16 Budget and Finance Committee - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Budget, Finance, Economic Development Committee. It is now 9.04 a.m. Welcome. This meeting is being conducted in accordance with the Sunshine Law. As a reminder, when your name is called, if you're not in the council chamber, please identify by name who, if anyone, is in the room, vehicle, or workspace with you today. Minors do not need to be identified. We'll start off with Chair Lee. Good morning, Chair Lee.

Good morning, Chair, and in case you're going to Hong Kong this weekend, the greeting there is , and so . I'm home alone in my workspace, looking forward to your meeting, thank you.

to you. Good morning, Vice Chair Patongan, .

Good morning, and .

Good morning, Member Cook.

and today.

Good morning, Member Johnson.

Morning, Chair, council members, community members. There's no testifiers at the Lanai District Office. And nay-ho to all of you, thank you. Member Palten, good morning.

Aloha kakayaka and nay-ho kakou, streaming live and direct from the council chambers.

Nay-ho to you, Member Rollins-Fernandez.

Aloha kakahiaka kākou. I'm at my private residence alone, but it's so hot I may end up going to the Molokai District Office. There are no testifiers. Mahalo, Chair.

No rain then, not like Maui. Member Sinensi, good morning.

Aloha kakahiaka kākou and nei ho. Happy to be here and no testifiers.

Nei ho to you, Member Uhajans.

Aloha, Chair. Aloha, everyone. I'm at my private residence. It is pouring at my house. I am alone, and I look forward to this meeting. Thank you.

Okay, good morning. We have also invited as resource persons from the administration, the Managing Director, Chief of Staff, Deputy Director of Finance, Budget Director, Deputy Director of Environmental Management, Environmental Protection, Sustainability Manager, and Deputy Corp Counsel Wigglesworth. And thank you very much for BFED staff for all the work you've done to get us here. Please see the last page of the agenda for information on meeting connectivity. Thank you, members, for attending today's BFED meeting. We have two items on the agenda this morning. BFED 18, Bill 93, 2024, amending Title III, Maui County Code, relating to the monetary donations during an emergency, which is Chair Lee's bill. And BFED 20, 32, vehicle disposal fee, and program, so let's begin. Do we have public testimony?

Chair, we don't have any testifiers at the beginning of the meeting. Would you like me to do a last call?

Yes, please.

This is the last call for oral testimony at the beginning of the meeting. Please come up to the mic or raise your hand on teams if you would like to testify. The countdown is three, two, one. Seeing none, Chair, no one has indicated that they wish to testify.

Okay, managing director has a conflict and Marcy Martin, what is? Okay, sorry that Marcy Martin, welcome. All right, so there's no testifiers. I am going to then start with BFED. I'm gonna close public testimony at the beginning of the meeting and start the meeting. So BFED 18, Bill 93, 2024, amending Title III Maui County Code relating to the monetary donations during an emergency. And this is Chair Lee's bill. And given the number of recent disasters and questions about where people can donate, I thought this was a good time to bring it forward for discussion. This bill would establish the Maui County Kokua Fund to receive and use monetary donations during a declared emergency and for and for one year afterward. The bill would allow the county to accept these donations without first obtaining council approval under chapter 3.56. Donations would be appropriated upon receipt and used only for emergency management functions. The mayor would approve expenditures in writing and report to the council quarterly. The referred bill came without corp council's approval talked to Corp Council Wigglesworth about that. So it's not approved about form and legality. Implementing the bill would also require an amendment to the general fund provisions. That amendment has been drafted and is under review. Corp Council has requested additional time to review and revise the bill with the general budget provisions and the department's response is under Granicus document number five. Today I would like to discuss the bill's concept, hear whether members support moving it forward and identify any additional amendments that may be needed. Because Bill 93 and the related amendment to the general budget provisions must move concurrently, Bill 93 will need to be deferred today. If both amendments are ready, I plan to schedule it for the next October 20th meeting. So at this time then, I'd like to ask for discussion from Chief of Staff Lalo. Okay, Deputy Director of Finance, Zielinski or Ms. Milner.

Thank you chair, thank you council members. I had an opportunity to review the bill. I think we do have some concerns about the creation of a special fund. Generally our grant funds are recognized under Appendix A part one, whereas special funds are Appendix A part two, they're separate. I'll let Deputy Director Zielinski talk about it a little bit, but we would have to create a carve out in our financial reporting system solely for this fund. So I think that's the concern. But I think if what the body is trying to achieve is to allow us to accept donations in the wake of a disaster without needing to do a resolution every time, I think there's a way we can get there. And I think we're happy to have that conversation. I just don't know if the special fund is the right way to go. I think the other thing I'd like to flag is there's some language in here about the mayor needing to publicize that the county is accepting donations. As you all will recall, in the wake of the wildfires, we really directed a lot of those donations to our community partners who we worked really closely with. I just did a quick Google before I came down, and between August and October, Hawaii Community Foundation received $140 million. And that's not an amount of money that in the wake of a disaster while trying to manage infrastructure changes, updates, I feel the county is prepared to oversee. So if there was a way to update that where we say we're willing, but we encourage you to actually donate here because we want it to go to the community, I think that would be helpful. So those are just the things I'd like to flag. Thank you, Chair. Thank you.

Deputy Director Zielinski, do you have any comments?

Thank you, Chair. As Budget Director Milner indicated, yeah, we do... believe the intent and the concept is a good one and certainly achieves what we'd look to achieve. Even though we never really thought about disasters occurring so much in this past year, it seems like it's much more frequent than we'd like. As budget director indicated, our concern is with regard, not concern, but how we'd like it structured is to have it as a grant fund instead, so not as a special revolving fund. And the reason is because special revolving fund is usually revenue generating events, so this is not really revenue generating per se. Because of the way our accounts folks put together the ACA for our annual report, if you will, this would be, if you have a special revolving fund, it's going to show up as revenue and as county funds, and that's not really what we want, because it's basically a donation that's going to be spent. So we're really looking for reflecting it as a grant fund instead of as a county fund. So that would be our recommendation. Having said that, we can still work with it, but it would be, we'd have to manually do it, and honestly, we'd rather, you know, our accounts, people are pretty busy as it is, so if possible, we'd like to see it as a grant, and it seems like it's probably better situated there. And I did actually check with the council, and they told me that at one point we actually still have about $200,000 in a grant fund that related to the fire, and that's where it is. It's with OOR, I believe, Office of Recovery. So this would be consistent. The treatment would really be consistent with what's been done in the past relative to the fire. As Ms. Milner had indicated, we would, and I think, Chair, as you had indicated, this would require general budget provision changes. So it might be, I don't know, we'd have to discuss with Corp Council and budget, but perhaps section 14 under donations or 13 under additional grant revenue, I'm not really sure how it would how we we'd have to discuss the uh the language um but in any case that's that's where we are with that and also having uh just to reiterate that we we also believe that uh you know other firms or other entities such as nonprofits such as hawaii community foundation or maui united way those folks are you know very very well positioned to you know to to disperse and and respond to the needs of the community so that would also be our are thinking as well to utilize it that way. Thank you, Chair.

Okay, thank you. Chair Lee, do you have any comments? This is your bill.

Yes. Yeah, thank you. I realize that it still needs work. But three years ago, right after the fire, I know a lot of you were, but I was on national television, international television 27 times. And I use that platform each and every time to advocate for donations. Because at one point we didn't need any more bottles of water and things like that. What we needed was money. And I really didn't have a place to direct the money to go to. So I I mentioned the county's website and on the website there were lists of various organizations they could donate to and I often mention Hawaii Community Foundation. In fact, I pushed that one the most because I knew it was one of the largest nonprofits that was situated to take in large donations and many of them. However, over time, Over time, I realized that the over $140 million and monies like that were out of the oversight of the council. And it was more of the administration directing that money. Because you would find Hawaii Community Foundation contributing to various accounts, you know, the fire related accounts and And then a lot of the administration was very much involved in deciding where a lot of that money went without council oversight. So that concerned me. And so now I'm feeling that Unfortunately, if we do have another disaster or many other disasters, we need to direct the money to a place where we can get some kind of a report. I'm not saying that we should be the ones to say where the money should go necessarily, but I believe that we need to find out where the money is going. And so that is the reason why I came up with this recommendation And I haven't pushed it hard until now because I'm leaving in three months, three and a half months. And I would like to see that something is in place so that the legislative body has a seat at the table for these types of matters. And yes, the administration needs to, participate in helping us finish the legislation to where it's going to not impose so much on their current operations. And so there are suggestions on how best to implement this idea is more than welcome as well as the technical suggestions of Corp Council. But this is pretty much the impetus of this bill. Over $140 million is a lot of money, and we need to have some kind of oversight, some kind of participation. I don't think that any kind of reports were given to us on how monies were directed. So I'm not saying that the administration was deliberately trying to not share this information. I'm saying that it's part of our job to oversee the budget and see how monies are coming in and going out. it would have been nice to have some kinds of setup where there is not only an Oahu-based nonprofit, but a Maui-based, several Maui-based nonprofits where we can direct the money to. You know, because all of us are asked to be interviewed on television. We need to come up with specific answers. We can't just say, oh, go look at the website, you know? it'd be better for them for us to say on the website you'll have these and these you know organizations you could consider and then and then ensure that there's some kind of reporting mechanism so that we we find out how much money came in and where it went any questions anybody very good any questions for cheerlead yeah we got to take testimony

Okay, we will do testimony and get back to you, Chair. Are there any testifiers? There are. Yes?

I apologize, Chair, yes. I believe we have one testifier signed up.

