HomeMy WebLinkAboutPublic Works Dept, FY 2014-15 DEPARTMENTAL BUDGET REVIEWS 3/28/2014 and 4/1/2014
DEPARTMENTAL BUDGET REVIEWS 2014-15
DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS
(Operating & CIP)
March 31, 2014
Department of Public Works—Operating & CIP (ss:dmc)
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The departmental budget review reconvened on March 31, 2014 at 9:05 a.m., and
proceeded as follows:
Department of Public Works— Operating& CIP
Honorable Tim Bynum
Honorable Mason K. Chock, Sr.
Honorable Gary L. Hooser
Honorable Ross Kagawa (excused 1:36p.m.)
Honorable JoAnn A. Yukimura
Honorable Jay Furfaro, Council Chair (excused 3.02 p.m.)
Excused: Honorable Mel Rapozo
Chair Furfaro: Aloha, and good morning. This is March 318t.
We have submitted an order of the day as it relates to calling back from recess the budget
session. Again, for those that do want to give testimony, I will accept testimony in the
morning. On the order of the day, we do have posted the agenda items dealing with Public
Works today and tomorrow will be Capital Improvement Projects (CIP). So on that note
before we start again, is there anyone in the audience who wishes to give testimony this
morning?
LORI L. MARUGAME, Council Services Assistant I: Chair, we have one
registered speaker. Glenn Mickens.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you. Glenn.
GLENN MICKENS: Thank you, Jay. For the record, Glenn Mickens.
I have three testimonies since they do not come on the agenda...or have not been on the
agenda for a long time, this is I guess my chance to go over them. The first one is the bike
path. There have been a multitude of questions about this past site since its inception 12
years ago with no answers forthcoming. Let us review a few. How does the total length of
the path keep changing from the original 23 miles proposed to the reported 16 miles by The
Garden Island in Monday's paper? When the paving our County road 20 feet wide by 1 mile
long will cost about $147,000 then by using the same formula a 10 foot wide path should
cost about $73,000. This path is costing an unbelievable $5 million a mile, over that. For
the one eight of a mile of the Wailua Corridor the cost was $2 million or over $15,000 per
mile. How can that cost per use ever be justified? The State highway project for 2 miles by
Kaua'i Community College (KCC) cost under $1 million a mile when considering the total
material and labor used for the project, which includes off-ramps, curbs, sidewalks,
center dividers and a path? The traffic mitigation this project has accomplished compared
to the cost use benefit from the path is staggering, absolutely no comparison. How does the
use of this path change from a transportation path to satisfy the TE qualifications that say
that the path shall be used for transportation and not recreation to a dog-walking path as
used today. Finally the Councilmember who has pushed this path from the beginning once
said it would take vehicles off the road and lessen the carbon monoxide going into the air.
This has never happened and will never happen as people will continue to use their vehicles
for their transportation needs. Our time, resource, and money should be used to build
alternate roads and not a recreational path that is costing a fortune to build. Where is the
local, State, and Federal oversight to find out where this obscene amount of money is going
to build this path? Why no accountability? Seven, it takes over ten years to build this 7
miles of this path, so if ever completed a big "if' since Fed funds are drying up, it would
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take 30 years or more to complete. Even the Department of Highways that have done a
master plan of the segment of the path from the Nawiliwili to Lydgate have cut the major
part of this project from their plan. Eight, I am not opposed to bike paths per se, but this
path was planned wrong from the beginning and is trying to be retrofitted into an area
already built which is causing outrageous money and delays. Again, insane planning.
Nine, the rules of this path say no motor vehicles shall be permitted on it. Yet, vehicles
drive and park on it by the Kapa'a Neighborhood Center creating a hazard for use and even
has a driveway over there by the Safeway Shopping Center. Let me end by quoting from an
editorial by the retired lawyer Walter Lewis once wrote on 04/13: "we must recognize that
no definitive accounting has ever been given on the cost of the completed portion of the
path, a shameful disregard of the rights of our citizens to know how our government
expends taxpayer funds and the future cost for the completion of the path remain
obscured." For anybody that likes this path, thinks it is great, why is anybody not
concerned about the obscene amount of money that we are spending for it? That is my
biggest complaint.
