.

So it looks like we have questions for our water department and housing department. Doing a switch.

Adam, are you able to come up?

Any questions?

My first question that I would like to do for Housing First and Water It's the same question. Can you please help us understand if this impacts any of your existing plans for how we're going to be doing our affordable housing on the properties that we have purchased and done? You've done a lot of work on having these houses. Will it create a redesign issue, or will it be fine?

Adam Roversi, housing director. So I think it depends on the stage of the project. So Lima Ola has received its permits already. So I think phase one is done. Phase two permits are pending. I think once the permits are issued, it's approved as is and would not need necessarily to comply. Our future projects, Kīlauea, Waimea, we have concept plans developed They're not approved in any way yet, but we've represented to the community. Those projects have generally sought to do small lot sizes so we can have lots of homes and keep them more affordable, do more houses on smaller lots, smaller homes. We haven't gotten to the point in those projects of designing exactly what the house is going to look like and the footprint of the house and how far away it is from other homes. So this bill will certainly add some cost to the homes with the different types of the mesh and the flashing and the different things, potentially with materials. However, I think that the May sections of the bill, I think, to my level of understanding, and I am not an expert on the language as much as you folks are, or Kaina and his consultants, but I think there's enough wiggle room that we can modify our designs of the homes, still keep them affordable and meet the distancing requirements, or through the May portions of the bill, seek reasonable accommodations that allow us to achieve our goals of small lots and high densities and still meet the general parameters of the wildfire bill. And I haven't seen the cost estimates the chair was sharing earlier. I was on my way in the door and just sort of caught it on the screen downstairs. But as far as the potential cost increases associated with the bill to affordable homes, my preliminary understanding, notwithstanding the new information that was shared, was that the increased costs in the current bill would be more than offset by the savings coming from no longer having to pay FRC charges, that the increased costs are less than the savings that would result. That was my preliminary understanding based on the information and projections that I'd seen so far.

So, and then, when you talked about, like, well, you already have your Lima Ola 1 permitted. If it wasn't permitted, would you have had to change those plans?

I think the single family homes at Lima Ola, I think, are too close together to meet the current requirements. So we would have had to have made some changes. We could have, I think, if I understand the bill correctly, we could have chosen different siding material. For example, had a metal roof instead of an asphalt shingle roof. And then we could have gotten exceptions for the 30 foot requirements. And we could have built them as we built them, but it would have required some different materials. and a process of consultation with the fire chief to come to an agreement that because we've used these fireproof, noncombustible materials, we can vary from the maximum setback distances. That's my understanding.

And it'll raise the price. OK, no problem. And I'm going to ask Water a few questions. And then I want to open it up for others. to ask questions.

Can I just follow up, please? Sure. Director Riversi, am I understanding that you support this bill, correct?

Yes. Yes, I do. I think it's important to protect from fires. I am not an expert on the bill. I have read through it. I think it's workable for our projects. I'll leave it at that.

And just one more on that. Related to density in areas like tsunami zones and all of our fire zones we should talk about in this case, without the exits and the concerns around density in areas associated with higher fire risk, do you feel like this makes it any more problematic for us in regards to public safety? Or do you feel that this bill addresses the safety needs of higher density or increasing density in areas to address the affordable housing?

So I will have to admit that I'm not clear on the access way requirements. So I'm not prepared to talk about that. OK.

Thank you.

All right.

Council Member Cowden.

Water Department. Director Tate. I would like to hear your perspective on this. I want to allow you to say what your thoughts are before I drill down on different questions.

Thank you, Council Member Cowden. Chair Boleson, I'd like to make a statement before I address any specific question. Thank you.

Go ahead. Thank you.

First of all, there is no perfect solution to this issue. We can talk six months in this room nonstop, and we're not going to have a perfect solution to this issue. The reason I state that is not the issue itself. Whether it's housing, development, business, schools, hospitals, playgrounds, whatever, everything in life starts with water. Unfortunately, we have not followed that model on the island of Hawaii. So I state that regretfully. I also state that because of what I've learned in the last four and a half years of what we're making up. So please let me continue. When I arrived on Kauai, I had my eyes opened to the little water infrastructure that exists here. What we have is a century-old system that was developed by plantation owners. private landowners, some by the Department of Water, some by people we don't even know. But the island was developed with various systems and forms of systems over the decades. And because of what I just said, it directly and daily impacts the ability of Chief Gibson. It's an emotional issue for me. To do his job. So because of that, we started our own planning process. After 35 years, we now have a water use development plan. Thank you to Michael and the engineering staff. That results in life for the island. We didn't have that before. We didn't have any guarantee of life before that. We still have shortages. We will have shortages for another 40, 50 years until our new water system investment plan is actually put in the ground. So that's just the facts of life here. I have to compliment the fire chief's success in doing the best he can with what he was dealt. I also thank the many councils over the decades that have gone through the struggle of everything you brought up. Nothing here is easy. It's our location. It's our lack of funding. The Water Department has not been sufficiently funded since its inception. Those are all facts. They're not my opinion. Those are facts. Having been in the water business for 45 years is all emotional to me. The scenario modeling by The group here, planning, housing, fire, water, council, elected, unelected officials, is admirable to be complimented, to be commended. And it results in, what do we do moving forward to best prepare? Unfortunately, that's where we get to bills like this one, because it's really a matter of opinion. It's not an agreeable. subject that we can all say, yep, we're 100% in favor of it. If you put the fire issue into context, you've got three subjects. You've got vulnerability. You've got that versus lost revenue of others, whether it's housing, water, or others. And then you have the worst of all, the loss of life. So to get to... Back to fire department, I commend Chief Gibson for the application of best practices to minimize the loss of life. Fire departments partnering with the Department of Water to locate hydrants, to mark hydrants so their new staff know where to address first rather than searching for when the fire flames are going on. We have worked hand in glove with fire to help them learn the system, the water system, the available areas, the non-available areas. Chief's been on the island long enough to know where those exist. Fire and water responders do their best job when resources are in place. Unfortunately, they are not. How much is a loss to the water department of FRC? is a relevant issue because of our financial situation. It's also an irrelevant issue compared to the loss of life, what that value of life is. On an annual basis, the Department of Water receives anywhere between $800,000 and $2 million in FRC. That's not all single family housing. Single-family housing last year is $1.1 million. Some would lead with the underlying question, is the loss of FRC greater than the loss of life? Of course not. There is no value cap on the loss of life. There is a value cap on everything the Water Department does based on what our costs are. Unfortunately for us, we have no power to eliminate legislation. We simply do what fire does, what police does, what water does. We adapt, we react, we overcome, and we continue to provide the service the best we can with what we're given. The same question you asked Adam, do we support the bill? We support any bill that helps minimize the loss of life. Unfortunately, We can only support that as far as our resources allow us.

So when we look at FRC, and I was in the water department meeting, I was kind of shocked and stunned when what I believe the subsidization of this effort is put on water by removing some of your income Is that something that the board can choose to undo? Like when we pass this bill, is it already passed? I was sitting there, I was listening.

Well, our board has passed it in the current form that it's in. That's all they had to go off at the time. Staff was not, we didn't have the ability to research or do any kind of preparation. We were That was put on the agenda, and the board voted on it. We would react a different way if we said we were flush with money. But unfortunately, we're just the opposite, right? We have been never in a financial situation. As far as I can go back in records, the water department has never been adequately funded. And that means the fire department has never been adequately protected. So I'll keep reiterating that. That's really the bottom line for us.

So when I look into that, when we look at fire flow protection, I would say it is inadequate by probably 30% of the island. Is that a close guess?

Well, that's a Chief Gibson question. The water department, when I got here, it had been 35 years since we did a water use plan. They're required by the state. Every five years, Michael? We had been 35 years. It has been documented and proven through that water use development plan. The island of Kauai will never be without water. It doesn't matter what you want to measure that with. We're one of the top two or three wettest spots on the planet. We will always have an abundance of water. What we don't have is a system to deliver it, and that's a funding issue on the water side. That then directly impacts Fire's ability to put fires out tip to tip, side to side, we can't do that right now.

So does the water department know, or is it the fire department's question? There are many places like Powerhouse Road in Wainiha. There's about, I can think of about five or six roads in Kilauea. There is roads in Hanalei that don't even have a standpipe. There was a standpipe at the highway. There might be many houses up. Certainly, I think Waimea Canyon has that problem. Hanapepe does have some features up there. Who's responsible for putting those in? Is water? I mean, you must be somewhat responsible, because you guys got to provide the water. Who determines when those pipes go in?