Okay, very good. So testifiers wanting to provide testimony should sign up with staff, join the online meeting via Teams link, or call in to the phone number noted on today's agenda. Written testimony is encouraged and can be submitted via the e-comment link at MauiCounty.us agenda as well. Under the Sunshine Law, the chair will receive oral testimony for agenda items at the beginning of the meeting and as the item is called up. For individuals wishing to testify via Teams, please raise your hand by clicking on the raise your hand button. If calling in, please follow the prompts via phone. Use star five to raise and lower your hand and star six to mute and unmute. Staff will add names to the testifiers list in the order testifiers sign up. and raise their hands. For those on Teams, staff will lower your hand once your name is called and staff will then call the name you're logged in under the last four digits of your phone number when it is your time to testify. At this time, staff will also enable your microphone and video. Please ensure your name appears in Microsoft Teams as the name you prefer to be referred to as anonymous or if you wish to testify anonymously if you're in person please notify staff that you would like to testify anonymously otherwise please state your name for the record at the beginning of your testimony oral testimony is limited to three minutes per item and if you're still testifying beyond the item beyond the time i will kindly Kindly ask you to complete your testimony. Once you are done testifying or if you do not wish to testify, you may also view the meeting on Akaku Channel 53 Facebook Live or MauiCounty.us backslash agenda. We will do our best to take each person up in an orderly fashion and we'll now call up the first testify, please.

Thank you, Chair. The first individual signed up to testify is James Langford.

Mr. Langford, good morning.

Good morning.

Good morning. That's loud again, yeah? We can hear you. Wonderful. Good morning, Chair. Thank you for having this meeting and bringing up Chair Lee's Bill 93. I'm testifying on that. I'm in support of the oversight and I would ask that you folks extend uh the the subcontracting audits across all agencies that uh that are subcontractors who receive county funds that will empower you folks the most to have the least amount of pressure applied on you from potential bad actors or folks that don't know any better because of uh a culture of not having these types of audits in place. So as we are now a billion dollar corporation, it will empower future council folks to deal with the facts of the contracts and to have accountability so that unforeseen pressures don't pop up. So I'm in full support of Chair Lee's Bill 93. And I also, I don't know if she remembers or knows this, but my father's initials are Albert and one of his middle names is Lee and Langford. and his initials are the same as Chair Lee's. And despite whatever pressures you folks are dealing with, I always think of her fondly as a family member. So may you all have a great day and I encourage the last 91 days of Chair Lee's tenure to bring Omiyagi to her every day. Thank you.

Any questions for the testifier? Seeing none. Thank you very much, Mr. Lankford. Next testifier, please.

Chair, that's all the individuals signed up to testify for this item. If anyone in the audience or on teams would like to testify, please come up to the mic and begin your testimony or use the raise your hand function on teams and staff will unmute you. Here's a brief countdown. Three, two, one. Seeing none. Chair, no one has indicated that they wish to testify.

Thank you. At this time, members, I'm going to close public testimony and receive written testimony. Thank you. All right, so questions for Chair Lee, maybe, or whoever. Three-minute questions, starting from Vice Chair Betongen.

Thank you, Chair. Okay, so I support the goal of getting or creating a mechanism in which the council can receive donations during an emergency or the county can receive these without having to come to council every single time. I hear the concerns from the administration. Can you explain in a little bit more detail the difference between the special funds and the grant fund account and why you have a preference over one over the other?

Thank you, Chair.

Yes, the special revolving funds, typically the revenue that's reflected in there, you have expenditures and you have revenue, is revenue generating? In other words, it's taxes, it's fees. In fact, the next item on the agenda has to do with disposal fees. So it's things that we get in versus this is a donation. There's no, you know, it's just as we can't really expect it. It's not something that is generated. It's just we have no expectation when we get it. So that's really the distinction. And Reflecting it in our, I'm sorry, go ahead.

Okay, but mechanically, there's no difference in when the money lapses. One doesn't necessarily lapse at the end of the year, the restrictions on spending. Your concern is purely in the nature of the money that comes in.

The nature of the money, but also then how we reflect it. So anything that's in the special revolving fund is not going to be shown as county funds, if you will. Or rather, I should say, I said that wrong. If we were to show this, this would be shown, if we had this in special revolving fund, it would be shown as county funds. County funds are for services, governmental services. It's kind of a mismatch.

But wouldn't the nature of... government response in an emergency be a government service?

It is, correct, but this is a donation, right? We're getting a donation in. Okay, we're not charging anybody for it. Somebody's giving us a donation and then we're just dispersing it based on whatever the need might be. So it's kind of a different, we would, from a financial standpoint, financial reporting standpoint, our auditors, we could not do this. I mean, it would be a finding. We'd have to pull it out and show it separately because it is in fact a donation. So it's an extra step, if you will. but creating it as a grant fund rather than a special fund it would still achieve all of the stated goals of chair lee when she introduced this bill absolutely no lapsing um you know and whatever controls we need to we'll work of course with budget and with the corp council but yes we could achieve the exact same thing there would really be no difference except we from a financial reporting standpoint it would be a much more straightforward okay

Okay, so say we made that amendment and we changed it from a special fund to a grant fund. Would that address all of the concerns from the administration? Or are there still outstanding issues that you would need us to work through?

I think there's just some issues that we'd need to talk with Corp Council about in budget. We do have to change general budget provisions.

We have to add language. I mean, understood.

But other than that, I don't see anything. Okay.

Yeah.

Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Shirley, do you have any questions for administration or you want to say more?

I'm totally supportive of their suggestions. The idea is to try and meet the goals and objectives of this bill, but how that is done should be with the cooperation of both branches. Thank you.

Okay. Pretty good. Member Paulton, followed by Member Johnson.

Before you start my time, I just wanted to disclaim that three minutes is not a lot, so I might cut you off if I got my answer. I don't mean to be rude, but my first question would be, I guess, to whoever can answer. I saw the correspondence from management in 2024 reflecting the hundreds of thousands donated from Japan and other sources, and I was wondering, is there an accounting of how that had been spent?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Paulton. It's my understanding that those funds were spent on the Lahaina homecoming. Oh, okay. But I will, I confirm that, but now finance is saying maybe there's an outstanding balance. So I just want to have that conversation because my understanding was it was all spent on Lahaina homecoming.

Okay, which I was totally in support of. I guess, I appreciate Charlie for bringing this up. I think that we should be talking with our partners right now. A lot of people weren't super happy with the way Hawaii Community Foundation distributed the money, even though you can go on their website and see what was spent. There was a full accounting. There's some people confusing Lahaina Strong, Maui Strong, and all of that. I'm not so eager to jump into the fray and accept money on the county, because then that's gonna be directed at us, like what was directed at them. But if we can have a pre-list, we partner with, I don't know if Kalanoi needs to close his ears or what, but we partner with MEO on rental assistance. Humane Society was a big, I think a lot of people earmarked their donations specifically for animals and things like that. So having a list ready to go, if you wanna help people with rent, that was a huge one. If you wanna help people, take care of their pets for specific things because I don't want the county to take in money and then pay for government related things. This money that when I donated to, I don't wanna say what I donated, but when I donate, I want it to go directly to the people that are affected, and that was a big drawback from the community foundation. They had to flow it through a nonprofit. And so then organizations like Help Maui Rise that vet people's Venmos, and you can get it straight to them, and then they don't have to tell anyone what they need. I need diapers, or I need what they, it's a little bit of dignity for them to have money to do what they need and they don't need to tell anybody how they're going to use it. Or gas cards, these kind of things. You always see propane, water, just basic cooking essentials. And I think... While I appreciate the county taking in money and not having to have a meeting to accept it, I really would hope that we're not the central acceptor, that we have a list ready to go. People are gonna need rental assistance and we're partnering with MEO, Catholic Charities, and so and so. If you wanna help people with rental assistance, we're partnering with, Maui Humane Society, because they're the experts in pet care. So this pre-work is really important for us to get those partners ready. And if people still say, I want to donate to OEV resources or environmental management, sure, fine. I don't know that the county is the best entity to get money directly into the hands of the people that are affected. So that's what I got to say, thanks.

Okay, very good. Member Johnson, followed by Member Rollins-Fernandez.

Thank you, Chair. you know, in all these times of disasters, it's sad that we're at this point where we have to realize how much money is coming to help us get out of these disasters. And just to remind everybody, I put a charter amendment to use 20% of the TAT for climate disasters that kind of fell on its face, but that's a different story altogether. But for today. You have to say that. I just had to say that, yeah. I wanted to bring up that donation from the Japanese billionaire, Mr. Yanai, $3 million. Is that kind of an example of what this bill would address? That money came in and went where and who administered it? Can you get into that? Because that's kind of a specific example on this.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Johnson. I would say... What this addresses, and I think what we definitely would work with Chair Leon in any revisions, is to ensure there's regular reporting on funds received and how they were expended.

Did we do any reporting on that, Mr. Yanai's $3 million?

I don't remember recognizing a donation for $3 million by resolution.

He gave it to the state? All right, okay, we'll wait for that, but okay, so.

I thought we received less than 500,000, so if we receive three million, we need to make some calls.

Then let's go into the specific example of OOR, right? They had $200,000, right? How did you report that and explain that? How did you show that?

Thank You chair Thank You councilmember Johnson when we submitted the budget amendment for the festivals of Aloha for the Lahaina homecoming at that time We told the council and we also put in the transmittal letter that the grant funds would be utilized For Lahaina home.

So just sending us a letter was your type of reporting? Yes, and if you'd like to have more formal reporting we can definitely talk is that really where the where would this bill meets meets us is that we want reporting we want to hear where it went we want to have a bit of a at least you know it's our our kuleana as a council to look at any kind of money so is do you think that would help kind of

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Councilmember Johnson. Yes, I think we can definitely work with the council to ensure that the reporting for donations meets the transparency you're looking for.