Number 2, I want to talk about our roads. I have testimony about our roads. Over a
month ago I testified before this Council about the horrendous condition our roads are in. I
even gave copies of my testimony to my friends Larry Dill and Ed Renaud. The roads I
brought have not been touched and I still see cold mix and asphalt concrete (AC) being
dumped and wasted in potholes to be washed away in the next heavy rains. For three years
we did not resurface our roads even though this Council approved the roads resurfacing
budget each of those years. As I told Larry, since our latest contract with Grace Pacific
shows that our roads are finally being done by Hawai`i Asphalt Paving Industry (HAPI) or
American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) standards
which will cost more money up front but save far more money on longevity. This modus
operandi (MO) may be very good. However, I walk and drive all over the Homesteads area
and have yet to see resurfacing of any kind going on. Realistically I know that only the
high-usage, bad-conditions roads will ever get resurfaced. At least if we keep politics out of
the picture is what should be done and since no records were kept on the sub bases of the
paving of these 300 miles of roads or will core holes ever be taken on all of them to indicate
what was previously done? I want to know why Kahuna Road was resurfaced, 2 miles of it,
when it did not need it. The northern part of the road was repaved a few years ago but it is
about 12 feet wide and should have been made wider before resurfacing to build it up to
County Code. A section of lower Waipouli Road and I do not know if you have driven over
that, over a culvert ten years ago a section fell in. The fix was to put a metal plate over the
hole and that is the way it is still today. Not fix the road or do anything about it...but leave
a metal plate over the top of it. Where is the oversight to see that the jobs are properly
done? Let us be realistic, Larry will need had a huge budget to even scratch the 300 miles
of roads that need attention, but people are screaming, read the Letters to the Editor.
There was one in there today a lady wrote about the roads and how bad the condition and
throwing your cars out of alignment. I am not sure if she was completely correct
but...many more have been... About the County roads and State roads that need work. So
what is going to happen? Larry has shown slides of our roads deteriorating to a greater
degree with no proper maintenance resurfacing so action must be taken and soon. Had all
of these roads been properly maintained as I have complained about 15 years there would
not be this huge backlog of work to be done. When a road about 1,000 feet long going into
our Kapa'a Transfer Station that is used by a thousand cars and trucks cannot be
resurfaced, I have complained about this for months, then something is very wrong with
you our system. Finally...
Chair Furfaro: Hold on Glenn, let me change the allocation.
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Mr. Mickens: Okay. This is my last testimony.
Chair Furfaro: I will give you another moment.
Mr. Mickens: Thank you. This is about two-lane and one-
lane bridges. Since there has been no resolution I am aware of to the two-lane bridges
versus the one-lane bridge on Kaua'i, I am compelled to bring this issue up once again. I
fully understand Section 106 of the Federal Code regarding the historical importance of
bridges and this Code must be looked at. But I also have factual statistics from Alvin
Takashita, State Highway Engineer and JoAnn you have a copy of that verified by the
Kaua'i Police Department (KPD) and Glenn Okimoto, Director of Transportation, there are
two times more accidents on one land bridges than there are on two-lane bridges. Can my
friend Larry Dill or anyone else tell me that any law, Federal, State, or local should be
made to have the historical importance override the safety of the driving public? Today the
Feds will not build bridges unless they are two-lanes for safety purposes, so why should we
even consider rebuilding the Pu'uopae and Opaeka`a Bridges one-lane? Sure 106 may have
to be looked at, but when overriding evidence shows that accident rates on these one-lane
bridges are double of what they are on two-lane bridges, then why consider building them
one-lane? Especially since the Feds never build them one-lane today. These two bridges
with issues, Pu'uopae and Opaeka`a go back to 2003 when our late Mayor Baptiste had
them in the final design stages and wanted them built two-lanes, when a group of "feel-
gooders" got the projects stopped because of historical purposes and cost the taxpayer
$189,600. This project was time sensitive and thus the money was forfeited. As we sit here
11 years later, costs continue to escalate senselessly to keep delaying these projects when
again, no one should ever preserve historical importance over safety. If I am wrong, then
someone please tell me why this statement is not true? Look at Section 106 but you
engineers will make the final decision and I cannot believe that the Feds who mandate that
all bridges today be built two-lane would make you build them one-lane. I appreciate you
allowing me to give testimony and I hope that I am not just talking in the wind. I hope that
some of you members will at least consider what I am saying here and again if I am wrong,
tell me where I am wrong or tell me where the statistics are wrong. If you want these
statistics from the Department of Highways and KPD showing the accident rates on these
bridges, I would be happy to provide them to you.
Ms. Yukimura: Question.
Chair Furfaro: JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: Glenn, I heard three testimonies, I only have
two. Do you have one that I do not have?
Mr. Mickens: Yes, I forgot to give you the copy about the
Bypass.
Ms. Yukimura: Could we have a copy of that?
Mr. Mickens: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you.
March 31, 2014
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Chair Furfaro: Any further questions? Thank you, Glenn. Is
there anyone else who wishes to testify today? I will give you your six minutes upfront and
no additional time, please.