Funding?

funding, but who makes the decision? The fire or is it water?

Sorry, just to clarify, this is for this related bill. It is related. So you're asking based on new development in these areas that would be affected by this bill?

I would say, if I were to clarify your clarifying, is that we have an existing water shortage, water deliverable shortage. So when we have deliverable water shortages, say in Kīlauea, because that's where I live, we have a shortage of water, correct? So he's nodding his head yes for the record. So when we have a water shortage when we're building new places, In any of these places, they wouldn't get their, I don't know if they can get their fire protection. Can you put a new hydrant in areas that have water shortage?

We have not practiced that. We have not been putting fire hydrants anywhere where we're not allowing residential. The man to my left here would be really happy.

OK.

The man to my left would be very happy if we had a tremendous amount of funding because he'd have a tremendous amount of housing. We just don't have it. The guy sitting behind me would be fantastically happy if we had 200 more hydrants. We don't have it because the system will not provide it because the funding for the system has never been there. So when we came up with the water use development plan, we followed that with a water system investment plan, as I called the ones that I did on the mainland. We now have a water system investment plan. Many of you have seen it. It's about $1.3 billion in today's numbers. By the time that system goes in, it'll be $3 or $4 billion total. We're now just finishing our first in 13 years rate approval approval process We're down yesterday. We had a public hearing we had one person show up Virtually no one show up in person. We've been out in the public for 22 meetings 23 meetings, so We have one step left to go to the state small business regional review board They unanimously gave us approval a month ago. We have to go back now that the public hearing is over and we expect adoption and But again, that's 13 years old. So when you combine all of those things, the questions you're asking, Council Member Cowden, all relate to that.

Bottom line, we don't have the money to have the water to be doing any of it. That's the bottom line.

Which then affects Adam and Chief Gibson and everyone else.

So another thing that came up excellently in our presentation two weeks ago, when we talked about particularly the fire flow problem in Los Angeles, but I believe it was also the problem in Lahaina, although maybe that fire just happened so fast nobody even got to notice, there wasn't any water in the hydrants anyway because it was combined pipes. Is that correct?

I can't comment on what pipes had water in them and what pipes didn't. I just know that my colleague on Maui, who is also from the mainland, inherited a lot of the same things I inherited.

I'm not putting blame anywhere. What are our pipes made of, and are both water systems, fire flow and housing, they're integrated, right? So if the house burns down, the pipes melt.

Yeah, I can have Michael address the various types of pipe we have and what that integration looks like, because we do have different types of pipe in the same systems.

So just to clarify, this is in regards to the bill, so there would be meaning for any new development. Is that correct?

No, it's all in the written.

I just want to make sure it's relatable so that way we can stay.

This is relatable to the bill, because this bill is about how do we set a template for fire protection and fire defensible spaces. You know, it's really important, you know, what happens. So similar to like when the hot wind goes, does it dry up all the leaves? Yes, maybe. How fast is the wind? Is there any water in the pipes? That's a big part of what happens when we talk about conflagration, which is what this bill is about, stopping conflagration of neighborhoods.

Do you want us to address the pipe types?

I want to know if the pipes will melt, if the houses burn.

That all depends on the depth of the pipe and the type of pipe.

And have we ever had, I don't know if this is a Michael question, have we had houses burn? Because we've had a lot of houses burn lately. Does it melt the pipes to any way that it's having water leakage? We've had a number of houses just like in Kapaa. Do we have the water leakage as a result of the house burning down? I just wonder how big of a problem it is.

Mike Ohinozumi, Executive Engineer, Department of Water. Council Member Kaneshiro?

This is just clarification to Council Member Cowden on the questioning. As far as fighting a fire or when there's a fire occurring, I think there's multiple options. Ideally, if we had all the water in the world, we would dump water on the fire and it would solve it. But this bill is going to protect the house on the front end so that it doesn't actually catch on fire, so that we don't have to put the water on. So I'm trying to put together the two with the pipes burning and there's no water. That brings us right back to the bill where we're saying we're trying to protect the house in the first place so that if there is a fire, these things will, it won't 100% not have the house burn, but it will protect the house. more so than if they didn't implement these.

Thank you for that question. And so I think it was both Councilmember Kagawa and Chair Ufaro who used to say ready, fire, aim. And I think that what Director Tate is kind of stating is how critical the problem is with water in general. And when I think about creating hardscapes so that we have defensible neighborhoods, how we make that work, we have to look at everything. So I think this is a really good building block, but it needs the support of access roads to get out of that neighborhood and water fire hydrants to be able to put the fire out. And a wetscape. It doesn't burn as easily and just doesn't start as easily. There's multiple pieces in it. And this bill has done a really good job of just looking, OK, right here at this house or this little neighborhood, what can we do? And I think it's looking with one objective, but I think it misses some really key points. So I don't think it's ready yet. And I appreciate how everybody said this is a great effort, and it's a great program. And just to cement it in right now when we have all this change of administration and it's not really ready yet, I think it's a problem. I think it'll create problems. It might help some. It'll create others.

Any additional questions for Adam or Joe?

Do you want me to respond to Errol's question? So one part of Errol's question triggered in my mind a group that's not here, but is just as critical as fire and water, and that's the power side. So the water department has spots on the island where we are the only customer for KIUC in a certain area. So when that area goes out, water goes out. So we may have plenty of water in the pipes, but we don't have power. So it's not always just confined to a water restriction in a certain geographical area. When we have plenty of water in a pipe and in a well, and the power's out, and we're the only customer for KIUC and the only provider to the public in that area, everybody loses. And so it's not just water and fire. You've got to include power in all of that island wide, because any time they're down, we're down. And we just went through it three weeks ago with the storms where we had multiple geographical areas of the island down with no water, but we had water. We just couldn't deliver it.

Thank you. I just have one follow-up. Thank you, Joe, for your statement. Appreciate it. And just to clarify regarding to this WUI bill and what the water department board passed, just so the public can understand, if this WUI bill pass, what would happen when people apply for their FRC?

Yeah, as I understand it, and Kiana can come up and join us, because I think that's the process side of where all this starts. Remember, in the process train, we're the tail of the dog, and they're the head of the dog. So we get it last, which We've had some good discussions with planning and our board on should we be last or should we be first. But that's here or there. But at the same time, my assumption, and it can come up and hit me on the back of the head since he's one of my bosses on the board, it would start with planning. They would make a determination if the proposed residence meets the requirements of the bill. And it would be at their discretion whether they apply a waiver. And then the water department would not receive that FRC funding. That's the way I understand it. And maybe I oversimplified it, but that's the way I understand it.

Any additional questions for Adam or Joe? Any additional questions for the administration? I know we have, we're going to have...

I have another question for Kaia.

Sure.

Let's swap out the 1998 Dream Team here.

As... 2-29-98.

For Bill 2-998, yes. And council members and... Just know that we're about half an hour away from caption break, so I just want to just put a timestamp there.

Thank you, and thank you guys again for being here. I know Ms. Cowden alluded to the amount of the maze that are in here, and I think Adam called it the wiggle room. Do you know offhand how many, I guess, variances or exemptions can be granted with this bill as it's written and for what? I was trying to skim through right now. I just did not take notice of that.

There's exceptions in the building section, which is using combustible material and how that's done. And that's essentially where the flashing is. The exceptions in the zoning code there's one or two, the most important one that everybody seems to be paying attention to is the setback exemption. Being able to, for new subdivisions, be able to reduce those larger setbacks. We do have a draft amendment to introduce to further clarify that so that through the 201H process or through the PDU process, those setbacks could also be reduced.

Would be what?

Could also be reduced.

Yeah, and I, okay. And I think because what Joe said about The loss to the water department is irrelevant when you're comparing that towards the loss of life. So wouldn't you agree that if this bill is for safety, then there should be no exemptions?

Well, it's not an exemption carte blanche of like, oh, you are exempting out from the setbacks. It's an exception to say further designs can accommodate wildfire resiliency. As we kind of presented two weeks ago, when you have a 10,000-square-foot lot, 6,000-square-foot lot, 4,500-square-foot lot, we made the analysis to show all of these lots can accommodate the setbacks. There's not really necessarily a need to exempt or veer out or reduce them. Now in places where you're going to apply for a 3,000-square-foot lot, a 3,000-square-foot lot is not permissible under county code. But you can apply for a project development use permit And that allows you to vary from the standards of the size of the lot. And so in these smaller lots that would not be able to meet those more robust setbacks, in that scenario, you can look at other design standards, or materials, or a combination of both to be reviewed to ensure wildfire resiliency is still addressed. Thank you.