Just one last question because I'm on three minutes. So, you know, some of the times the nonprofits get these monies and they charge admin fees, of course, to do this so that money shrinks a little bit because some of it has to go to the administration of those funds. How do we do that? Do we charge anything for any kind of donations?

Thank you, Chair. No, we do not currently charge for funds that we receive. The staff time is just charged to the general fund.

So 100% of those funds go 100% to the people that is where it wants to go?

Yes. I mean, if it's issued as a grant, some of it may go to the administrative fees for the grant. Of our own funds? No, like we make an award to a nonprofit and the nonprofit has a 10% admin, something like that. I think if the amount of donations we receive rises exponentially, we would probably need to use some of the donated funds to pay for people to manage those funds. So we would need to cover some administrative costs.

I heard the time. I think that's really a point of interest for me is that sometimes the donations get whittled down through all these admin costs. Maybe... another step would just whittle that down more. That's just a concern I have. But thank you for the time. Thank you, Chair.

Next we have Member Ramos-Fernandez, followed by Member Cook, then Member Uhl-Hawchens.

Mahalo, Chair Lee, for introducing this bill. I do support the intent. It's unfortunate that he didn't work with the admin on this bill before introducing it, though, so that we could have passed it out of committee today. Like Member Lee, I also interviewed on national and international news stations and did advocate for donations to be directed toward Hawaii Community Foundation's Maui Strong Fund, Maui United Way, and Help Maui Rise with the direct donations going directly to Ohana. Hawaii Community Foundation did report on the funds they collected pretty regularly in the first few months and how those funds were being spent or how it was being saved for recovery versus spending it all on response. So I did think that that was responsible of them to think forward, understanding that There's a lot of need in response, but there's going to also be a lot of need in recovery after response is at that phase. I didn't necessarily support all the ways the funds were spent. There was like $80,000 given to a children's book author located in Colorado. and not giving any funding to Lahaina Community Land Trust. Those things I didn't support. In the first year, I did request the BFED chair to invite Hawaii Community Foundation to come before the BFED committee. to give us that opportunity to have some additional oversight and transparency for the public. But Member Sugimura never asked them to come before us. And we still can. We can still invite them to come before the committee. It's not like it's too late. We just have to do it. So I think after incorporating the recommendations from finance and the budget director, you know, I'd be supportive of moving this along. I don't have any questions.

Mahalo. Okay, great. Next, we have Member Cook, followed by Member Uhajens, and then Sinensi.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you for bringing this up. I think that I'm really glad to be able to discuss it. And during the fire afterwards, I was asked many times, I believe everybody was, like, where is this money going? Where is it being spent? Social media had its own things about famous people. It was difficult. I couldn't give any answers. I also really empathize with you and the administration to be able to, you're managing $1.6 billion budget and all of the different departments and everything. This is sort of an outliner that's very, very important to provide. We need, and we're asking, transparency and accountability without increasing the bureaucracy and without slowing everything else down because you can do anything but you can't do everything. The non-profits receiving a tremendous amount of money also have to grow their bureaucracy and they might not have it so as it's growing so their accountability and transparency in my opinion was lacking So I just want to say I'm in supportive and encouraging of navigating this and listening to you how we can accomplish it and asking as a council member the legislative branch have visibility so that we can add answer to our constituents when people are donating money appropriately they want to know where it's going they're trusting the government as this intermediary. I wish everybody trusted our government. I'm gonna be really optimistic for a minute. But we're sort of that basis. Do you have any advice?

I mean, I think taking Council Member Palten's suggestion into account of developing a list preemptively of trusted partners and maybe working with those partners on if, I mean, I know a lot of them put everything out on their website on how they're spending the funds and things like that because they have their own transparency requirements as a nonprofit, but just working to make sure that what they're putting out there is meeting the needs of data for you all so that you feel you can appropriately communicate to your community and anybody who reaches out to you about these donations. So I think that's something we could all work on together.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Member Wu-Ha Jens, followed by Sinetzi.

Thank you, Chair. I really don't have too many questions that haven't been asked already. I guess I'll just look forward to whatever balance we find to make it make sense for admin and to make it make sense for us. Thank you. Okay, thank you.

Very good. Member Sinensi.

Thank you Jerry yeah some of my questions were already asked I guess I would I mean we're we're not a nonprofit or do we have a nonprofits we're not a nonprofit but we're taking in donations so we're not we don't have a 501c3 designation We're not giving any tax breaks for some of these donations, but particularly for large sums of money. We're not building a ballroom. to take on more donations. So, I mean, those are just some of the questions. We want to be kind of transparent. I do agree, and then if the donors are saying it specifically for certain things, like some of the other members' comments, you know, if it was towards infrastructure to rebuild Lahaina or expand the, you know, the water line for more access, I mean, then that would come under the purview of the county, but I don't know, how do we distinguish if they're just, you know, donating stuff for social reasons or for government reasons?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Sedensi. Yeah, I think that's some of what we would need to get into. We recognize sort of the donations that came in for the wildfire generally just under the Department of Management and then used that for Lahaina Homecoming. And I did confirm with Department of Finance that was fully encumbered. So that's been expended. We did have some donations that came in that were specifically for the Department of Public Works. People specified, because that one was from an association of Public Works employees from around the country. So they specified that they wanted that to go to support the work of Public Works. We had some that specifically came into the fire department. And as I know, Chair Sugimura is aware, we had equipment donations that came in as well in the wake of the fires that we spoke to you all about. I agree. I think to me it makes the most sense if people want to support infrastructure rebuild or something like that. Yes, those funds would come to the county, but then we would direct them to our partners if they want to support the work of Malhumane or of rental assistance or things like that.

I think the big difference between us and the nonprofits is that they cannot always apply for some of the federal aid that we get to apply for. Nonprofits don't get to, we had a significant amount from the federal government for the rebuild. So nonprofits maybe, I would be supportive if they are specifically to help the community. then yeah, we'll just forward it to our partners. So I'm supportive of that. Thank you, Chair.

Very good. Thank you. So I didn't hear from court counsel. So can we hear your considerations, I guess?

Thank you, Chair. I just, I know that this... I didn't feel signing it as to forming legality until the general provisions were also revised at the same time because they would be conflicting. So that's why. And it sounds like we needed more time and I've already been drafting another version that can share with council member, chair Lee and everyone else to make sure they're reporting specs are what the council wants and all the concerns that have been listed off today.

Okay. Very good. So we'll wait for that, then the general budget provisions from you, as well as what you're hearing for amendments to this bill. Okay. And we'll capture that with Chair Lee's concerns as well as what the members say and administration. So we're good, yeah? Okay, thanks. Member Paulton.

I don't know who in the county would be the entity to work on partnerships with our non-profit partners, whether it's the Humane Society, Maui United Will, MEO, Catholic Charities, Lahaina Community Land Trust. And by part of this bill, I think we should kind of set guidelines in what we're looking for as best practices for reporting. Like if we're, during an emergency, gonna put on national, international television, radio of our partners to donate to for various reasons, whether it's rent, pets, whatever, we wanna be sure that the accounting and reporting is also vetted or in a best practices way. So that's more of an implementation than a legislation. And so I don't think it would be us. So I don't know like how we go about that. Like saying like, we wanna make sure do this during blue sky times, that we pre-identify partners, that we would have a list ready to go during any kind of emergency when anyone from the county is doing interviews. Here's our vetted partners and they do best practices. of accounting and reporting. These folks can help with this, this, and this, this, this, and this, and then you choose who you wanna donate to. You can get a tax write-off. Maybe folks from other countries don't care about the tax write-off, so they're like, you guys deal with it, the county. But locally, within whatever system we're in, they might care about tax write-offs or stuff like that. I think like now is the time to standardize our criteria and reach out to our partners if they have the capacity and are willing to step up. And I don't know if that needs to be like a working group or what, but we can't, or we shouldn't just, use their names and say, go donate to these people without forming that foundational relationship of seeing what our expectations are, what are the feedback that we've heard from the public. The Help Maui Rise where, they get the whatever it is, Venmo, Cash App, GoFundMe of the person to go directly to them. That might not be accounted in a similar way, but it's invaluable to the survivors of whatever disaster. And so maybe they can share with us their vetting process or whatever their best practices are so that it's not a mystery to folks. Like having seen what they, did in my community, that's now my preferred way to donate directly to the person that was impacted so that they have that, just because of application fatigue and all the things that they're going through, I just want them to be able to have some money in their pocket, even if it's just to buy ice cream. Ice cream helps. so, or their own personal clean underwear, you know, like whatever it is, socks, I don't care, but I wanna get the money directly to them. Some people might care more about the animals, but you know, letting people donate where they're at for what they want it to, I think is just as important component of this bill, like just getting it all kind of squared away. So I'm not sure if that's our role or if you need our help on it or it's a working group or how it works, but I don't want it to be lost in the shuffle. Chair? Chair Lee.

Yeah, I think those are great suggestions. And probably here's another one. Why don't we create a tag within a WhatsApp since human concerns, including animal care comes under his committee. And maybe if member Sinensi is willing, and then maybe member Paulton can be on that tag as well. I think those are great ideas, because this may be a blue sky week, but who knows what's going to happen next month, a couple of months from now. We have been very unlucky worldwide. Worldwide, we've been very unlucky with the weather.

This week is a lower week, not a blue sky week.

Okay, low week. then we can get started on this, come up with some good, strong ideas, and begin to work with the administration for implementation. Okay, that's all I have, thank you.

Thank you. So Member Sinensi, did you see your, did you hear that? You're fine. Oh, you can't hear. Okay, so you're fine, Member Sinensi, and you're fine. Oh, Member Bataga, you have a question.