JOE ROSA: Good morning, members of the Council, for the
record, Joe Rosa. Again I am here to testify against...to do with the bike path, the road
system, and those two bridges out in Wailua Homesteads. This bike path...ever since that
thing got started, that is when our road resurfacing and reconstruction went down the
drain. Think about it. Go back to when that thing got started. 2004. Isenberg Tract
subdivision, the road was supposed to be paved. What happened? It was shelved like
everything else as far as resurfacing and paving being done. Only for a select few people
and the rest of the majority of the people were always saying we need things to be done
with the infrastructure of this island, namely the County road system. It was in a chaos,
because it was neglected for all of these years with a bike path that goes to nowhere and I
think it should be stopped until the County coffers are built up. It is only for recreation,
that is what it is going to be used for. Not transportation. Doug Haigh sat on this chair
here and said that it is going to relieve the traffic situation in Kapa'a Town and get the
bikes out of the town. I do not see any bikes at all. There was no rationale to the fact to
build these things except for a select few people. At that time, Doug Haigh told me "no
worries" and of course the late Mayor Bryan Baptiste. It was only for a few select people,
not for the majority of the people that always saying that they are choked with traffic or
stuck in traffic. It was only a few people who were satisfied. The bicyclists like JoAnn who
does not even ride her bike today. She was one of the proponents who pushed on it when I
started the first shoulders job which was eventually used as a bike path from KCC to
Halfway Bridge. Where is her bicycle? Where is her bike rack that was built special for her
in front of the County Building here? So all of these things. So it has not proved anything.
You think about it and you look at the traffic jam in Kapa'a Town. I do not know if Mason
Chock was here when it got started, but yet it has not improved the traffic situation. It
took me half an hour to go from the Kapa'a Shopping Center signal light to the one at
Foodland. So that tells you how bad it is yet. People are not being diverted to the bike
path. It is a waste of time and money. I do not know how you can compare the cost on
Kaumuali`i Highway near Kukui Grove over here costing more...sure, that is a four-lane
highway that they are building and that thing is not even going to solve the problems here
in Lihu'e. It was a good road job for Jimmy Tokioka. It is not going to solve the traffic
problem here in Lihu'e. Lihu'e will never be a walking town until they have other alternate
routes out of the town with great roads coming into the town. I think the bike path for the
time being should be stopped right now, because you people are bleeding the people of
Kaua'i with taxes. Property tax, vehicle weight tax, tipping fees, all of that. We are up to
our necks. Stop the bike path for now, right where it is. As the County coffers get built up
again, look into continuing it. Simple mathematics. You think you folks getting a big bang
just spending the people's money. We do not all have deep pockets like some of the
members of the Council or in other committees. Think about it. Just shelf the bike path
where it is, no property tax raises, no tipping fees, no vehicle weight tax.
Now getting back to the roads system. Like I was saying, none of these things that I
hear about taking core samples...the core samples cost money. Go to the files of the County
Engineer's Office and see how wide those roads were built in the 1920's. The majority of
them were 10 feet because I worked on some of the restoration of the roads like Ma'alo
Road. The road was just 10 feet wide. You do not need no test boring to see what it is. Get
the plans out, if it is not in micro film. Get them out and see how wide it is. Every test bore
hole you take costs money. So those are the kinds of things, you people say you do not have
money, we do not have money. Those are the roads that need to be fixed because, like I
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said, that is why this County's roads are all in limbo. The deterioration of the roads itself.
Now, the County is faced with so many liability lawsuits because of the condition of those
roads. Something should be done and be given a priority. Shelf the bike path and fix the
roads first. Do not jeopardize people's lives. Safety comes first, recreation and bike riding
come second.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you, Joe, that was your 6 minutes.
Mr. Rosa: Well I am on another subject, I have another one
to go.
Chair Furfaro: That was your time, 6 minutes.
Mr. Rosa: I thought it was 6 minutes or three minutes for
each subject.
Chair Furfaro: No, let me explain something.
Mr. Rosa: Under your rules, but your rules sometimes... we
come here as the public and spend the time to give you the information.
Chair Furfaro: Joe, let me explain something to you. The
posting started last week. That is a whole Ordinance. Testimony could have been taken
last week. I am making an exception to the rule that as the items move forward, I am
letting people testify on those items that are in the Ordinance, the budget ordinance every
day. I am giving you all 6 minutes. Then again on May 7th when the work is completed,
you folks will have another time to give testimony at 5:00 p.m., public testimony. Now I
will give you one more minute, but I have already made exceptions to the rules. So set it for
one more minute and continue with your testimony for one more minute.
Mr. Rosa: Okay. I will wrap it up. I will jump to Wailua
bridges, Wailua Homesteads, two bridges.
Chair Furfaro: You have one minute, go ahead.
Mr. Rosa: For those two bridges I do not see anything of
historical value except for a group of ladies that drink tea and play cribbage all day,
probably. Those two bridges have no historical value, but when they had a bridge on
Kamalu Road that causes a flood and at that time Stanley Baptiste was on this Council, it
back flooded into his home in Wailua Homesteads. Right away the County did things to fix
them up. Look at the bridge at Kamalu Road, it is not no old bridge that they had that was
dipping down in the road and the water used to go over the road when it goes up mauka.
So those other two bridges, they are not of historical value. I restored two bridges on the
north shore. It was a big liability for the State. After I fixed it up, the residents were
grumbling about it, the late Charlie Ford, when I finished it, they said right on brother,
right on brother...they are a bunch of hypocrites. So you know, safety comes first
Chair Furfaro: Thank you, Joe.
Mr. Rosa: It will save the County and people a lot of
liability suits that are all going on right now in courts. I thank you.