I have a follow up on that.

Council Member Itade.

take that money from somewhere else than take it away from the water department? To me, it's like slapping the victim. Can't we take it when we have $39 million of our housing revolving fund, when we have this money that we got from taxing the visitors. You know, we have other monies that we could do so we don't have to take it from the water department. I mean, to me, it seems like a real problem to take the money from the water department when that is a really critical element. It seems like we should be, in fact, putting more money into that so that we can have more housing.

I understand the concern.

OK.

I've got to follow up on that. I'm sorry?

It's a policy decision.

Yeah, it is a policy decision. But I'm just curious as to the rationale. Assuming that, and I said this at the last meeting, assuming that the added cost to this house is going to be $6,000, why are we taking away $14,000 from water to accommodate that additional cost? That is a question. I mean, where did that come from? Who said, let's waive FRCs so we can basically soften the blow to the homeowner of $6,000, but at the same time, we're diverting $14,000 from the water department? I mean, you guys think about like a... an exemption of the amount that they spent or a percentage of the FRC, but we just said, no, we give up the FRC, 14 grand, for what someone will pay $6,000. What was the rationale for that?

Well, it was $6,000. So it depends on the size of the house, right? Under the limited analysis.

Well, let's just use the thousands, because that's what you guys are using. So let's stay with the $6,000, because that, to me, makes it sellable to this council, because it's only $6,000. So let's use $6,000. But we're taking $14,000 from water. What was the rationale for that?

Well, one, there being a nexus between water and also the ability to exempt it out. Also, too, I can say as a water board member, I have been increasingly frustrated in the application of a $14,000 FRC across the board for all homes. And I've expressed that frustration a number of times publicly on the water board and the notion that, A 500 square foot house pays the same FRC as a 20,000 square foot mansion with swimming pools. And so when the water department gets into its portion of what it does with FRCs, My position is that we need to have further studies to get into the legal analysis of how certain uses can be charged higher FRCs, i.e. resort uses or vacation rental uses.

And I'm not going to disagree with that. I'm just saying that that's kind of irrelevant right now because the decision was made to take the FRC away so we can accommodate this. I mean, there's no nexus. I mean, there is a nexus to the water department, but I don't see the... It doesn't balance out. I mean, even if it was $10,000 in additional costs for a little larger house, you're still taking $14,000 away. And the last discussion, Mr. Tate up here, and thank you for that amazing statement. I think you open up a lot of people's eyes. We are taking from the agency that needs our help. That is the critical component of the fire department's operations. I think he made it very clear. So why would we take from that agency and not, like Felicia said, maybe the housing? I'm not sure where you get that money. It's a subsidy. And some people disagree with that. But it is a subsidy. Because taxpayers are going to pay for that somewhere else. So I'm just curious, what was the rationale that the administration had to do that?

Well, again, it is a subsidy. And within the current water structure, There's another group that gets subsidized already, and that's agricultural water rates. That's a policy the Water Board has made saying, we need to help farmers. In a housing crisis where the FRC does make an impact, it was also now saying, we're going to subsidize it. Granted, it has to be paid through another mechanism. And that's why I'm saying, when we go through the FRC analysis as a Water Board on increasing FRCs, because that's also on the books. Right on the books right now is like, Draft proposal, $20,000, FRC, across the board. My position is 14 is hard enough. Now 28? And I made it very public that I want the consultant to do the study to assess the legal capabilities to look at uses as opposed to across the board, 5-inch meter, RESIDENTIALS, VACATION RENTALS.

I UNDERSTAND, BUT THAT'S A DIFFERENT DISCUSSION. THIS BILL HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS BILL. BECAUSE I AGREE WITH YOU. I AGREE. BUT I'M JUST CURIOUS AS TO WHERE THAT CAME FROM. LET'S JUST GO TAKE FRC. IS THAT GOING TO BE THE NEXT SLUSH FUND FOR THE COUNTY? WE'LL WAVE YOUR FRC. IF YOU HURRICANE PROOF YOUR HOUSE, YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO FRC. THAT IS NOT A POOL OF FUNDS THAT WE SHOULD BE USING to incentivize behavior. I'm going to have a rough time supporting this bill. Again, going on the $6 a square foot figure, that won't impact, in my opinion, someone's ability to get a mortgage. So they don't, in my opinion, warrant a $14,000 discount. That's just my one council member opinion.

Another question. I want to talk about enforcement. So first of all, I want to just let you speak on how you think this would end up being enforced. And then I have some specific questions.

The construction aspect is basically enforced during construction. Outside of that, there's no real enforcement because that was built in and got a certificate of occupancy that determines that all the home parks and apartments are in place.

So does that mean you aren't enforcing on all these other shells, like all these shells about how people might build their plants or do their landscaping with their leaves in the gutters? Are we going to go around and look at everybody's houses and give them a notice of violation of $10,000 per day per violation if they don't cut their avocado tree down or something like that?

No. The requirements for the landscaping and maintenance aspects are only for the larger subdivisions. They're not for the individual lots. And those larger subdivisions, it's fairly standard to have subdivision conditions of approval around landscaping. It just isn't standard right now to have wildfire resiliency built into it.

So again, just being really clear on that, because I know that enforcement is complaint driven. And so a lot of times when I bring up these, really painful stories is that somebody has a beef with somebody else, and so they file complaints about them, and then they go through something that could potentially cost their house. So when there is all these shells on gutters, these things, leaves in the gutters, leaves under the trees, This would only be enforceable when you drive through a big subdivision and it's the common area. It wouldn't be people that somebody could file a complaint on somebody's yard. And then they say, yeah, there is some leaves under the trees.

The way that the bill is set up is that the enforcement isn't with the individual homeowner for these larger subdivisions. It's with the homeowners association.

The homeowners association would be the one looking at that?

Yeah.

Okay. Councilor Kuali'i?

So kind of. I mean, we do FRC waivers or exemptions for certain affordable housing projects and other projects, right?

I mean, that's a reduction.

That's a reduction then. So in essence, to address Chair's concern, if the amount you were trying to offset was $6,000, instead of doing a full exemption of the $14,000, you could do a half exemption.

The water board could entertain that.

Oh, the water board could entertain that.

Yeah, it's ultimately up to the water board on that.

So, I mean, and I think what you were saying is relevant because if there was already a tiered structure and you could differentiate between the lowest small affordable home that you're trying to build in a subdivision or whatever versus the McMansions or whatever, and so the fact that they all pay the same rate currently. I hope that changes in the future, too. But if it does change, then having that lower amount could be more palatable, if you will, as far as a FRC discount or exemption. Yeah? Thank you.

Just following up on that, would that be feasible to be able to calculate the cost of each home based upon the difference of the WUE codes and then only exempt for that amount? Or would that just be nearly? We could look into it. I mean, it seems like that would be like, I don't understand enough about how you guys' internal process works. But it seems like you'd have to calculate that per individual project and calculate every cost additional that would have come in due to WUI?

So the building permit process has a calculation just based off of square footage. That calculation doesn't necessarily reflect the accurate amount of what's being put into it, because if you build a house with cedar versus teak, the calculation is specifically set up for square footage. And that would be a potential scenario, I think.

I just want to go back to the conversation from last meeting regarding garage conversion ADUs and just really getting back to clarifying that it's only for the area that is being affected. Can you share? If this passes, say, somebody in Monacoa converting their garage, what would be required of them?

As long as they're not expanding the footprint, they're not going to have any requirements.

So no requirements for a garage conversion? No. So it's only extending the footprint. Thank you.

This question is not really from me, but from the letters that we received. So I just want to hear your thoughts framework on it, and I will caveat by saying Joe Tate's piece that lives are worth more than money. But something that has been asked of us, comments have come to us, that they feel this concrete around the house and a little bit more of a hardscape rather than a soft greenscape will reduce the assessed value of the houses. Can you comment on that? Like people don't want them as much. They're in the business. They're not worth as much as what is being suggested. Not as sellable. How do you feel about that? Like lowering the value of the houses?

I mean, I don't have to say my grandmother's Japanese rock garden she had around her house. I don't think of a high value. Sorry, I can't really pull on that.

Okay, you can't respond on that.

All right. But you know when we were talking about those numbers before and it was concrete versus aggregate, there are other machinations, if you will, like some concrete and some gravel that you could do in combination that would perhaps cost more than one but less than the other, all of the other. And in fact, while this is only regarding new construction, if somebody with an existing home wanted to do something themselves, they could do it relatively inexpensively. They could go to Home Depot and get those concrete stepping stones. They could fill them all in and then cover it with gravel. I mean, it would meet your requirements for fire safety, right?