No, I wanted to share some thoughts after hearing what other members had to say. So I did hear Corporation Council's concerns about not signing it to form a legality at this time, and I hear you, and I guess at least personally, I would be comfortable deferring until we have that ironed out. But I also heard things from other members that I wanted to be able to comment on, because I actually do think that this is a much... better written bill than the conversation kind of reflects. So it, There are people who gave to nonprofits because they wanted to direct their money towards the missions of those organizations. But there were people who wanted to give money to the county. And I think this is a good mechanism to address that need. I personally like that they can still direct their dollars towards specific departments or specific projects if they wanted to. This just says that it's presumed to go to this COCUA fund if it's not otherwise specified. And then the money is somewhat restricted in that it has to be used for an emergency management function as defined by HRS, whatever chair put in there. So I think that this is a tailored policy towards a specific problem, and I don't want us to get too far out of what Chair had been trying to do, because I think it addresses what she was trying to achieve very well. And I don't want us to get too sidetracked on the larger issue of coordinating resources to meet unmet needs in the event of a disaster. This is very narrowly tailored towards allowing us to receive donations that people want to give to the county. It still lets them direct those dollars to other services, but if there is no stated purpose, it again goes towards emergency management function. So there's a streamlined way for people to give us money, which I am in favor of, and for us to direct it towards an emergency response during an emergency. I don't want us to lose sight of that or have this get buried in a larger conversation of how do we respond. to a disaster at large. And I guess I felt the need to, I heard the grace in which Chair Lee had responded to some of the comments, but I actually think this was very well written, and save for the general terms and provisions that were described, I think it actually does a pretty good job of addressing the issue. So I wanted to speak in support. Thank you, Chair.

Very good. So members, the next BFED meeting is not till October 20th because we're taking a pause for the South Maui Community Plan approvals. So it won't be for a while. Administration, Corp Council, is that gonna be enough time for you to work on what you need to, how about administration? Yeah, Chair Lee, you can discuss with them. So by October 20th, we can have this and then the TIG, Member Sinensi, Member Fulton. We can have one more person. Oh, Gabe Johnson.

Well, as far as take, I don't really have much to add to that discussion, but I will say, you know, unfortunately, this is the new normal. This is science that this is going to happen a lot more often. And the fact that we're actually trying to address it before it happens, I like it. It sounds like a, like a trauma skill. Like we're good and good at dealing with big disasters, which is sad, but it's the reality. And I don't think we should ignore that these, we have what three hurricanes knocking on our doorstep just now as we speak. So This is the new normal, folks, and I'm willing to work with it so that we can actually be quick on our feet, agile, and don't let our bureaucracy trip over our own shoelaces. Thank you.

And I think we, to answer that, you know, I think we're all getting calls, where can I donate, where can I donate? And Member Ramos-Fernandez, I'm sorry if I didn't hear you asking for HCF to come before this committee, and I'll check my calendar, ask them, you know, they have no secrets, so I will ask them to come and present to all of us, and then we can have your questions ready. I'll let you know what that date is. Any other?

Okay, great, that was gonna be my question. That was going to be my question to you, if you would invite HCF. Yep, yep.

So I checked with my staff and OCS. I didn't hear if maybe they had heard a question from you. I apologize. I didn't know you made that request.

Oh, this is like, what, three years ago. This is when the fire happened.

Oh, okay.

You were the budget check. But I do have... my second round two. Okay.

Please proceed.

Okay. Thanks. Okay. I didn't hear anyone speak in opposition of the bill, so I was kind of confused by Member Batongan's comments. I heard some comments like Member Cook who made a good point about nonprofits often having the ability to move faster than government. and members and NC's point of some folks wanting to take advantage of the tax write-off that 501 can offer. But I still think that, like I said before, I'm supportive of creating this fund so that it's another option, an option that we didn't have in 2023 that I think would be good to have for folks who would want to donate directly to the county. And I think now that we have Office of Recovery, we may even be a little faster about getting money into the community than we were pre-2023, pre-creation of Office of Recovery. And I think that's everything I wanna say. And you're gonna invite HCF, so that's great.

All right, so any questions, members? If not, I'm gonna defer this item. Members, big smile, thank you very much for taking that on. And I don't, I guess, gotta figure out that you know what the parameters are and whatever that we're trying to achieve, right? And work with Corp Council too. Okay, we're good? Oh, yay. All right, members, I'm going to defer this item. It is 10 o'clock. You want to take a break, or shall we just continue on with the second item?

Can I request that break? May I request that break, Chair?

Yes, sure. Okay, 10-10, come back. Budget Finance Economic Development Committee. It is now 10.16 a.m. Thanks for the break, everybody. And now we have the second item for review. It is basically the Vehicle Disposal Fee Fund and program, which is BFED 2032. And the reason why that I brought this up, it's a 7B, is just because looking at the fund, the Vehicle Disposal Fee Fund, and it's starting to accumulate a lot of money in there, and wondering do we need to revise the program was my thought. of the $25 collection every time you register your car or what, and to understand what the fund is being used for. For fiscal year 21 through 26, finance reports average annual collections of about 4.2 million. Annual expenditures range from about 259,000 to 1.4 million. Finance projects an average fund balance of about 18.9 million at the end of fiscal year 27. Today I would like to better understand the program's operations and needs and reported fund balances and whether the fee remains aligned with the program's costs. No legislative action will be taken under this item and today we have with us Deputy Director Peterson, Cecile Powell, Director Martin, I'm not sure if she's, oh we have, Deputy Director Zielinski, Budget Director Milner, as always, as well as our staff. So I'm asking for opening comments and who wants to take the lead? Yes, please.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Members. You wanna go first? I'm totally fine with that. Okay. Yes, as you're aware, we have some fines and fees that go into this revolving fund. The current balance is over, the current estimated balance is over $19 million and we've appropriated approximately 3 million of that for fiscal year 27 I am happy to have a conversation today and answer any questions. You might have Thank You chair deputy director Zelensky Thank You chair

As you know, this is a revolving fund, the vehicle disposal fee is a revolving fund item. And as budget director indicated, right now the balance as of August 28th actually is 19,213,139. We actually did provide to the council a schedule reflecting the revolving fund balances since fiscal 21 to 2027. So you do have that in front of you. Now, the one thing I do wanna mention on that is because we looked at the, you know, looking at 2027, Keep in mind that when the budget is done and you look at your revolving fund and actually in the budget ordinances, it'll actually show that the beginning balance as of July 1st, now this is for fiscal 2027, so it's the very last line on that schedule if you have it in front of you. It's darkened. It was showing a beginning balance of $16,158,361. So it's a big difference. You can see that the beginning balance actually was 20 million, 072, 472. The reason why we looked, and it ended up that after the, as you know, budget is done in March, we finalize everything in March or whatever, and we actually did receive revenues. At the time that we provided the balances, our revenues were very small, and then we actually did get a bunch of revenues in, and as a result, that's really, that's the reason why we have a difference of 3,914,000 actually, for that beginning balance. So as a result of that, when we show what our expected revenues and expenditures are, and that's all per the budget, so you'll see that in the ordinance, the ending budget, if you look at that, is actually going to be higher than, let's see, the budget is showing, oh, 19 million, Okay, so it is actually going to be showing $18,925,000 per this schedule. So I just wanted to clarify the beginning balance as the reason why we have that difference. Again, it's an estimate, and if there's some large activity afterwards, it wouldn't reflect in the ordinance. We do, just trying to see, oh, there was a question, just to clarify, there was a question from this body that what the difference was between the $4,340,617 at 3-31-26. That's the number that finance provides, and we provide that big, very large schedule of all of the expenditures and all the balances, and that's as of 3-31, so it's a quarterly report. that the council receives and that shows that amount. And I think there was a question as to what's the difference between that and then the 19 million. Well, the 4,340,000 is really just showing it's reflecting adopted budget expenditures and encumbrances. it's not showing the beginning balance. So that's the reason, that's just showing that activity. So that's different. There is a reason why there's a difference. And then the last thing that was asked of finance, and I'll just cover that here, is that what the average disposal fee collection was over that period from fiscal 21 to fiscal 27. It looks like it was about $4.2 million. And I believe, I don't know, The EM folks will be talking more about it, but the current fee is $25, and we are projecting revenue of about $3,126,743, which is on that schedule that we sent to you as fiscal 27. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much. Ms. Powell, our Deputy Director. Mike, do you have anything?

Thank you, Chair. The DM is ready to discuss our operations and open to discussion regarding the fund. Thank you, Chair.

Ms. Powell, you have any comments? None? Okay. Thank you very much. So at this time, we have any testifiers?

Chairs, there's no individual signed up to testify. Oh, I do see one individual now, Kai Nishiki. Chair. Ms. Paulton, Member Paulton.

I just have one clarification question for you before we go into testimony. I don't know if it would affect testimony, but there are other entities within the county that deal with abandoned vehicles like MEMA or Parks. So I just wanted to clarify why we're only hearing from one of the entities that deals with abandoned vehicles.

So we were looking at the fund itself. And so that's what generated the letters to the departments. But maybe that's a good input because, yeah, go ahead.

Sorry to interrupt. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Palten. EPNS is currently the only department that expends any funds out of this fund. So I think that was probably the thinking there.

Thank you, Chair. I was looking at the fund. But that's a...

That's who utilizes that, I would ask the department. My clarification is, If we are using general funds to give to those other departments that also deal with abandoned vehicles, why wouldn't we use some of this excess money that are for abandoned vehicles to deal with abandoned vehicles that other departments are using? but I don't know, it doesn't seem like there is an answer other than that EPNS is the only one that taps into this fund. But I mean, I just wanted to put that out there for like when people testify that we have other departments that deal with abandoned vehicles, but maybe they're not specifically tapping into this fund and we have this excess of funds, so that's, an issue.