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Chair Furfaro: Thank you, Joe. Is there anyone else who would
like to give testimony today on the agenda items listed for Public Works? A reminder
tomorrow is Public Works-CIP. No other comments? Okay. Mr. Dill, I am going to call you
up for Public Works. You can have anyone from your team. And you can have anyone
from your team, your staff team sit with you, and the order of the schedule today is to hear
from you on the overview of your administration. Then the Engineering Division. Then the
Building Division. Then Road Maintenance. Then we will break for lunch at 12:00 p.m.
today. Then we will go at 1:00 p.m. to the Auto Maintenance Division, Wastewater at 1:30
p.m., and Solid Waste at 2:30 p.m. You have the floor and you may begin your budget
presentation.
LARRY DILL, P.E., County Engineer: Good morning and thank you
Chair Furfaro and members of the County Council. For the record, I am Larry Dill, County
Engineer.
LYLE TABATA, Deputy County Engineer: Lyle Tabata, Deputy County
Engineer.
Mr. Dill: Thank you for going through the schedule today.
I would like to ask the Council's indulgence that as we transition from Division to Division
in making the presentations, that we have a short five minute break in between to allow us
to reconvene and get together up here. If that works in the schedule, I would appreciate
that.
Chair Furfaro: I can make that work.
Mr. Dill: Thank you. I am going to be going through as I
initiate the presentation for the Department of Public Works by touching on some of the
highlights of the budget presentation that is being provided to Council. The Division Heads
will be coming and making their own presentations to you for their respective Divisions to
present their budgets to you for their respective Divisions. One small exception to that rule
is that I will be making the presentation for the Engineering Division. As you are well
aware, we have a brand new Chief of the Engineering Division and so I will be taking the
lead for that presentation. He should be present here for the presentation of course, but I
will be taking the lead on that. Deputy County Engineer Lyle Tabata will be here the
whole day and we have our Public Works Fiscal Officer in the audience to help us answer
any questions that may come up during the presentation. As a general theme today I have
instructed the Division Heads as they come before you to touch on some of the highlights of
their budget. A couple of them will have additional information to elaborate on as they
present to you. Generally speaking they will be touching on some of the highlights of the
budget presentation already provided to you and then we will open the floor for any
questions that you may have. I ask at this point are there any questions or points that the
Council would like to make now?
Chair Furfaro: Larry, I would like to say that as people have
brought up some particulars, I would like to revisit those when the appropriate Division
shows up. For example, Mr. Mickens was talking about a metal plate covering a bridge
hole. I would like to hear from the Roads Division specifically on why that bridge plate is in
place for almost...I think he said seven years. So I do want to make sure that the public
knows we are hearing the testimony, but when we get to that Division, I would like to see if
we could not get some feedback.
March 31, 2014
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Mr. Dill: We will certainly do our best to answer those
sorts of questions. I have told the Division Heads to be prepared for their budget
presentations today. So if there is a particular question that is really not part of the budget
presentation, they may not be able to answer that so readily, but we will be happy to do
that.
Chair Furfaro: If the problem is so glaring and it has been 7-10
years, I sure hope that somebody would have the answers. Mr. Kagawa you have the floor.
Mr. Kagawa: Chair, just to follow-up. On some of those
questions, I agree with Larry. We could perhaps have it in my committee, Public Works
Committee. I would love to have some items that are of importance to the community. I
would really like to stick to the budget and to the reasons why they need these moneys. I
think if we go into a particular situations, then perhaps at the committee level we can dig
deep into it.
Chair Furfaro: I do not disagree with you at all. In fact, if you
would like to get together with Mr. Mickens on his testimony and selectively decide what
you want in Public Works. But I think in particular situations such as a metal plate that is
on a bridge for ten years, I mean, that is a red-flag right away for me and I would like to get
some feedback. So I hope you understand. JoAnn, did you have a question? No? Then
before we go any further, I would like to recognize that the Mayor is in the audience.
Thank you for being here, Mayor. Nadine, Finance Director, as well as the Budget
Manager. Thank you very much for being here. Mr. Rapozo is on an excused family
appointment for today and will not be attending. I will be leaving the meeting at 3:00 p.m.
today and at that point, the next step is Vice Chair of the Committee of the Whole in the
meeting, if that individual is not present, by our pecking order, I will turn it the Vice Chair
of the Council. You have the floor, Larry.
Mr. Dill: I will begin with the budget for the
Administration of the Public Works Department. Much of this report touches on things
that pertain specifically for the Divisions, obviously. The Administration exists to support
and help the Divisions implement their goals. I am going to briefly touch on some of the
things here and leave a lot of the details for when the Division Heads come forward to make
their presentations to you. Engineering Division I will touch on. We have replaced the
Chief of Engineering position with an individual that comes to us with a lot of experience in
the transportation and traffic worlds, which is for the Department of Public Works, is a new
talent that we have not really had in-house before. We are very happy to have him on
board with us and help us in implementing our Complete Streets goals. As you are aware
the Council adopted a Complete Streets Resolution a little while ago and that will help us
implement all the goals of that Resolution.