Yeah. Home Depot's gravel. You try to get 13 tons of gravel from Home Depot, it's going to be expensive. But there's other vendors.

I mean, maybe use more of those concrete blocks. And they go on sale. I mean, I've gotten them pretty inexpensively. I'm thinking of doing it.

And since it's a public document, I'll put the small plug that for existing homeowners, again, this is not a recommendation. The county of Kuwait does have a partnership between the fire department and fire department, whereby we're doing home assessments for homeowners, voluntary, that can give strategic tips on how you can harden your home, voluntarily.

Community members, we're about 15 minutes away to our caption break. I'd like to actually take the caption break now, if you don't have any more additional questions for admin, so that when we come back from caption break, we can go to our, if there is any amendments, and then after the amendments, go to public testimony, so at least the public can comment both on the amendments and the actual bill. Any additional questions before the caption break? We'll take a caption break for 10 minutes. All right, I'd like to call the planning committee back to order. We're going to start off with if there's any amendments, and then we'll do public testimony after the amendments.

I move to amend as circulated.

Second.

Right here.

All right. So we have a floor amendment, and it was moved and seconded by Council Member Cavallo and Council Member Cowden. And then it looks like it's just more housekeeping. I'd like to suspend the rules. Director Hall, would you like to speak on this? And if there's any questions from council members regarding the amendment...

Apologies, Chair. Is this the by request amendment?

By request amendment through Council Member Cotton. I mean, Council Member Calvario.

Most of it's just really housekeeping. The first one is the image was slightly off. And then there was clarification on the floorboards and in a deck. Clarification that the wall intersection and post-intersection don't have to be the same. And then the last one, there already was the setback reduction in there. We're proposing adjusting it so that It's explicitly in the ordinance concerning beyond just the structure-to-structure setback, but the property line setback can be reduced.

Questions for...

So this is just omissions that your team found.

Yeah, and there was the last one for the setbacks. You know, I had discussions with some developers, housing director, Reversi, and while they acknowledged that there were setback provision reductions in there, that it might be better to tighten it up to explicitly call out that the setback lines from the property line could be reduced.

Which section is that in right here on the setback?

Page 3, subsection E at the bottom.

In consultation with the fire chief, these setback distances may, that's one of these, may be reduced if the exterior walls of the proposed structure are constructed with noncombustible material or the proposed lots incorporate adequate wildfire designs. So that means it's a cinder block or it's those hardened wood. So... How much is that likely to be? How much distance?

I'm not saying you would consult on the design. So you'd be reducing the setbacks through various design standards. And it could go as much as 10 feet back to the standard.

Back to 5.

10 to the building, 5 to the property.

10 to the building.

5 to the property line.

So that means if there's an eave or something like that that's between the building and the property line. When you say 10 to the building, 5 to the property line.

Standard setback is 10 foot between buildings, 5 foot to the property line for rear and side, and 5 to 10 on the front.

As opposed to 50.

Yeah.

And it doesn't give those numbers here, but that's what it would be without giving the numbers.

Yeah, I wouldn't be able to veer beyond that minimum, I already said.

Any additional questions on the amendment, Council Member Concio?

Yeah, for the stairs, they got rid of the screen mesh. And I was reading, you can only get rid of the screen mesh if it's built with ignition-resistant material, or?

There's other material that's part of them, like hardwoods as well.

So even if it's hardwoods, you don't need, if it's just hardwoods, which most stairs are, it doesn't need anything underneath.

It can be open there. Why is that? So if it's post and pier less than four feet, the screen would still be around the house. And so between the stair and the post and pier mesh that's around the house, there should be no problem as far as ember intrusion under the house if it's slab on grade. Thank you.

And the possibility of the stairs catching on fire and then catching the walls on fire is not as...

It's not as severe. When we had our wildfire science folks at US Fire Alliance, Doki Solutions, and Underwriters Laboratory assess that, the science doesn't indicate that the stairs are a particularly vulnerable point.

But the ember could still get under that stairs, right?

Yeah, but as far as from a wind-driven event, it has less exposure area, at least my understanding.

I'm just trying to visualize what's the difference between a house and a stair as it relates to embers.

Yes, when you have a whole house, and same thing with the posts and why the posts are removed, is that It's the constant accumulation of embers in a particular pocket, particularly those perpendicular areas between a wall and the deck. And so there's a clear need for a noncombustible strip of six inches at that intersection. In discussions with Doki Solutions and US Fire Alliance, their point is in high wind situations, it's going to keep on pushing those embers off of that stair. And then it should be hitting either wall side and dropping down to the base, where it's going to have that flashing, or concrete for a slab on great houses, or it's going to be prevented from going under through the mesh. Does that, Chief, I'm looking at you.

Any additional questions for the amendment? While the rules are suspended, I'll take public testimony for the amendment. Any public testimony? Come on up.

Good morning, everyone. Tommy Passarella here, Kawhi Lahui. I'm going to read something real quick. Excuse me. Does anyone know the oath of office that you guys took when you became county council people? Can anyone pull that up?

We have to swear to uphold the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Hawaii, the Charter of the County of Kauai, and all the laws there within.

Does anyone else know that by heart? No? You guys take an oath of office to do exactly what she said? I don't know, this 35 page, does the person and the director of that department take an oath of office to do that? Well, I'll tell you right now, this is a violation of everything that you guys stand for, life, liberty, and property. Is that the 14th Amendment, I believe? Who is the government to tell you how to build something? If you guys want safe zones, then put safe zones that can protect somebody from fires in every strategic location of this island. We don't have enough water. No, we have plenty of water, obviously, but we don't have the infrastructure to take things and make them work properly. So water goes downhill, the same as H-H-I-T. It flows downhill. Now, I didn't mean to say that as a derogatory. You guys and ladies take your job very seriously. I don't know how many hours you average a week, But I highly recommend four-year term limits. And Mel told me he agrees to that when I talked to him at at the end of that meeting. That question didn't even make it through KKCR with Radio Annie to the front of that room. Now, you guys take that oath of office very seriously. This 35 pages, I don't know who, if AI wrote this. I don't know who wrote it. But we don't need a 35 page recommendation when we don't even have fire extinguishers in most of our properties. Most people don't even have alarm systems in their houses for burglary, for fire, that could go right to the police department and fire departments. So part of an issue with fires is the proper notification that something bad has happened. Maui dropped the ball in a huge way. And all these fires on the mainland, please do your research. These are not natural occurrences. There's arsons involved. There's land grabs involved. And I don't know who did the investigation for the Maui called wildfires. Why did we call them wildfires? That's another term that needs to be looked into. We are not told the truth about certain events, and Maui wildfires is one of them. So I highly recommend that this thing gets thrown in the trash. We shred it and start off. saying she kind of agrees with me. I say shred this bill and start from scratch, because whoever came out with it, we need a new bus director too. I don't mean to keep bringing it up. She laughed at me yesterday on the phone twice. Thank you. Thank you.

Anyone else wishing to testify on the amendment?

Good morning, council members. I'm Melanie Pimentel, executive director at Hawaii Habitat for Humanity. And this is Donna Rice, the president of our board of directors at Habitat. And we're here today just to underscore our support of the bill as currently amended. We wanted to commend the council and especially the administration for coming to us to work out solutions in considering considering these changes for our community and what really might make things affordable or unaffordable, especially for a program like ours that works with the lowest, the low income and the very low income in our community. That's the 80% AMI and below. We put in a number of hours and work to achieve what you see there in front of you in the attachment to our letter testimony. And we're satisfied with the bill as it is. One of the things that made this definitely acceptable and the numbers work out in our favor was the ability to waive the FRC charges. Now, of course, as an affordable developer, we are able to have exemptions along the way in certain county requirements like the FRC already. So that's always been a help for us. And again, in looking at these considerations that will be further help to ensure that the population that we serve continues to qualify for the affordable loans they need to meet the costs of construction and development.

Donna, did you have anything you wanted to share? Right here.

Again, Donna Rice, president of Habitat. Just to emphasize the ability to build safe homes for this lower end group is very important. Many of the homes, as you know, we've been building on the west side, which has a higher fire hazard, even though we're going to be building all over the island going into the future. But to be able to have a home that we know that is going to last a long time with construction, not only with the environment, but for fire protection, but also be a lower cost to the homeowners in the long run. Because if we can build homes that have fire preventive materials, it is going to lower the cost of their insurance. The slight increase in the built materials we're able to absorb and be able to still pass on a low income home for them, one that they can afford, one that they can be able to to obtain a mortgage. And so we feel good with the bill and the amendments that are being presented to you today.