Maybe they can share share chair director.

I think I think maybe there's some confusion about the different funds that we have because I think member Paul teen is referring to the highway beautification fund which just uses money to address abandoned vehicles and things like that. This one I think this fund that's on the agenda today I think is more for like Vehicle owners who want to dispose of their car, you know, they can call up they can use this money or this fund To just defer some of the costs You know, I think it's free in fact and I was gonna use it myself But it's basically you call you follow the you fill out a form you follow the instructions and someone comes and picks up your vehicle from your house and takes it to the scrapyard and and all that stuff, so I think it's a different type of fund that you're referring to.

Oh, so it couldn't be used, like when MEMA has all these abandoned vehicles on county property, or Parks has all these abandoned vehicles on county property, we could not use this fund?

I don't believe so, but I would ask.

You know what, we're getting into discussion.

Right, we're getting into discussion, but I just wanted to clarify your question. Your question.

Okay. But good question. We can discuss it. So there is Kai Nishiki to testify. Good morning.

Good morning, Chair. committee members. I am testifying on this issue to advocate that the county consider changing the rules so that if and I can just speak from my personal experience is that some folks when you buy a property there will already be vehicles on the property. And it could be for a number of reasons. But when I have tried to utilize this program, it can only be a vehicle that has, like I have to own it. And so that really poses an issue because I'll never figure out like who dumped this this car here and and also you know just for folks who have um tenants sometimes the tenant just leaves the island and then you know you're left to deal with that um there's just a lot of instances where um there are vehicles that you can't identify the owner on uh on your property and um it would be very helpful for this body to really discuss you know i can understand if say like someone's running a chop shop on their property and the county doesn't want to come up and and pick them all up i totally get that but like if you put a limit on it like one or two vehicles per year and you know like there's like a maximum uh for a person um then you could you could put protections in place so that a person like me or whatever, obviously not running a chop shop on my property, could have a valid way to protect our environment and have these vehicles go where they should go. And it would just really support our community to do the right thing if we could have protections for that and also get these vehicles. Because I promise you that the increase in vehicle removals would be astronomical if you could change the rules to allow this and then we would be getting more of these vehicles from just like on my property I'm concerned about like the oil and eventually you know all the metals going into the ground and A lot of this can happen in the SMA and stuff. So anyway, just would really appreciate if you folks could consider amending or discussing how rules could get amended so that we could expand use of this program. Mahalo. Oh, and if I could just add for, you know, community cleanup days and stuff too, would be awesome. You know, there's plenty of people in my neighborhood who would love to clean up our neighborhood, but then the costs are just, are an impediment. So mahalo.

Okay. Thank you for the good work you do. Any questions for the testifier? Member Sinitsi.

Malachi, for your testimony this morning, when you speak to community cleanup, the cars are left because the registration has expired. So it's sitting there, but it doesn't have any current paperwork. And I believe the department requires paperwork. So some of the changes you're suggesting that if we can kind of exempt some of those older cars that have been sitting there for years, but the registration has just been expired for long periods of time. Oh, you're muted.

There's all sorts of situations, even where, you know, someone came and took all the tires, and so it can't easily just be towed. It probably needs, you know, those guys who have good skills. They, like, put all these wrenches, and they pull the... They use hydraulics to pull the vehicle onto the flatbed. So, yeah, you know, there's... I hope that this fund could be used not just for a typical like, oh, my car died and I can get it towed just because it has wheels or whatever, just for those more complicated situations would be really helpful. that's kind of like going the next step besides just like towing a car that, you know, something went wrong on it. Really addressing the little bit more difficult situations would be great.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much. Any other questions for Ms. Nishiki? See none. Next testifier, please.

Chair, I believe Member Poulton had a clarifying question. Oh, sorry.

Go ahead. Ms. Nishiki, are you still there? In your expansion of uses, I just was wondering if you were seeing as well abandoned vehicles on county properties as well.

Well, that is certainly a huge issue that we have and would definitely support if there's available funds for assistance with that.

Like prioritize on private property first and then if there's any additional, you mean?

Let's see, prioritizing... Since the disposal program that the county is running I think was primarily created to assist private folks on private property seems that that would be the right priority and then excess money could go to address the abandoned vehicles or just vehicles that should not be on county property. That's a huge issue, especially in West Maui.

Okay, thank you. So you're open to it, but just prioritize the fund for what it's been. Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions for Ms. Nishiki? See none. Next testifier. Thank you very much.

Chair, that's all the individuals signed up to testify. If anyone in the audience or teams would like to testify, please come up to the mic and begin your testimony or use the raise your hand function on Teams and staff will unmute you. Here's a brief countdown. Three, two, one. Seeing none, Chair, no one has indicated that they wish to testify.

Thank you. Members, with your permission, I'm going to close public testimony and receive written testimony. Thank you. All right, so we'll continue on with this discussion. And I wonder if, oh, go ahead, questions, I guess. Member Patongen, three minutes.

Thank you, Chair, I don't have any questions.

Okay, so none. All right, next, Member Chair Lee.

I have no questions, thank you. Member Paulton.

I'm just wondering you guys feedback on the testifiers points about like you know how you run the program and no criticism but that there is excess money and there is plenty abandoned vehicles still like out there. Any thoughts as to like what if they don't know whose car it is and like I remember a little while back where somebody crashed their car, crashed a car onto somebody's lot and then dug out and it might've been a stolen vehicle or something. I don't remember the details, but it wasn't their car. It was on their property. And then because they didn't have all the paperwork, they, had to end up paying for it to get removed themselves when it seems like this fund is kind of the reason, but it's, you know, they didn't have the paperwork. So any thoughts as to if that could be accomplished where, you know, somebody else's car was abandoned on their property, what should be done? Or is this fund not the right pot of money for that type of situation?

Thank you, Council Member Palten. We have been looking into that for At least a year at this point. We understand that the private property problem, there is sort of like this hole that just needs to, it fell through the cracks in the ordinance that gave us the funding. So it's a matter of, we're looking at modeling an offer. The Big Island has a successful program. We're looking into getting that expansion of the program for Maui for folks And we're also, I just wanted to quickly clarify that we do utilize these funds to clear abandoned vehicles off from the county properties. So you shared this money? We absolutely do. Yeah, but we manage the contracts or the grants that do the legwork and then other departments may be overseeing the actual clearing of the public property. But we definitely utilize the funding for the removal of the abandoned vehicles part of it.

So when they did their big ukumehame.

We paid for the disposal of all those vehicles for this funding. And we're also doing Cup Mountain, Pulehu, Holomoa, all of them.

Oh, nice, nice. And then when they get abandoned in a park, do you guys manage those contracts as well?

It's the same contractor, and a park is county property, so we're able to remove those vehicles, yes. With this fund? Yes, with this fund. Oh, okay.

And then, so what is the highway beautification?

The highway beautification is more of a, you know, when people do abandon their vehicle, and we pay a fee for us towing and storing their vehicle, that goes into a separate type of revolving fund, and highway beautification is more like litter mitigation or hotspot removal program as part of that. Should I have one more follow up?

Please. Okay. The other thing that I had heard from your former staffs was that the tow company won't remove it if it's filled with rubbish inside and like that. Could some of this money be used to be an individual to remove that rubbish so that it could be towed?

We do, we do have that program in place. So the tow company will contact our sub, I'm so sorry. Okay, thank you. A tow company, I know we're limited on time, that's why. So our tow company notifies the folks that we have contracted out, and they'll come and clean out the vehicle, and then the tow company will follow up. So this money can go to that? It does go to that.

All right, thank you. Okay, very good. Member Johnson, followed by Member Rollins-Fernandez.

Thank you, Chair. A couple quick questions. I'll try to be quick. The Lanai affordable housing project, the developer has found vehicles on the county parcel. That's kind of similar line of questioning. What funds did we use to get that out? And nobody knows whose cars those were.

Thank you, Council Member Johnson. We have been in partnership with Paloma Lanai. The issue with Lanai is we don't have the metals processing facility that we do on Molokai and Maui. So we've been sort of partnering with Paloma Lanai towing the vehicles and us working on disposing of the vehicles. From my understanding this year, we removed through our metals event, I believe we removed, I have to check in with Tia, I think like 50 vehicles from Lanai already. And we may have already cleared those other ones up. If we haven't, we certainly, I can guarantee that we have a plan to remove the remainder of those that have been sitting there.

And yes, these fundings do go towards that as well. I'm sorry, that wasn't my question. The funding comes from you guys? Yes, long story short, yes. Okay. I'm sorry, I have a county car on Lanai that is... Council Member Sinensi has a story. I picked him up and our brakes went out on a county car. It's kaput. It's pow. It's done. Do we use that fund to get it off island? What do I do with this car? Sorry, Shane. Because... It was pretty scary.

You know, that is something that we've been wondering ourselves to look into with Corp Council because this is a public fund and for county offices to be utilizing public monies is supposed to be for residents. So we may just have to fit the bill for that somehow.

Okay.

Out of general funds, which is almost like counterintuitive because...

I didn't mean to throw a wrench in this, but it's something that I wonder how we're gonna get it off and this, you know, Lanai.

Don't we guinea pig this? I have this idea. Let's use this one as a guinea pig so that we'll know what to do moving forward. We'll have our abandoned vehicle office contact your office and we'll figure it out. And then we'll know how to move forward when this happens again.

Your people will talk to my people?

Hey, my people is gonna talk to you.

We'll do lunch. We'll talk about it. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you, Chair.

On Lanai. Are you done?

Well, yeah, we'll have some blue gingers and we'll talk about it.

Yeah, they're the best. Member Rollins-Fernandez.

Mahalo, Chair. And mahalo to our resource folks for being with us, answering our questions.

Okay.