The Building Division has been working hard on managing projects and updating
and implementing the ePlan Review process as we continue to make strides and set higher
goals for processing building permits. That moves forward still with some hiccups but we
are making progress.
The Roads Division has been making a lot of strides to implement overall policies
and procedures of bringing themselves into the 21st Century. They are making electronic a
lot of their work order system through a computer maintenance and management
information system, as well as road pavement management system in order to create better
records and better plans, programs, and systems for road maintenance.
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Automotive Division continues to do really good work with limited resources in their
shop. They have been recognizing that they are constrained within that site currently and
at least for the moment, there is not a new site to go to. They have developed some ways to
make that site more efficient and make the best use of the space that they have available to
them.
Solid Waste Division, I am proud to say continues to be a leader in the State as far
as waste diversion is concerned. We will be making a lot of investment, time, money,
personnel wise, and seeing some results as far as our waste diversion efforts are concerned.
We are also continuing to work on transitioning to a new landfill site. Two fold...we are
maintaining the Kekaha Landfill, managing that operation while we look for a new site to
develop for the County.
Wastewater Division. A big item to mention is that they have concluded the
expansion and upgrade of the Waimea Wastewater Treatment Plant. A plant that has
doubled in capacity and it has upgraded its treatment level from R-3 to R-1, the highest
grade of treated effluent by the Department of Health standards. This will allow for much
more readily, the use of reclaimed water for our recycled water usage on the west side
where obviously the weather is dry and there are demands on potable water. That will
create both a revenue source for the Wastewater Division as well as lessening pressures on
the County's potable water systems.
Some of the challenges that we have in Public Works...I think the continuity
planning, succession planning, and as people retire are some of the challenges that we
have. Simultaneously, those are also some of the opportunities that we have. As I
mentioned we already had an opportunity to bring on board a Chief of Engineering who
brings a lot of new skills that the Department has not seen before. Where there are
challenges, there are also opportunities to be seen at the same time. We always look at the
regulatory review issues. I mentioned the building permit system, and in the Engineering
Division we have made tremendous strides in reducing the amount of time that we are
seeing things like grading plans, subdivision drawings, grading permits, roadway permits,
in-house and turning those around much, much quicker and a lot of credit goes to the
Engineering Division for making that happen.
Generally speaking of course, we seek to support the objectives of all the six
Divisions in the Public Works Administration and implement the Mayor's Holo Holo 2020
projects and many I will speak to in the CIP presentation. Of course our operating staff
with us.
I think in addition to that I will mention the Engineering Division. You are
probably aware that last summer we saw five retirements...departures of engineers within
a fairly short time frame. Of those five, we have replaced four of the five positions, one of
them was actually converted to a construction inspection position. For some reason
attrition wise prior to our arrival, they had lost a lot of their staffing in the Construction
Inspection Division and we felt it would benefit us the most to convert one of those junior
engineer positions into a construction inspection position. That position has been hired.
There is one vacancy that has not yet been hired. Part of the reason for that is that we
wanted the new Chief of Engineering to make his own assessment of the Division and
decide best how to use that position. We will speak to that a little more during the
Engineering Division position. One thing that I will mention under Engineering is that a
significant goal we have is to create the living streets manual. That will be a major
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component of implementing our Complete Streets vision. So a lot of that work has begun
and again with our new Chief aboard. As well as I will mention...I will not take credit for
it, but I will mention that our Planning Department has a Transportation Planner on staff
working closely with the Public Works Department and both of those positions will be
instrumental in helping us with the living streets manual.
A specific objective of the Building Division as was mentioned is to adopt the 2012
Uniform Plumbing Code. Our Division Chief Doug Haigh plays a key role on the State
Building Council representing the County of Kaua'i and he has contributed a lot to that
group. That group statewide has been moving forward and becoming consistent as far as
what building codes are adopted by the various counties. That will provide for efficiencies
statewide that will trickle down to us as well when contractors know that when they are
bidding on projects that they are having to meet the same building codes regardless of
where they are in the State. So Doug plays a big role in that to make sure that we can keep
consistent with current codes and keep consistent with other municipalities of the counties
as well as the State.
When we get to the Roads Division presentation I will be presenting as requested by
the Chair sort of a 30,000 foot level plan about how we see progression of road resurfacing
plans and a draft funding plan for that as well for the next several years.
I will now speak to...you have in your presentations the operating budget graphs.
Those outlined to you and demonstrate where some of our moneys are currently being spent
and we have an operating budget discussion at the end of every section. In the
Administration's I will touch on some of the reasons for some of the changes that you are
seeing in the budget for the Public Works Administration budget right now. I would say
that the changes are not that significant after the wages and salaries and I know Council is
aware of increases due to Collective Bargaining that have increased those sorts of costs and
also are aware of...and this will be a general theme that wages and salary costs are up
throughout the Department and that the County has made...excuse me...a conscious
decision to fund less than 100% of our OPEB, our Other Post Employment Benefits and so
that will be reflected throughout the Department in the various Divisions.