Before we end up tying here, I did just want to share that my colleague in Maui at the Maui Habitat for Humanity has been through this, obviously. The value in this bill kind of sits heavy on my shoulders as a nonprofit leader, as a nonprofit builder and developer. Maui Habitat lost in 2023 during the fires eight homes out of their subdivision, completely burned to the ground. And we're fortunate where their homeowners were well insured with some gaps. But this is, you know, it's, I think we're all concerned with safety in our communities with the ever-changing environment and other pressing needs that kind of weigh on our costs and other considerations. So I urge you folks to consider passing this bill as amended and really commend you for your deep thoughts and consideration on this. Thank you.

Any additional testimony on the amendment?

On just the amendment? The amendment.

Just the amendment. Just the amendment.

Just the amendment.

You can make suggestions to the amendment, the existing amendment, yes.

Start with your name and push the button.

Brian Bowers. I'm the president of Artistic Builders Corporation. Just a little background. I grew up in Maui, so I'm very sensitive to the Maui fires. In Kihei, I spent a lot of time in Lahaina, built all over Maui, Hawaii, Oahu, Big Island. So I've done a lot of building. I'm very sensitive to the fire situation. We were building in Lahaina when the fire hit. We ended up being part of the Kapalua Temporary Housing Project. I don't know if you've heard about that one. We did 50 homes in less than six months, and the majority were done before the one-year anniversary. We were flying a lot of guys here from Kauai over to Maui to help with the workforce. And so trying to make the best of a bad situation, right? A couple of concerns that I had, you know, I think in principle, I like what we're trying to do, right? We're trying to keep people safe, right? That's the lives and, you know, it's most important. And Kanina and Alicia were very great. I had some concerns. I went and talked to them and they were very helpful in talking through it. So I really do appreciate the time. Just some of the concerns, you know, from a building standpoint, the setbacks, right? If you have a 45-foot house, you do. 15 feet on each side, that house gets really, really narrow. Then there's a 15-foot house. If you've got 15 on one side, this is 15 feet. So just a concern. And we talked through the zero lot line provision. I think that's really interesting, because we built a project in Paia where it had to share garages in the zero lot line. And it turned out to be a really nice project. It sold out really fast. is right there in Paia town. So I think that can help with that. But then you have to have the whole subdivision basically designed with that idea in mind. If you don't do that, then we talked about how, well, if one neighbor says you have to get the two to agree, well, then if you're one neighbor, why would you agree? And you both have to agree that that's going to be your house. Because if I build a zero lot line, then all of a sudden you've got to be 30 feet away. Then that next lot is not usable, right? if it's like a 30 or 40 foot lot and then you got to go 15 feet or 30 feet. So it makes sense for like the master plan communities. Like if your habitat and you're planning out your subdivision and you're going to build the houses, but those subdivisions that you sell the lots to homeowners that want to build the house, I think that makes it pretty tough. Um, the only amendment suggestion I'd have is maybe a little clear on the wording for like the variations. Cause I think, The variations, if you leave it at discretion of the fire marshal, I think us as developers and builders, we just like clear direction. It'd be nice to just know, okay, if you do this, this, and this, then you can be X amount of feet from the barrier. I think that's one thing. Lahaina, the big thing I don't think that we're addressing is, Lahaina fire is the big fires coming from the vacant lands.

Sorry to interrupt, Bob. We have just a timer here. If there's no additional... people looking to testify, you can have an additional three minutes. Is there anyone else wishing to testify for the first time? Sorry, I'll bring you back for another three minutes. Go ahead.

Good morning, Chair Bell-San. Good morning, council members. Elena Oakman here. I'm grateful that we're having this discussion today because there have been so many, many questions that have been felt like unanswered, unclarified. And what we've been discussing here with the building costs, that increase of the building costs, and also we don't have enough housing on Kauai, and it will definitely affect especially low-income people who will be building homes. And for the clarification of the five feet around the house in open zones, would it affect the square footage of how much usable space? Because it's 10% in open zones. So would it be in effect on this five feet around the house? How would it affect in this situation? And I want to mention that in the discussion like this, I think we could have had KAUC. We had water department, but we didn't have KAUC here to discuss how much hazard could be done by the fire. Well, I will add on more when we talk about the bill, but this is it. Thank you. Thank you.

Any more testimony on just the amendment, the current amendment that we have With the housekeeping proposals. Does Brian want to come back up? Go ahead. Come on up. And then you want to press?

OK. A couple of quick things. The biggest thing from the Lahaina fire and why Commandment is paying $800 million was the vacant land, not having the proper breaks between the vacant land. I think the subdivisions do a pretty good job of mowing the subdivisions. We have fire hydrants in subdivisions. Subdivisions between houses, I think there definitely are problems. But I don't know if they're as big as the problems, because once the fire's huge, and then it hits a subdivision. Plus, the building standards are much better. The part that burned down behind is a lot of the older single wall construction. If you're familiar with that, it's just all wood, really old wood. Versus nowadays, we have better products. We have drywall. There's just a lot of better products out there. So just a couple of things, I think. And then the five foot, I see a lot of three foot Separations, no plants around the houses. Like the planter strip, I think it does preserve the houses, not to have plants and different things built up against the house. You see a lot of dry rot and different things. But I don't know if five foot's the right number, because then you start taking away the beauty of it around the lot. So just a couple of suggestions.

Thank you. Any more testimony on the amendment? Oh, go ahead. This is follow up for this amendment.

Yes. So I did a little research. Norway, Denmark, and the United Kingdom rank among the best countries for residential fire prevention due to the strict building codes, mandatory smoke alarms, and resilient construction. Countries and practices, Norway, the Nordic countries consistently rank at the top of global fire safety resilience They enforce mandatory smoke alarms, laws on all residential housing, and maintain rigorous public awareness campaigns like the Nordic Smoke Alarm. Somebody's making money off that. The UK implements strictly regulated billing codes covering materials use, cavity fire barriers, and stringent fire retardancy standards for household furniture and electrical systems. Germany's nations mandate smoke alarms in private residences and rely heavily on noncombustible primary building materials like stone, brick, rather than light timber framing. Key prevention factors, mandatory detectives with lowest risk enforce laws requiring interconnected smoke alarms inside every bedroom, outside sleeping areas, and on every level, building materials. European nations generally utilize masonry and concrete construction which naturally limits the spread to wood frame housing, electrical and furniture standards, strict regional regulations regarding grounded electrical plugs and fire retardant furnishings, greatly reduced ignition sources. If you'd like them, well, this is some. If you want more details, I'll send that to the county council. This is what I found yesterday at the health department. This is a separate issue. We're still poisoning our cakey.

Thank you, Tommy. You can send that over. You'll look into that?

So I still have more time, correct?

Yeah, you have time for testimony on this amendment.

So what causes problems? Are we looking to prevent property damage or prevent lives being damaged? So one of the things that causes a lot of property damage is water damage. So there's got to be healthier ways of dealing with fires, such as vacuums. So we should look into technology that doesn't result in the damaging of that property. Like, WB's had a fire. They've been shut down for a while. I don't know what type of fire suppression system they had at their place. But we should look into all the different fires that have occurred on Kauai the last 10 years and say, what could have saved this versus that? And we really need to do our research before we pass a 35-page bill. Thank you.

Thank you. Any more additional testimony on the amendment since the rules are still suspended? I do want to ask Director Hall. Yeah, thank you director.

I was just hoping you could talk a little bit about the testimony we just received related to Setback and and try to address some of the concerns that were specifically brought up by the testifier Yes, the setbacks again are only for vacant lots and larger subdivisions Ten or more units those are generally

subject to requirements in the subdivision for landscaping already, and going through that master planning process. The provision that was specifically ramped up is saying that the lot line can be reduced in scenarios where all the property owners agree. Candidly, that will rarely happen. You're not going to get both property owners in an existing situation that are going to say, yeah, you can build up the property line, and I'll build next to you. That's rarely going to happen. But being that it's provided as an opportunity in future subdivisions, we want to say, if this scenario happens off our existing lots, and all the property owners agree, we want to provide that stuff out as well.

So when he's talking about 15 feet on either side and a 40-foot house, I think was the number that you were talking about. Yeah, so can you address that?

Yeah, so to go... Director, just to make sure that we're tying this in with the amendment.