So for... Is there like a... I know we for FY27 have appropriated over 3 million toward from this fund for its purpose. Has there been like a historic use or like a pattern or like a procedure developed in how the fund is used? before FY27, or is this a new process that we're going to be following?

Thank you, Council Member Rawlings-Bernandez. When I did come on board, as I don't know if a lot of you folks know, I used to be head of recycling section for eight years and with the county since 07 before that, EP&S division manager since May of last year. And when I did get on board as division manager, I did identify that there were some pretty significant over encumbrances of contracts utilizing the revolving funds, which is why there is this situation. So with that, we've, recognized it and this fiscal year we are fixing the problem and we plan on utilizing the funding through tire recycling for residents. We're doing the encampment cleanups and we're looking into more ways that we can expand it. For instance, we recently made it so that you don't have to follow the vehicle, especially out in Hana. And folks who are living remotely weren't utilizing our tow and scrap program because they had to follow the tow driver. So we're fine-tuning and expanding while utilizing those overages that appeared in previous years, if that makes sense.

Okay. Mahalo. So under 3.27.020, the purpose is providing funding for the county vehicle disposal program, which simplifies the process for residents to properly dispose of their unwanted vehicles. And by their, you mean having title to the vehicles. That's how it was meant to be interpreted and it's only interpretation or like it could be expanded or I guess if we wanted to expand it, we could expand it there.

I think, sorry about that. Technical difficulties. Thank you, Council Member Rawlings-Fernandez. Yes, that's the intention and that's working with Corporation Council to ensure that we're utilizing the funds for its intended use. And if not, then there was the highway. We do also have the highway beautification revolving money. So if it didn't fall under this pool of money, then those expanded ideas that we have, such as the tire recycling program, if it comes out that we cannot utilize this money, then we do have extras that, from previous years in the highway beautification funds.

Okay. Well, I guess, you know, as far as like Ms. Nishiki's requests since Member Poulton followed up, I guess that that's where it could be amended, this section. Oh, were you going to say something?

Yes, I'm sorry.

Also, my last name doesn't have a G in it. It's Rollins.

Rollins, apologies. I know that sometimes it's nervous talking on a mic in front of a bunch of people, so. Thank you for your patience with that and duly noted. We realized something and I kind of crossed the side of my mind, but I didn't want to bring this up without conferring with budget director and deputy Peterson that we could potentially do an amendment to chapter 3.27 to expand the use of those funds that way as well.

Okay, that's all I got. Mahalo.

Thank you. Next we have Member Cook.

Thank you, Chair. I have a bunch of questions. So I'll just, my first round will be these. was the was this fund originally started so that homeowners had the opportunity they could dispose of a couple vehicles a year at no cost it would be picked up and towed and sort of the intent I thought was that people wouldn't be dumping their cars because they couldn't afford to dispose of them.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Councilmember Cook. Yes, that's my understanding of why it was started, to try and cut down on the abandoned vehicles because people didn't want to pay for their disposal.

Thank you. Thank you. Not necessarily homeowners, it's any registered owner. You don't have to own a home to participate in the program.

Thank you. Yeah, I should say vehicle, but yeah. Somebody that can say this is my vehicle, this is a spot, come pick it up, I'll follow it, I'll give you all the documentation, I'll prove it's mine, and that way I don't have to pay for it. very restrictive. I'm really happy to hear the flexibility that the department has been utilizing for county, I've just been hearing county properties and all the different things. There is a lot of money in the fund and it seems like your recommendation or suggesting the possibility of modifying it to enable it to be legally used for a variety of purposes would be very prudent and I welcome that that would be great because. If we have the resources and there's the need in the community for us to be able to expedite this what is the obstacles. Is it the amount of tow companies? Is it the ability for Hammerhead to receive them? What are some of the obstacles to really dig in and clean up?

Thank you, Council Member Cook. It's multifaceted. We have the registered owners that can participate in the program. It's education and outreach with that. There may be changes to the ordinance to include those folks who are not technically the registered owners, and there could be changes to the ordinance. We have to identify if we do need to change the ordinance first, so that's a corporate council method or process. but in order to allow those folks that have abandoned vehicles on their private properties. And then we have, you know, we're always going to have, I hate to just be, I'm not a pessimist, just a realist over here, but there are going to be abandoned vehicles regardless of how many people participate in that program. So.

And that's, that is very real. So that's my comment and clarification is to be able to Identify they're not registered.

They're you know Not having to find the owner when do you not have to find the owner Thank You councilmember cook it's when you know if it's illegally abandoned on the side of the road then we find the registered owner through our processes and we store it for 30 days, I mean that's the chunk our abandoned vehicle program so we have the it's twofold we have the tone scrap program where people self haul and that's yes utilized with the um vehicle disposal fee but then the highway beautification revolving fund handles the abandoned vehicles that they're just abandoned on the side of the road that there's no registered owner in sight so you so you pick them up take them someplace store them for 30 days where is that We do have a storage lot out in Punene over where the old hospital used to be, like in that area.

Thank you. I'll wait for my next round. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Member Uhajens, you have questions?

Sure. I guess, well, what does Hawaii Island do that we don't do that you would like to now incorporate? Good question.

Thank you, Council Member Uhlhajens. That's something that our abandoned vehicles section head, Tia Stapelbein, had discovered and has been working as a side working group that will need to get more information out to you because they had to navigate legal processes that aren't exactly like ours. but similar enough that we can utilize them as sort of spearheading. They've already gone down that path, but even though ours is not exactly the same path as theirs, it's still gonna be useful for us to at least assist with navigating it.

Okay, thank you. Well, I would love to see how you guys handle expending all these funds because I do think it's there for a good reason. I know it's separate but similar, but the highway beautification fund, it really does get my goat when I see the cars on the side of the road going through like this de-evolution process and eventually somebody will light them on fire. which they're super dangerous when you light them on fire obviously and my husband and several of the firemen have to run into the fire while others get to run away and of course you have oil and gas and it's leaking everywhere and ruining our environment so i appreciate all that you guys do i don't think this is an easy job so i do appreciate it um and i look forward to the expansion of the program and um you know spending down that 19 million dollars um since it's there um anyways thank you that's all i really have thanks chair thank you next member sanensi uh malo chair and um

Yeah, first off, I did want to thank you for the quarterly metal collections in East Maui. It's a great, a big hit, and if we could utilize maybe some of the extra funding for a couple more containers. I know in the first, it's like a two, three day event, and on the first, second day, all the containers are already full, so... I mean, if we can send a couple more containers, that'd be great. And then I would like to advocate for member Uhajan's district because I don't think they have any... I don't know if they have metal collections in Haiku, and passing Haiku to come to work, I always see a lot of the dumping on the side of the road. So if maybe using some of the extra funding for Haiku area, because all the dumping that happens on all the back roads, that would be nice. At least, if not quarterly, bi-annually.

Thank you, council members and NC. I've always, I'm a hiker girl, so I'm familiar with all the illegal dumping of the, a lot of it is they grow babies. I don't know how, like somebody drops off a refrigerator and then all of a sudden there's 15 of them. But those types of bulky items, metals types of stuff is not utilizing the vehicle disposal fee, it's utilizing the highway beautification fund.

Got it.

But having an event in Haiku, we do have what's called a hotspot program through Malama Maui Nui. We started that in 09 and they routinely go out to these spots that are hotspots to go and check for any illegal dumping and any new ones we add to their roster. We need to add some to their roster because I live off of Haiku Road.

Yeah, and I'm supportive of expanding 3.27 to include neighborhood cleanups and cars that do not have any registration. So I'll be happy to work on something like that too. Can the fund be used to purchase metal shredders for Molokai, Lanai, and East Maui?

That is not a bad idea. Council Member Sinensi, I'm so sorry.

Mike, how much is one of those metal shredders?

Besides, we'd have to talk stories. I'm sure it's under $19 million.

Yeah, we can get three.

But I mean permitting in the facility and all of that.

We'd have to talk stories about the zoning and land use and Department of Health to see what we can do. If we want to shred the cars and

But then, you know, shredding cars as opposed to crushing cars, and then the private sector is already crushing cars on islands, and the infrastructure costs to add that on there. We'd have to do the feasibility of, like, is that ideally the solution to it? Or are we taking away from business from a private sector, that kind of thing?

Would the fund pay for a feasibility study? I mean... Director?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Sinensi. You know, as Council Member Rollins-Fernandez said earlier, there is a specific purpose and use of the funds specified in the code that is about the county vehicle disposal program for private vehicles. I think we could certainly talk to Corp Council about whether a feasibility study for the county disposal of those vehicles as a part of the county vehicle program would be an allowable use. As long as that is the ultimate intent that it serves that program, it may be an allowable use.

Yeah, we want to just put the cars through a shredder like you put a paper through a paper shredder. Thank you.

Thank you. So I have a question. The electric battery situation, where are we and can these funds be used for those kinds of cars?

Okay, this can of worms, were we gonna peel it open or are we just peeking inside the can? We got it. Can we use these funds for it? Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Sigmar and Chair. My understanding is that we can as long as it pertains to the abandoned vehicle aspect or the disposal aspect of vehicles as far as... EP&S, we've been working with a statewide working group for our existing ongoing program. And my understanding is that our MEMA office is also working on a program simultaneously, and that would be more towards natural disaster types of accumulations of abandoned vehicles and or the encampment cleanups is sort of like a gray area. Currently, EP&S, we've been handling the disposal of the non-electric vehicles and because of the hazard and the concerns of the electric vehicles, MEMA was handling the process of that and we sort of partnered with them. So it's long story short, it's a gray area and we'd have to ensure that the funding is being utilized, so conferring with corporation counsel, definitely, but it would be great if we can. Okay, so we don't have a program yet then, is what I'm hearing you say. We have a current contract where the contractor has been processing electric vehicles, but from my understanding, there has been some permitting and some shipping constraints that has halted processing them. They're basically being stockpiled at the moment until we find a solution on our end. So, I mean, all the funding in the world, if there's no solution, I mean, if no ship is going to take an electric vehicle on board and there's no place to dispose of it on island, then the money is, it doesn't matter how much money we have. It's identifying the process first. But if the process is identified and that process is approved by, you know, Corp Council vets it through the ordinance use of funds, then yes, we can use the money.