So specifically in the Administration, you will note at the bottom of page 7...I hope
we all have the same page numbers. In operations an increase of almost $107,000 for
Public Works Administration. And on page 8, the increase in that expense is detailed as a
$30,000 new expense for the annual license fee for the eBuilder application currently being
implemented to manage the County's CIP program. During the CIP presentation tomorrow
I am sure that Mr. Keith Suga, the County's CIP Manager will outline the status of that,
but this $30,000 expense is part of that implementation of that CIP program. We had two
uncollectible grants that contributed to the increase of the Public Works Division this year.
One was a $43,000 expense related to IKilauea Road in 1992. I will not be able to speak to
that specifically and why this money was uncollectible. Our Public Works Fiscal Office
worked with the Department of Finance and this was still on the books for whatever reason
and it was decided it was not appropriate to keep it there. We do not have history to find
out why it is still there and why it was uncollectible and decided to write it off. That is
happening again, as well as a 2001 disaster removal grant of $25,000 that was written off
again as being uncollectible. Being 13 years ago, again I apologize as I do not have the
information on that.
Chair Furfaro: For clarification the first item was $43,000?
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Mr. Dill: Chair those are on page 8 of the budget
presentation. $43,000 in 1992 for something related to Kilauea Road and $25,000 in 2001
related to disaster debris removal.
Chair Furfaro: So what I want to make sure is...that is work
that we are supposed to be reimbursed for that we had not been reimbursed for and
therefore, you wrote that receivable off?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. So it is a write-off of the receivable which
was reimbursable money?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Go ahead, Larry.
Mr. Dill: That completes my presentation for Public Works
Administration.
Chair Furfaro: Let us see if we have any questions at this point
then. Questions on the portion just covered regarding the Administration and Fiscal
Divisions in Public Works? You have the floor, JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: I just want to say something and that is to really
commend you Larry and Lyle and your team Deputy for the real progress that has been
made in Public Works. Some very visible changes in a positive direction and you have
highlighted them. The reduction in permitting time. The reorganization and hiring of new
staff. The R-2 to R-1 in Sewers. So just thank you for your leadership and management.
Mr. Dill: Thank you very much, I appreciate that.
Chair Furfaro: Go ahead, Mr. Kagawa.
Mr. Kagawa: For me, too I did not really have a question, but
want to echo Councilmember Yukimura's. We do not always agree on every decision, but
that is just the nature of the Council and Administration's relationship. I want to thank
you. I think you bring a common sense approach. And you know, you get the job done. I
just want to thank you for the work we have done together as Committee Chair of the
Public Works Committee. So I wanted to thank you.
Mr. Dill: Thank you very much. I appreciate it. I also do
want to say Lyle and I are here as the leaders of the Department, but there are a lot of guys
that are not here today who are working hard to make all of this happen. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Larry just on your overall administration in
Public Works, two comments from me. When we get to them, I want to thank you for
responding to the query about the progressive improvements on overtime, especially as it
relates to Solid Waste and Public Works. I have gotten the responses from you all and Lyle
today and you can definitely see the progression being made. The other one I want to thank
you for is also giving a continuity plan some thought about identifying as we go through
these increments of retirement, but more importantly identifying high-achievers in
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replacement. Job well done. Thank you very much. Any other questions as it relates to
the Administration portion of Public Works? If not, Larry I would like to go right into the
Engineering Division.
Mr. Dill: Thank you. I will ask our new Chief of the
Engineering Division to introduce himself.
MICHAEL MOULE, Chief of Engineering: Good morning everyone, I am
Michael Moule the new Chief of Engineering and I have seen you here a few times now. I
have not had a chance to speak to you much and I will not be speaking much today. I look
forward to next year, perhaps, in presenting the budget information directly. Since I just
arrived, the budget was put together by Larry and others in the Department. So I am not
as familiar as they are. So they are making the actual presentation this morning. Thank
you.
Chair Furfaro: Michael Moule? Ccould you give us just a real
quick briefing of your background?
Mr. Moule: Absolutely. My background is that I
started...started my career at the Oregon Department of Transportation. So I am a Civil
Engineer with most of my career focused on transportation issues. I worked in bridge
design, as well as road design, but spent the bulk of my time in their pedestrian and bicycle
program, making sure that we implement what is your...the nation's first Complete Streets
bill which was not called that at the time, but from 1971 Oregon has had a law requiring all
projects to include walking and biking facilities. I then became the City Traffic
Engineering for Ashford, North Carolina and spent three years there. Since 2002, I have
been a consultant. Six years in Oregon and then three years in North Carolina and since
2002 I have been a consultant. Mainly for eight years on my own. I have had my own
company called Livable Streets, Inc. Then I joined a company called Nelson Nygaard four
years ago and I moved back to the west coast. I was in Tampa for a while when I was
consulting on my own. I joined here a month and a half ago and I am glad to be back in the
public sector here on Kaua`i and enjoying the island life so far. My expertise is primarily in
transportation. A lot in Complete Streets issues designing for walking and bicycling, but
general road design issues as well. I have done other types of civil engineering in the past,
storm water especially and I am re-learning a lot of things related to other aspects of civil
engineer since I have been mainly focused on the transportation side for the last twelve or
several more years. It has been great so far and I have had great support from Larry and
Lyle and others in other Departments. As well as other people in the Public Works
Department and I am looking forward to working with the County for the foreseeable
future.