Yeah, it's in the amendment for the record reduction. Rarely would you have a lot 45 feet, sorry, would you have a lot 45 foot wide. We did an analysis for 4,500 square foot lots currently existing, and those were 55 feet by about 79 or 80 feet. So the 15 foot setback would provide for 30 foot width wide homes. And again, there's provisions to reduce that setback.

OK, so there's provisions that would be able to allow for a house on a smaller parcel such as that to potentially have a change to the setback to accommodate for that.

Correct. And sorry, just to be clear, the example I just gave with the 55-foot width, that was the smallest lot permissible in the county code right now, which is 4,500 square feet. That's 6,000 feet, which is 6,000 to 10,000, the standard lot. And those can be... As we demonstrated in the handout, those can clearly accommodate the setbacks. But again, there is that the amendment is to allow for reduction with consultation by our chief on different designs.

Thank you very much. Any additional questions for the amendment for admin? Council Member Cowden.

The same testifier, Brian, raised a good point about making... that the maize and the discretionary elements have some sort of predictable element in there. Is that something that we can consider? What tends to make this maize happen? Right here on E, it's really the noncombustible material, right? So that's pretty clear. But probably what isn't clear is how much that distance would be adapted. So in our small community, typically they go and they have a conversation and it's negotiated. Is that what happens? I mean, when we say how much that setback distance may be reduced, I think his trouble was with that vagary of, What may be reduced to 2 feet, 5 feet, 10 feet?

JOHN W. It's not going to be a discussion with the community. Again, this is not existing built environments, existing communities. It's going to be with a single developer. And so that single developer who's proposing a 4,500 square foot lot or smaller, and that's going to be a very rare occasion. Is it going to happen? We anticipate it. We do anticipate it. And that stub out is made explicitly for those applications. So on the rare occasion that it's necessary, That's when that conversation happens. And that happens either during the project development use phase at the planning commission or at the 21H state affordable housing process. Having said that, you know, clearly additional administrative rules certainly can be set up along those lines as well.

They could be set up and then developers would be able to reference them so they have some sort of an idea so it doesn't feel... Sometimes we hear... cries out that it can be discretionary. It works for this group, but not for that group. So if there was rules, then they would know that they are following a standard that has a degree of fairness and not suggesting anything not fair about you or your department. But we always have to think about what's 10 years from now.

Any additional questions, Paso?

A clarifying question. The previous testifier mentioned 15-foot setback. But can you clarify what the setbacks are? I thought it was five feet or half the height of the building.

So that's the existing setbacks, is five feet and half the height. And that will be in play for all of Kauai. The only time these 15-foot property line setbacks come into play is for brand new subdivisions that are fully vacant, have no development on them. And then the 15-foot setback is in play for those lots. And it's a 15-foot side setback, but can be reduced if they have, like one of those flag lots will have driveways in them so that 15 foot can be reduced because the driveway itself functions as the buffer. It will also be reduced to the front to be 10 to 5 feet in the front because the road fronting the property also serves as a buffer.

Any additional questions for admin for the amendment as presented? Seeing none, I'll call the meeting back to order. Any further discussion on the amendment? With no further discussion, can I get a roll call vote for the amendment?

Council Member Cavaglio.

Aye.

Council Member Cowden. Aye. Council Member Conachero.

Aye.

Council Member Cooley.

Aye.

Committee Chair Bolasan. Aye. Passes.

You're still in discussion? Go ahead.

Oh.

Oh, no, go ahead.

Yeah, I have two amendments. These are coming from Council Member Holland, who's not on the planning committee. So I'd like to amend as circulated.

Second.

The amendment regarding the wall. Yeah.

Second.

Which one is the siding?

Okay, the option.

And I think it changes the...

I move and second, and if you could explain the amendment, please. Thank you.

Yeah, guys, so last meeting, you probably recall that I was trying to search for alternatives to the five-foot hardscape. I understand that that's a limiting factor for some people, even if not financially. If the cost is more, I would still love for there to be options provided so that people have choices. And so what I did was I did some brief research about different places in Australia, like where Black Saturday happened in Victoria, and some of the places that deal with fire a lot. And it does look like there are some codes that exist. And so the science team went back and looked at what those different things are, and they analyzed a few different things, and they did say that Under this situation with non-combustible walls, which is an increased cost to just grab around your home, but if you had non-combustible walls with specific metal shutters that were included, that this could serve as an additional option to avoid the five foot hard skid. If we want to call planning, they've been helping me with the science side of it, of what they're comfortable with.

I have a clarifying question.

Go ahead.

So it removes any of that. So it could have soil or grass or ground cover or whatever.

Yes, it would remove the hardscape requirement of five feet surrounding the home under the condition that the walls were specific grade and kind of maybe just expand a little bit on what those specifics are, if you could for me, because I know you guys have done a lot of research on it.

I'll suspend the rules.

again with Fire Chief Gibson. Yeah, so brought the idea up that Australia did have these codes that did not have their groundscape. We did look into it. There are several options we reviewed. This is the final option that was drafted and came up with and was reviewed by US Fire Alliance, Doki Solutions, as well as Underwriters Laboratory Fire Safety Research Institute. And all three came back saying this would be an adequate response to exempting out the hardscape. So it's being provided as an option. It's not a cheaper option, but it is an option.

Thank you, Director.

Any questions for planning regarding this amendment? No questions. While the rules are suspended, I'll do public testimony on this specific amendment. Is there any testimony on this specific amendment?

We will have Chair Polozan, members of council. I'm going to use my testimony for this amendment because it is regarding the final. My name is Anna Modaz. And I prefer to use my allotted time back to back because I'm very late for work. So I would appreciate that. Thank you.

We can do that.

Thank you. OK. It's very enlightening to listen to the testimony this morning, so I do appreciate being here to listen to it. And my suspicion on when I first read this bill that whoever designed it isn't from Hawaii, and it's confirmed with what I've heard today, the topography here is just so diverse. So it would be really hard to cut any situation. Although it does, with the language that I'm hearing, It doesn't require for any existing. I still want to direct your attention to page 24, section 15. That reads, Chapter 8, Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance, Kauai County Code 1987, as amended, is amended by amending in section 8 through 4.5, standards of development applicable to all residential development. by adding new subsections 8 through 4.5 E and 8 through 4.5 F to be appropriately inserted to read as follows. E, non-combustible zone, a five foot non-combustible zone with ground cover comprised of hardscapes such as concrete, brick, or gravel with a depth of at least four inches shall be constructed and maintained for any residential structure. For pervious material like gravel or crushed rock, a protective barrier shall be utilized beneath the previous hardscape that prevents organic material growth. This five foot ground cover hardscape requirement is not required for accessory structures. So it doesn't say that it should only, any new construction built from 2027 on, So Council Chair's question, if there's any, Well, that wall would require this five foot. So what does prevent the planning director, whoever will be at that time, to implement this law that you are all considering to pass just across the board? I don't see language that prevents that. So maybe that can be a considered amendment. But let's just, in a thought exercise, go through it. So you're talking about five feet exterior wall. So let's look at what five feet looks like. This is five feet. Let's say you have a neighbor. They also need another five feet.

Sorry, is that right there in the water? Thank you so much. I appreciate you. What a gentleman. Okay.

Ten feet right here. So do you recall any neighborhoods on Kauai that have an exterior wall that goes from basically to the door to where I am? Because I've seen a lot of neighborhoods like that. It's pretty tight.

So that would require basically everything concrete from wall to wall.

And I come from a place that has that. And there is maybe a little bit of lawn before a sidewalk. And there's maybe trees and then the road. The trees, they become a nuisance. Those roots, they pop up. They break through the concrete. Let's get rid of the trees because they're becoming a problem for the concrete. So this concrete solution, it's very convenient for the fire prevention. So practically speaking, it's a great idea. I don't believe that. Our firefighters are the kind of people, you know, they train really hard. They're not like you and me. They can persevere through the most egregious circumstances. So I'm not sure why we're trying to make things easy. They're not the kind of men that I see are wanting things to be made easy for them, but let's just go through it. This is a very convenient solution. Let's expand it. There's a lot of issues on this island that could use this solution. Like for instance, The river. Let's just dam the river, concrete the bottom. We get rid of those slippery boulders, that mud between the toes. And then on heavy rains, we no longer have brown water flowing through. The LA River does that. It's beautiful. So that's a convenient solution for that issue. Let's not stop there. How about the beaches? That's sand. What a nuisance. It gets everywhere. I can't even vacuum it out of my car. I mean, I know what you're thinking. It's really hard to dam the ocean. I'm not trying to suggest that. But we can concrete from the shore break all the way to the parking lot. We get rid of that problem. And maybe, yeah, it's not that comfortable to lay on concrete when we're trying to experience the beach. So let's just bring in the chase lounges and the umbrellas and charge people to be there. And that money can go to the county and be actually directed, allotted to the water department that really does need this funding. So that's a solution there. Now, if we've taken care of that area, why stop? Let's go to the forest, those pesky trees that caused those forest fires. Let's just eliminate all of that, concrete everything, How you don't even get a landslide ever because you've solved it with the convenient concrete method. Does that sound like a good idea? What could go wrong? I guess we would lose the beauty of nature, for one. And another issue I believe Council Member Cowden touched on was the heat factor on the sun just burning on concrete. So making everything really, really hot. But I mean, that's OK, because I work for an air conditioning company. Thank you, Anna. All right. I know I got my hand up.