Wow. So, but right now we have no solutions then?

Right now we're working on a solution and there is a light at the end of the tunnel, but I think we'd probably want to confer with department on the messaging of that.

Okay. And check with Corp Council.

Exactly.

Do you have anything you want to say, you want to add?

I'd rather not, because I'm not assigned to DEM. Another of my colleagues is advising.

Okay, safe answer. Round two. Member Paulton. Oh, I'm going to start down the row. Member Patongan.

Just one question. Could the fund assist with businesses that have vehicles which need to be disposed of? or is it only for individuals?

Thank you, Council Member Buttigieg. My understanding is it is a residential program. So if you are a registered owner to a residential vehicle, then that $25 fee is there. We need to confirm if that fee is assessed for commercial folks or not. I'm making an assumption that it's not because I go straight civil service.

In reading the code, it says resident, but if you have additional money, I was just wondering whether or not it would be something that we could put towards since we know that there are additional vehicles out there that need to be disposed of. I was just thinking if there's additional resources, can we help move the needle by addressing the access need? But it doesn't sound like it currently is. I'm planting that bug now, and I think I'll just end it there.

Okay. Chair Lee, you have questions?

No questions, but I support expanding uses. Thank you.

Okay, very good. Member Paulton, here you go.

Thank you. To Member Patonga's point, I wouldn't support it for the people that are taking money to dispose of the vehicle because they're taking money for it. But I think we've seen in like Olowalu areas, people take money for the disposal and then they dispose it on county property, which is part of the problem. But... To Member Sugimura's point, that was gonna be my next question and I would love to expand the use of the fund to create a facility because that was part of the problem when Hammerhead had to pause because of safety concerns in collecting the electric vehicles because you can only have so many So I was wondering or what I would love to do is also like while we have this big balance right now is maybe create a facility or RFP it because the county does own lands and what would have to be done is probably zone it like heavy industrial or like whatever, the highest one of toxic, and then if the problem is moving it off island, use that force explosion method that MIMA has, and then it becomes inert, and then you can take it off because I don't know of any other county jurisdiction or the state that is addressing the problem. So if we have such a huge excess in millions and we know like, you know, we're asking for infrastructure for EV chargers, we're seeing like whatever, whatever people are, not stopping purchasing hybrid or electric vehicles, and we don't have a solution. Just having a place, because when you don't have a place that accepts them, that's when they end up in the bushes, and that's a huge fire hazard. That's why I'm really lucky that they cleared that Oluwalu area before the heavy rains, because once it gets wet, there's more chance of spontaneous combustion and there's not real good fire suppression in that area. So having removed all those tonnage of electric vehicles prior to the Kona lows in my mind is really a savior for that whole area from just spontaneous combustion of EV batteries and not having a place to put it, not having a solution, not having a entity that accepts them at all times just puts the entirety of the county at risk because At one point I was hearing like, oh, just leave it in your driveway. And people aren't gonna do that. They're gonna just be like, oh, all the EV batteries end up in the bushes at mile marker 14 and that's the worst place for it. So it's really a plan to fail, the failing to plan for that. like I think Member Johnson had said, if we have all these, maybe it wasn't him, I don't know who it was, but if we have all these excess funds and we have all these problems, why we can't have the funds address the problems because that's just a spontaneous combustion waiting to happen.

Department, you wanna say something?

Thank you, Councilmember. The department is definitely interested in future conversations. We do have our 99-acre parcel near the landfill, which we are in the works of our master plan, and something like this could fit perfectly into that property. It's just a matter of being able to utilize the funds for that purpose. Thank you.

Chair, if I could follow up. I guess the outcome that you wanted to have out of this 7B, is it for the administration to work with Corp Council on the bill? Or is it for a member to work with Corp Council on the bill? Or what is your recommendation? And if so, I would love for the... not the registered owners to be addressed, for an EV facility to be addressed, and maybe we can state whoever it is that's going to be working on the bill, each of us state what is some of the priorities to be included for the expansion of funds along with the prioritization of how it happens should the funds run low.

Okay, the reason why I brought it up is because right now when you register your car, brand new car, you pay $25 for this disposal fee, and the funds are just accumulating as you're hearing, and I thought that the, I was trying to, yeah, the problems that you're all talking about, We will continue to work on the bill, but I was thinking that maybe we don't need to collect the $25 fee every time you renew your registration because it's accumulating, right? And probably if you have a brand new car, it'll be a while before you actually dispose of it, but then you can use these funds which have been accumulating for that purpose. But it sounds like we are talking about expansion of the funds and the use and I love this conversation and we will work on this with the department and come back with a bill is my idea.

Oh, sorry, go ahead. To your point, I mean, as we knock down the funds, like maybe next fiscal year, we can say like 10 bucks or something, but just to know that it'll fluctuate as like building out an EV acceptable facility would be a one-time expense but like the expanding it up to people that don't have the registration, that would be an increase. So I mean, I guess we just gotta work with the projections on if there is currently enough funding in there to address some of these longstanding problems, if then that'll get us on point to where 25 is right or 25 is too much, but it might fluctuate more in that case.

or like my car, right, a hybrid. So I have a electric vehicle, a battery, that would be a problem. So we should also look at that in terms of should it be a higher fee or whatever would be fair, but this discussion needs to happen.

I mean, since we have the surplus, I wouldn't do a higher fee until we're on par or anything.

And then if we build a EV facility so we can get rid of batteries, we can collect from the whole state and we can maybe earn money, raise money. I don't know if we want that notoriety, but who had a question? Member Cook, did you have a question? Oh, Member Johnson. Oh, you do, go ahead.

Thank you. Well, talking about batteries, I just Googled it, and basically the second life detour, instead of going straight to shredder, spent EV batteries with 70 to 80% capacity are left, are increasingly being diverted for grid energy storage or other stuff. So I just, utilizing the funds, and again, it takes us to fund somebody. And fortunately, we have the money. We need to work out the legislation so that it's, Competitive but works, but that's just a suggestion. I want to put out there because it doesn't seem like the disposal aspect of it shipping is a big issue because of the liability and Storage is an option but if we had it if we stored it and there was a facility that we sponsored or assisted to be able to sort through them because I don't know, my car is six years old and the batteries are probably like 35% spent. The body of the car is gonna be dead and not working before the batteries expire. So it seems like a lot of the batteries, the life expectancy for the car is shorter than for the batteries. I haven't heard of any yet that my electric car is not any good anymore because the batteries I mean, it has a nine-year warranty on the batteries, which is expecting. I didn't want to get on that too much. also wanted to comment about the $25 fee at some point to just sort of reflect on it whether it could be reduced to 10 so that we're not overtaxing people and that's that's something we'll do with budget so just sort of putting it out there if we're only spending 25 to 35 percent of the revenue that's being generated each year and it's accumulating and we have a current surplus it might be prudent to be able to

assess whether the $25 fee is appropriate or not comment Thank You councilmember at this point the department stance is we'd like to see the $25 stay in place you know I heard comments that you know the problem is only getting larger and we're going to see some substantial cip costs coming in the near future to deal with this problem. So we would like to see the $25 remain at 25.

I'm personally I'm real supportive of that with the understanding that we're going to be utilizing the funds for cip projects expanding the disposal recycling Is Hammerhead a constraint as far as their ability to process? I think one of the challenges they have is storage because of the market for metal fluctuates and sometimes they'll have massive. I built the facility when they first started it when it was SOS Metal, so I'm kind of attached to that place.

I was around when SOS was around.

Yeah, we contracted it back in the day for Sandy and his brother. Anyway, so comment on that. Is it legal and possible for your department to partner with somebody to handle some of the recycling, handle some of the storage?

Thank you, Councilmember Cook. From my understanding, Hammerhead Mentals is not the problem. They're doing a fantastic job, and they are processing, they have been processing batteries in the past. It's just this recent... Risk that was identified. I mean there are ships that can't dock because they're still on fire With these types of batteries on them so we can understand This working group. So like I mentioned prior Mima has been working simultaneously with their with EPA on processes regarding natural disasters and then our Abandoned vehicle team has been working on a statewide working group with our existing contractors and our contractors want to continue processing batteries They need to be permitted to do so and that needs to be it's not even a permitting problem. It's a shipping problem So from from my understanding at this point, they're they're designing a safe container of which to hold the batteries to avoid any leachate so that the shipper would be able to then ship it off island and then it can be processed that's what's standing in our way right now um so but then on the other side is we're looking at mima wanting to have a processing facility you know for vehicles that are related to storm debris and okay but there's no current plan for recycle to reuse them locally We've done that through solar backup batteries are very similar to lithium ion batteries. I mean, and we have had a pilot where we ship use panels to Molokai and but we have not done it through with abandoned vehicle or electric vehicles, and there's a different level of volatility there. They go boom, and to me, it's more of a risk.

Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody else have questions? Member Rollins-Fernandez, and then back to Paulton.

okay even though member paulson had her hand up before me she had around two that's why okay okay uh mahalo chair and um mahalo again department so i was looking back for the meeting minutes on um on the initial legislation in 2020. And it was taken up as a budget bill. And so it's a little trickier because it's like really like the meeting minutes is really tucked in there. I wanted to see the discussion and who introduced the bill. And I think the administration transmitted this bill to the council during that time, if I recall correctly. and that was under the Victorino administration because he wanted to offer first like one or two vehicles to be taken to the contractor for removal. Budget director, do you remember if that's correct?

Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Rollins-Fernandez. Yes, I'm trying to remember the discussion around that, but can't recall off the top of my head.

Okay. Mahalo. And then for the department, what is the policy when a vehicle is abandoned on just like the side of the road? Like how is it addressed? And what does the timeline look like? Because as member Uhu Hodgins explained, I've seen the same thing, you know, like vehicles there for months. And when no one does anything, it just like devolves until it's burnt and you see it. And it's just like, it's, it kind of, I think it makes the community, you know, kind of like feel bad about ourselves. Like, ah, we just like just trash our place and we don't even, clean up you know and we have 19 million dollars to like at least clean up on the side the road you know the cars are that are in the bushes you know it's like maybe you can't see it as much but are even more hazardous because it could start a wildfire if it's set on fire after it's like chopped up um but especially for the ones that you just see them abandoned on the side of the road for like for months and then it's is ashes and ashes for a while before it's removed.

Thank you, Council Member Fernandez, Rawlings Fernandez. I'm sorry. So the process, it varies from situation to situation. So for us, you're preaching to the choir because we feel the same way at EP&S and department. And so the processes, if it's a standard abandoned vehicle, we receive a police report, it's tagged and it's towed pretty quickly, like within 48 hours. If the tow company goes there and someone is living in the vehicle, then it has a whole nother process and technically it's not abandoned. If the tow driver goes to the vehicle and it's moved, even if it's moved like 10 feet, then it has to go through the whole tagging process again. If the tow driver goes to the abandoned vehicle and there's debris that is at risk of flying out during towing, then that has to go through its own process as well. So that is just before it actually gets tagged. People can always go to see click fix and then report an abandoned vehicle. So police has to get there and tag the vehicle before EP&S can go there and we can tow it. But if it does get caught on fire, then we're talking crime scene and we can't touch the vehicle until the police are finished with that vehicle.

Okay. And I saw a member, uh, like look up at the same time. I kind of looked, which was like the car is removed immediately because I do see like a sticker on it for a while before. So it's not immediately removed. I mean, I would love for it to be immediately removed after the police report. and then you know like the stickers on it to be told but it's not and and if if we can help to improve that process in any way i would love to help with that

Thank you We may take you up on that because again if someone is tagged the vehicle that the tag will still be on that vehicle Regardless if it has a debris that we have to hold off on or if it's been moved or if it's lived in So even you know of the vehicles that did get tagged immediately, you know We do tow pretty quickly if there's none of those varying factors like if the vehicle has moved or if there's debris in it, for instance, or if it's being lived in. But regardless, you're gonna see a tag on those vehicles.

Yeah, if I didn't see a lot of examples that I'm describing now, then maybe I would take your word for it. But I've seen too many examples that are to the contrary of what is being described right now, especially, like, driving over from Hana, all the east side. Like, it's just like, whoa, that car is still there? And it's just, you know, like...

Thank you. Apologies for the confusion and, you know, the mis... I don't think it's miscommunication. I think we have records of when we get the vehicle report, the police report and how soon it gets towed. So I can provide that data for you and our numbers for you so that you can have more faith in our program that we're actually working to do the best. And then maybe we can move forward with a solution together to see if you folks would be willing to assist with those hurdles that we deal with for the ones that do linger.

Okay, mahalo.

Okay, thank you. Member Poulton, then Member Cook.

For me, I really support the processing facility issue rather than the storing facility for the electric vehicle batteries because, My understanding of MEMA's goal with that is to make those be inert and then we wouldn't need to rely on another entity on the shipping part of it. Because once they're inert, can they just be shipped or it still needs to follow the same protocol?

Thank you for your question. My understanding, and I would confer with Mima because there are more boots on the ground with this process, is that it can be shipped, but it needs to be shipped to a hazardous waste processor.

So my understanding is there's a Redwood place in Nevada that accepts it. So once it is rendered inert, like it's not gonna explode on the transport carrier or whatever, it could be then sent to like Nevada to their facility. like we wouldn't have to go to Honolulu. I mean, odds are we're going to Honolulu, but whatever.

Yeah, I'm not sure about the pathway or I am aware of multiple companies. Yeah, it would be a facilitator such as that one or another one that would win the bid. But yes, we would be able to do that.

So do you know some of the pros and cons? Like if MIMO would like to pursue the processing facility, Are you supportive of doing a processing facility and a holding facility? Or what would be the pros and cons of just doing the processing facility, just doing the holding facility, doing both holistically? What are we considering and which direction are we wanting to go?

Thank you, Council Member. I think this issue at whole, we would have to... examine all the different options and figure out what's gonna be best for Maui County. I don't think I can answer that question right at the moment.

And then I guess for Lanai, I know your majority island owner has fully embraced technology and whatnot. Mr. Ellison deal with transport or offloading of his own EV and for Molokai, is there enough EV cars there that makes it worth it? Because even if we have the processing facility on Maui being a four island jurisdiction, getting those EV batteries to Maui, if that's where the processing facility is, is another whole issue. So just wondering if Molokai has EV disposal needs. I know Lanai is pretty big on EV, but does the owner of the majority of the EVs deal with it himself, or what? I think that's all part of the question of what is best for Mali County as a whole because it's not just like you can drive or bring the thing to one processing facility or one holding facility. They'll need to be at least two. I'm not sure about Molokai if they have choke EV or if that's a thing. Okay.

It's like a handful. It's not like a lot, not like Lanai. But hopefully, you know, Ellison will take care of the equipment he brings to Lanai and dispose of it himself.

I don't know the answer to that. Sorry.

Next we have, are you done? Yeah, I guess that's just another assignment for somebody who understands that assignment. Okay, Member Cook.

Thank you. The 30-day holding period, is there any statistics or tracking of how many people claim it within the 30 days?

Thank you, Council Member Cookie. Yes, we have those details on our annual report and our monthly reports.

and I'm not it's like it's not the total number but the percentage is it a lot a few I'm just saying I understand that the 30-day period is appropriate so if some car gets somebody's working on their car and it gets towed you don't want to trash it but what's the cost of storing them and transporting multiple times etc

From my understanding, I believe we have a $50 a day fee for holding it. Or was it five? There's definitely a five in there. I can get back to you on that.

Cool. So if they claim it, they're paying for the holding times.

They're paying for the storage and the tow of it. And also, if their vehicle does get scrapped and they pay, we do have a bill for the scrapping and the processing of the vehicle as well that's tracked and tied to the registered owner of the vehicle.

Thank you very much for your diligence in this and your flexibility in working with the council. Thank you.

Okay. Members, any other questions? Good discussion. So, Member Palten, your question about the facility and the holding or the processing, right, so we'll send that question to the department. And sounds like the department wants to maintain the $25 fee, which, and the use of it, we'll also explore those uses another day. Get back.

Chair. Yeah. I guess, you know, that would be like an informal request to like in the upcoming budget, maybe we, they, somebody can make a decision, you know, in like which direction that we're going to go in. It would obviously be coordination of MEMA and managing director probably too, but yeah. are we gonna go facility processing, which kind of would be my preference. Maybe there's an opportunity to reach out to Kikipua or someone on Lanai about if they make a processing, then it would be easy to just bring their waste to our processing facility, because otherwise transporting it is the major issue. And once they're all inert, the hazard is much less. I personally prefer prevention before spontaneous combustion, then spontaneous combustion, and then how are we gonna deal with this forever flame situation? So I mean, that would be my, but between now and next year's budget, I don't know if that's enough time, but I think the problem is only gonna get worse. as the existing electric vehicles or hybrid batteries get older, like we're reaching that point already with how many EV batteries were in the bushes already at the last cleanup they did. That's a big... scary thing because at least I guess the benefit is they were disposing of it in one location. Imagine an EV battery in random bushes that we don't know of and then them getting salt water or water and getting compromised and then spontaneously combusting is a big issue.

Thank you. Do you want to say something, Deputy Director?

Thank you, Council Member, if I could comment on that. I think one of the options to explore is to create a storage facility first to neutralize the batteries through the process. And then that would relieve the bottleneck from the public where they have no place to send their car right now, especially for the EVs. And then work on the processing facility, potential processing facility after that. But at least the batteries at that point would be neutralized and not a hazard. Something that we can consider moving forward.

But the storage facility in and of itself isn't exactly neutralizing the batteries. It would just be safely contained.

It could be both. you know, neutralizing it through the process that MIMO uses, because I think that's one of the things they do first, and then store that product, neutralize the battery, and then go from there. That's just an option I was thinking.

Oh, I guess I didn't understand the concept of a processing facility then. I thought the processing facility would be the place where it gets neutralized. Am I mistaken on that?

Well, there's many different factors in a processing.

What was their intention with their processing facility?

I'm thinking of it as neutralizing is just keeping the battery whole, but taking the hazard away where it's not going to spontaneously combust.

I thought Mima's process was to like either submerge it in the brine solution or like drill holes in.

And then there's also processing further from there where you could shred and further processing. That's what I had in mind. Or the further processing part. Yeah, the further processing.

And the holding facility would be the brine solution or drilling holes?

That was just a thought, yes. And maybe safely we could relieve the bottleneck that way.

Okay, yeah, let us know when you guys have a fleshed out plan or if you need legislation or stuff.

Sounds good, finding solutions, working together, I like it. Any other questions, members? Okay, so I'm gonna defer this item also. Appreciate the department, thank you for the hard work and the visionary thoughts, appreciate it. All right, so no other questions at this time. It is now 11.32, and I'm gonna defer this item as a first one, and this meeting is now adjourned.