Chair Furfaro: We are delighted to have you with us and you
will find even when it is difficult here on Kaua`i, it is still the best place to be. So welcome.
Welcome.
Mr. Moule: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Larry, who is going to continue the presentation?
Mr. Dill: That would be me. Thank you and, as much as I
want to acknowledge Michael for his coming on board and he is knee-deep in the issues of
the Division already I would be remiss if I did not recognize Stanford Iwamoto who joined
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us a year ago when our Chief of Engineering, Wally Kudo retired in August. Stanford was
the guy that was a temporary assignment into that position for several months and did
Yomen's work in more than just keeping things afloat. He kept things moving and
improving the Division. With Michael on board, Stanford is still in a position of leadership
in the Division, helping his Section moving forward as well. My thanks to Stanford for all
of his work as well.
I will read some points as well from the Engineering Division report. Starting with
the mission...the mission of the Division is the protection of the public's health, safety,
property and the environment through proper planning, development, maintenance and
operation of the County's infrastructure and administration of sediment and erosion
control measures, storm water run-off systems, driveway approaches, and land use codes
and ordinances. Listed in the presentation are several of the successes and achievements of
the Division for this past year. They played a key role in the building permit application
process having reviewed 500 of those applications for compliance with County drainage and
flood ordinances in the past year. In addition, grading permit applications...25 of them and
50 road permit applications. The Division is also responsible for managing and inspecting
some of our CIP projects. For instance Kamalu Road is a project that was completed this
year and we are in the final stages of completion. We did that design work in-house also.
With the presence of folks like Michael and Stanford and some new younger staff engineers,
we are enhancing the ability in the Engineering Division, to do more in-house engineering
projects. We are excited not only to be able to manage and outsource more projects, some of
the bigger ones...some of the smaller ones we can get done more efficiently and quicker and
less expense to the County by having some of our in-house staff engineer those projects. So
we are excited about expanding that capability in the Engineering Division. Some of our
other ongoing projects is the Hanapepe Parking Lot. The project is completed. The project
will be advertised very soon and the construction should be complete by this summer.
Consultant design is on-going for some of our projects, including the Kapahi Bridge, Koloa
Road Safety Improvements, Puhi Road Construction...I am not going to go into a lot of
detail because a lot of these will come up in the CIP. Consultant design for the Lae Road
Guardrail Improvements will be completed and that will be going to construction this year.
Consultant design for a number of projects listed there in front of you and I will not go into
detail again as those are construction also. Also some design services going on. In-house
projects...I mentioned that we did some in-house design for the Automotive Shop to support
one of our sister Divisions in the Public Works Department. Wailana Bridge, we are close
to going out to bid. That is the pedestrian bridge adjacent to the Wailana Bridge down in
Koloa at Anne Knudsen Park. That bridge has been closed for quite a while now. That is
something we are going out to bid soon and going to construction by hopefully this summer.
Also as you are aware we received approval for funding of resurfacing projects that we are
using Federal Highway Funds for three of our Collector Roads in the Kapa'a area. That is
Mailihuna, Hauaala, Olohena Roads. Improvement of those roads will tie nicely and
support our efforts for Safe Routes to Schools improvements we are doing up in the area
where there is I think five roads that intersect just mauka of Kapa'a High School. So these
projects will be supporting that other project in that area as well.
Chair Furfaro: May I ask you to repeat the names of those
Collector Roads that you are doing that work on one more time, please?
Mr. Dill: Sure that is Mailihuna, Hauaala, and Olohena.
Some of the challenges as I mentioned earlier, we had five engineers depart from the
Engineering Division all in short order last summer. We have replaced a majority of those
and they have been working very well for us. We have been managed to picked up some
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very strong staff. We are excited about that as well. Nevertheless that shortage of staff
that occurred for a while did create a problem for us in trying to keep up with our day to
day operations. I think than we have more than kept up now and we are actually moving
ahead. I am happy to mention that.
The Engineering Division is made up of regulatory compliance as we call it and
project management because the Division is responsible for managing many of the County's
CIP projects. The CIP management workload was spread thin in the past but as we now
staff up again, that is helping us to get more done in the project management arena. So
generally speaking some of our goals for the Engineering Division, as always the protection
of public health and safety by planning and developing safe and cost-effective roadway and
drainage systems, protection of public safety and assurance of high-quality of life by
administrating and enforcing subdivision grading and drainage ordinances and regulations,
protection of public safety and investment through effective project development, improving
the efficiency of maintenance of County facilities, roadways, and drainage systems, and we
continue to improve our in-house design capabilities, improve our regulatory review process
to streamline it and make it quicker essentially, and also to implement a Complete Streets
principles in the work that we do.