Can I just ask a clarifying question, please? Sure.

Sorry, that was the whole six minutes.

No, that wasn't. Yeah, it was two back-to-backs.

That was six minutes.

Sorry.

Just quickly, do you support my amendment to provide an alternative to the fivescape? Because it sounds like you do, but I just want to hear it.

I support the council rethinking the strategy on this. So if we're really looking at trying to make things better for our firefighters, let's provide what the firefighters need to fight fires, like ensuring that there's water in the fire hydrants and funding infrastructure. Because the county has this uncanny ability to create way more problems from the solutions to a problem. So thinking ahead, what impact could this have on everybody on Hawaii. Because there's not just one new neighborhood that is more valuable in lives than anybody else on this island.

Did you watch last week's meeting? I just read the bill. OK, I think you should watch next week's meeting where the presentation is given, because I think it'll answer some of the things you're talking about.

I'm just going to leave my eyes on what this bill is, because a lot of people can say things and interpret things, but it's not what I see written. So I would like to ask the council to really be thoughtful on what they're implementing as a law and dictating as people's yards, because yard-ins are a thing. We all like to grow, and we don't want to be told that we need five feet of a certain amount. So in that instance, I do agree with you. And if you guys don't pass this bill, that doesn't mean that humane society can't sorry, Habitat for Humanity can't create with these parameters or have developers come in that want to create with these parameters. Why this law to dictate forever that this is how buildings, when developers can actually do that themselves and promote that themselves and then maybe even have that be an inspiration for others. Thank you, Anna. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, there is one last thing, though, because this is about Lahaina. I know. What happened in Lahaina was very nefarious.

Sorry, Ana, just to be fair to everyone.

And I want to say that.

Can you email that to us in council's testimony?

This is my last sentence, and I'm going to be out of here.

Sorry. I mean, go ahead. One last sentence.

Vengeance belongs to God, but in John chapter 14, I am given the authority to bring his name in, and so I do claim and plead the blood of Jesus over all of Hawaii and Niihau. May only what is of God's will be done, and anything that is not of God's will be vanquished. In Jesus' mighty name. Thank you. Amen.

Thank you. Any additional testimony on the existing amendment? Just on this print amendment.

Thank you, Council, for allowing us to speak. The five foot and my name is Sandy O'Shaughnessy. I live in Kapahi. The five foot argument, so to speak, about whether it should be concrete, gravel, all of those things, obviously those all need to be considered. In Kapahi, very close to people's houses, there's wild Guinea grasses growing everywhere, which are a massive fire hazard. It's a problem all over Kauai. A lot of these wildfires start, and they just blow through these fields and along the side of the road where there's native or not native grasses growing. albesia trees, et cetera. And I feel like we're not really looking at the mitigation problem with those things that a lot of these fires start from. So I'm wondering, I know it's not the bill itself, but if we're looking at fire mitigation, we should definitely be considering how we're going to address these wild grasses and trees. Thank you.

Any additional testimony for this amendment?

You said it twice.

This is different. This is the same bill. Same amendment. Yeah, yeah. Different amendment. Thank you. Any additional testimony for the current amendment? Seeing none, I'll call this meeting back to order. Any additional discussion on the amendment? Council Member O'Connor?

I'll just say thank you, Council Member Holland, for looking at Australia policy. And if people have the cost they can afford to have a non-combustible house, it seems like they shouldn't be penalized with that hardscape right around the edge. So I appreciate the creativity and effort of going in and looking at it.

Thank you. Ms. Rekanshi. Quick question, and just to note, the amendment also does change the ordinance date to take effect on October 1st versus July 1st.

Yeah, it's just pushing it out a little bit to address those that are already under construction that was brought up earlier. So it's just pushing the data out a little bit. I forgot to mention that.

Let's just do it for the whole thing, to push the data. So can you just give one more? I didn't hear your reason that much, because there's already projects being designed?

My understanding, and just correct me, Director, if I'm wrong, but it's to allow for the extra time for the concern that was brought up about houses that are already in the works.

Any permit that's already in would not have the standards applied to them. You do have some that may be in the process of getting draftsmen work done. So they're midway through the process, but they don't have their permits in. So it allows that kind of buffer, essentially, if you will.

Just adding a little bit of extra time so people that are caught out in the start of it that might Yeah, and have a little bit more prepared time for this kind of thing to take effect.

So where does it say that?

It's just the date change on the bottom, October 1st from July 1st.

Any additional questions for Anne, and while the rules are suspended?

So you supported it. This was your idea?

Well, it was part of our discussion. And then he had brought up if I supported also pushing the date out to address that concern at the same time. And I said yes.

Any additional questions for admin? We'll call the meeting back to it. Any other discussion on the amendment?

Yeah, I'll just say I'm in favor of the amendment. I think it does give a little more leeway for someone that cares about what their yard is going to look like and don't want the concrete or the hardened area. For them, it's going to cost a little more, but they can purchase that type of siding that is more fire-resistant, and that's their own decision on what they do. As far as the date, you know, I'm in agreement, too. I mean, we've been working on this, and it's been in planning from, like, prior to July. So I think at the time, they were thinking a year out, and we're already in October, so it makes sense to push it out a year.

We're in September.

Oh, see? We're in September.

It's practically October. September, October.

Yeah. October will be right around the corner anyways. But, yeah, I think it gives people a little bit more time to adjust.

Any additional discussion on the amendment, Council Member Holland?

Yeah, I just want to thank you guys for entertaining it. I know I'm not on the committee, but I did look into some of this stuff initially, looking at irrigated landscapes to keep a wet scape surrounding the home. And there'll be additional conversation with that in my next amendment. But yeah, I just appreciate you guys considering this.

Any additional with that? Roll call vote, please, on the amendment.

On the second amendment?

Yes.

Council Member Cavallo.

Aye.

Council Member Cowden. Aye. Council Member Kaneshiro. Aye. Council Member Kuali'i. Aye. Committee Chair Bolasan. Aye. Motion passes. Thank you.

Then Council Member Cowden, again, she's not on the committee, so I'm interested. Sorry. Council Member Holland. Council Member Holland, again, she's not on the committee, but she does have an amendment that I'll be circulating for her, so I'd like to amend as circulated, and this is regarding the periodic review. Second.

Thank you. And now this measure is related, like you said, to the periodic review. Again, it's looking at the irrigated landscape and the potential for waterlogged plants to be also included in that 5-foot buffer. The problem is, and Director, please correct me if I misstate any of this, but my understanding after the scientists reviewed my suggestions and asks was that while they could support the fireproof walls and those additional things in the previous amendment we just voted on, that they couldn't really scientifically support the specifics of irrigated vegetation or waterlogged vegetation or like bananas or certain things that were suggested. So this amendment requires that those things are considered in the periodic review and that studies are done to allow for that to be an option in the future. But because the studies weren't done, the scientists weren't confident in making that assessment and allowing that amendment to go forward. And so in this case, they would have the opportunity to complete the studies and prove without a doubt Plants like, say, aloe vera or, you know, these very water-heavy plants might be exemptions that also allow the five-foot surrounding of the home. So that's what this amendment is.

Any discussion? Any other discussion?

I have a little bit of discussion, though. And just for the public, we don't get to hear before each other do things. I would have added to this.

But...

Pardon me?

Go ahead. Discussion?

Oh, OK. I appreciate that that can go into the review. I think whether we do another thing or do a friendly amendment, I think soil analysis and percolation rates should also be in that review. Because I think when we avoid percolation rates, it's a big mistake in how we plan it. And that kind of falls under what Animo Dez said. Because when we look at... The fire impact on plants, if we've got an 80 mile an hour wind with really hot, hot, hot, hot fires, that is really the anomaly. And so when we have, what we learned at NACO in our, our field trips there. After you have a fire, you have all this flooding potential, and flooding is more common than fire here. So when we're looking at all this extra concrete, especially in a narrow neighborhood, where, as Animo Des was talking about, if you had 10 feet out of 15 are asphalt, or 10 feet hardened out of 20. And when we... scorch the soil in ways that this bill asks to do in a lot of places. You don't have the percolation rate, so then you're going to have really intensive flooding. Absolutely percolation rate increases when you have natural plantscapes, when the plants can live the way that they're meant to live, with leaves on the ground and all that. So we don't have to add it to yours. I can see on your face you're not interested.

I'm just not clear.

OK. Well, percolation rate, I think, should really be in this wildfire resilient landscaping, looking at that. Because when we have hard, packed ground, which is what happens when you have the sun shining always on the ground, you don't have good percolation rate. Percolation rate happens when you have active landscaping. I know that's the truth.

Any additional? I do have to go to public testimony, so I don't know if you want to keep with the discussion.

I can.

I mean, I was just wondering what director thought about that.

I'll suspend the rules, director.

Yeah. Just to be clear, the bill doesn't require concrete. It can use hardscape as well. If a homeowner opted to use concrete in their five-foot non-combustible zone, it would not be allowed to go beyond the existing threshold of 60% for a residential lot. So it does not allow for extra concrete beyond what the code currently requires. So the percolation rate should stay the same. But I understand that.

The percolation rate doesn't stay the same when you don't have plants.

No, no. I just wanted to clarify that extra concrete beyond the 60% non-pervious surface limitation on residential lots does not change. So I just want to clarify that the concrete does not change. And then for the overall proposal, Council Member Holliman approached us, the team, to say, well, what about using certain types of landscaping in there? And the team did go back and look through. When looking at how wildfire science can provide guidance for regulatory regimes, either the science group is going to look at a forensic analysis of a wildfire event that happened, and or they're also going to use laboratory tests in which they're recreating a wildfire event on the built environment. And in both of those scenarios and the data that they have, they didn't have anything that could indicate that landscaping would be an adequate mitigation measure for the hardscape. Having said that, with the draft proposal, we would be going back to Underwriters Laboratory as well as Hawaii Wildfire to say, in looking at certain documents and studies that have been produced about wildfire-resilient landscapes, is there an interface between those and the five-foot non-combustible zone? And candidly, I had that conversation with the executive director of Hawaii Wildfire Management yesterday.

Yeah, I had that too.

While the rules are suspended, we'll do testimony. Is there a new machine?

I actually have one more question.

Okay, go ahead.

So this would be a question for both.

For the amendment?

Yeah, for both fire and planning. When we look at all these modern fire build elements, what we saw in the high net is – After the fire, everything was really toxic, right? It was really toxic. Where probably when you have a Higgs home that's just wood, it's not going to be so toxic. All these hardened kind of new combo products, they create that toxicity. Is that correct?

That's absolutely correct. It's what we're putting inside the houses, couches, mattresses, what's outside the houses, cars, tires, batteries, all those things are created.

And even those hardened walls. And that wouldn't be for concrete. But I mean, we just have to look at how all these things balance.

Any additional questions for admin for the amendment currently? No. So seeing none, we'll do public testimony on the amendment as proposed. Anyone wishing to testify on the amendment? Seeing none, we'll call the meeting back toward any final discussion on the amendment.

I have a final comment.

Go ahead.

I'll be supporting this amendment. I think it is certainly valuable to review as many things as we can review. And I think especially when I brought up how often do most of our reviews or reports actually happen, I would hope in the first five years of these, which will be into the future, because it'll be after these places are built for the most part, though it can be looking at what's out there in the nation, it will really matter that we look and we check that what we've done is right. So certainly I support more flexibility and breadth in the review.

Any other discussion?

Yeah, I'm supportive of the amendment, and I know we've heard concerns about how often the reviews are. I'm a little more, I guess, positive on the reviews, because I know that the county already meets yearly for wildfires, and so it's not as big as, say, a general plan-type meeting and result, but I do know that yearly fire is meeting with the community and everybody, and so I see those meetings continuing, and then these type of things being incorporated into it. And I definitely think, yeah, more information is better. You know, if we're looking at other ways to protect the house, we also look at, you know, what type of landscapes may be available at the same time. And so I'm in favor of this amendment.

Any additional discussion, final discussion for the amendment? Seeing none, roll call vote for the amendment.

Council Member Cavaglio.

Aye.

Council Member Cowden. Aye. Council Member Kaneshiro. Aye. Council Member Kuli'i. Committee Chair Bolasan. Aye. Motion passes. Thank you.

Any other amendments for this bill? No, it's amended three times. I will actually... One more amendment.

One more amendment, okay.

I move to amend as circulated on behalf of Chair Raposo, who is not on the committee.

Thank you, Mr. Kool-Aid. Second. Sorry. Mine is housekeeping. It's pertaining to that section on the gutters, and it's just adding if installed, just to make it clear that it's an optional component and not mandatory.

Any other discussion with the rules? Suspending the rules. Anyone wishing to testify on the amendments? It is adding the if installed gutters in the previous discussion. Seeing no testimony, call the meeting back to order. Any further discussion? Seeing none, roll call vote on this fourth amendment.

Council Member Cavaglio? Aye. Council Member Cowden? Aye. Council Member Kaneshiro? Aye. Council Member Kuli'i?

Aye.

Committee Chair Bolasan? Aye. Motion passes.

With that, we're still in discussion, and I wanted to give the public, if there's any more amendment, I'll just double check. Seeing none, no more amendments, I did want to give the public one last opportunity for public testimony of the entire bill as amended four times. Anyone wishing to testify in the entire bill as amended? Seeing none.

I have another question for Ka'ainu.

We do have another question, so we'll suspend the rules. Director Hall?

I have a simple question. So do you have your... I did read this, and it's a long bill, and it's got a lot of details, so I had a few things that I was just confused about. Probably simple answers, but it would help me. On page 12, section 5, in the middle of the page, what was removed was dwelling single family attached. So these are definitions. I wondered, why did we delete that definition? Because I didn't see it replaced.

Yeah, the single family attached is a structural element where it's just literally, you'll find some, proposals avoiding setbacks currently, the 10-foot building-to-building setback, by literally putting a non-structural element attached to it, a couple two-by-fours, and then it's separated by three or four feet, which is a clear hazard.

So that means like if I put a, and it's actually a lot in my neighborhood, somebody's put like a lean-to against the wall?

No, where it is structurally dependent, that's fine. It's where it's structurally...

independent so we just have three inches in between so we took that out so that we don't have that in here no and so when we saw where you can build on the zero lot line between different parcels and we had that in our presentation i would assume that's the developer builds it that way and those look like um

Those are structurally dependent.

And those are structurally dependent. So those are duplexes that are straddling a property line.

Either duplexes or garage scenarios.

Or garage scenarios. Or carport scenarios. So two weeks ago, we saw design drawings of that.

You had duplex designs straddling the lot line, but you also had carport straddling the lot line where the dwellings weren't actually adjacent.

Right.

So there's a single family paradigm with a connected carport.

Right, so it's got potential for crumbling, but if the developer decides to do that, I would presume that a developer would be the one to do that. You're not usually going to see two people buy separate lots and go, hey, neighbor.

We would not anticipate that. The provision is provided if that wanted to be done, but we would not anticipate that.

Okay, so this is just you can't have something that looks like it's attached. So we're just saying that doesn't happen. All right, and then, okay, my other very simple question is I noticed that we have definitions and the same definitions in several different places. They might have a few added or not there. So I read through every one of them, and I didn't understand why we have them there. Is it because it's a different section, and we have to have, we don't reference back to the old section, so a new section, so we're just saying, we just have to repeat ourselves.

One definition being provided in Chapter 12, which is a different chapter of Qui Connico from Chapter 8. So both chapters need the definition.

OK. All right. Thank you.

Any additional questions for Adam? I do have one more question. On page 21. This is on the maximum lot coverage. So this bill will increase the maximum lot coverage for R1 to R6 to 60%. That wasn't discussed. Is that for everyone now?

Yeah, sorry. That was more of a cleanup in that one section of the code already has the 60%, and this is just reiterating it's 60%.

So we've been how long? I wasn't aware. How long have we been at 60%?

Around the time the ARU ordinance was passed.