So having said that, page 24, shows the graphs and tables that summarize operating
budget for Fiscal Year 2015 as compared to Fiscal Year 2014. The budgets are very similar
actually, not very many changes at all. I will mention on page 25 salary increases due to
Collective Bargaining and decreases in benefits was due to a decision to short fund the
OPEB costs. We had a vehicle lease that we finished paying off. So no lease payments in
Fiscal Year 2015. But overall, as I mentioned not a lot of changes to the Engineering
Division budget for this year. That concludes my presentation for Engineering. So I would
be happy to entertain any questions.
Chair Furfaro: Any additional comments by the other two
gentlemen before we open up for questions? Is there anything that you would like to add to
Mr. Dill's report? If not, Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: Good morning. Mr. Moule, welcome to the
County of Kaua`i. I want to start by recognizing the position that you filled was for many
years staffed with a key County person, Wally Kudo, who for many years did service to the
County of Kaua`i. That change is huge for the County given his history. I will recognize
that the Division has been through a wholesale change. I know you are rebuilding and you
have piqued my interest about smaller projects being done in-house. As Larry knows, I
have a long history of looking at pukas in our transportation networks, particularly related
to pedestrians and I have a history of lobbying for smaller projects to fill the...let us do
what we can and not wait for this huge thing...I applaud that. My questions are more
about Complete Streets, things are zooming and going great in this County. Maybe that is
part of what attracted you here. It is an opportunity to do smart things in a rural
community. You mentioned you have history in storm water and storm water falls under
engineering Larry?
Mr. Dill: Yes, the engineering and regulatory facet of it.
Mr. Bynum: And maintenance under roads?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
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Mr. Bynum: The other thing that I am really interested in is
that the County do whatever we can to provide stewardship of the watershed and any
waters that flow into the ocean. I have learned about things that we can do to capture more
water and not let it run-off and things that we can do with water that runs off and catches
sediment...there are not big fans generally of engineering or the Engineering Division but
Public Works in general because they require maintenance, right? Catchments catch
sediments before they go into the ocean and if you do not clean them out, right? I am very
interested in those issues and think that there is a lot that we can do by every time
thinking about what we can do with this maintenance project? What can we do with this?
Is that the kind of thing you are talking about in being able to look at small projects and do
them in-house?
Mr. Dill: There will be quite a wide variety of projects.
They will include what you are talking about, some of the things, I guess, on my thoughts
are guardrail plans should be fairly simple, straightforward plans. Culvert improvement
plans we should be able to do the hydrology and hydraulics, and then do a civil drawings.
Small street improvements sort of plans, things like that. That will be the beginning of
those sorts of things.
Mr. Bynum: I want to stick with storm water for a minute.
We have done a great job of creating a culture and environment around our transportation
network that looks comprehensively at it. All that credit goes to the Mayor and you guys,
and Lyle and the Council, all of us have adopted that and we have created a different
culture and every project that we do we think about that first. I want to know how we can
create that culture around storm water and watershed run-of. I notice with the bike path, I
did not even know this, but I was driving down and was out there a couple of times this
week, great maintenance in Kapa'a and I am very, very impressed. That is the Parks
Division I guess. I am sorry, I kind of lost my train of thought. How do we create this
culture around environmental stewardship of the water and hardscaping...l saw permeable
concrete on the highway and I did not know that was part of our plan and somebody took
initiative to could that. Thank you very much. That is the kind of culture I am thinking
about and how do we create that in Public Works? Do you take the lead on that, and give
us environmental stewardship through good engineering or do we take the lead?
Mr. Dill: I would think that Public Works would take the
lead on that, together with our Roads guys. Whenever we implement these things often as
you have mentioned they include a maintenance component and more maintenance means
more pressure on the Roads Division to keep up with the work that they have to do. But
nevertheless these are good goals to have and like many other things we need to make sure
that we apply our resources as efficiently as we can. I would say that Public Works and
Engineering Division will be taking the lead on a lot of those things...implementation. The
bike path is a good example of permeable concrete. One thing that is new for the County of
Kauai is the catch basin that they are using. This is a special type of design catch basin
which is specifically designed to capture debris before it is sent off to the ocean. The great
thing is that it captures that debris and stops it from being sent off. Of course that means
somebody has to go in and maintain those things. We are working more closely between
Engineering and Roads to make sure that the things that we are proposing on the
construction side, that Roads is familiar with and understands the maintenance aspects of
those sorts of things.
Mr. Bynum: I am going to stick with this for one second and
then yield the floor, because I am sure there are other questions. What really got...one of
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the things that got my attention...I have been attending these Smart Growth conferences
for years now but a few years ago I started changing my attention to finance and storm
water runoff and other issues...not so much the streets and other issues because Smart
Growth is a much larger issue in principle in planning. I do not want to belabor this but
there is a bunch of things that we can do to be better environmental stewards of the
watershed. We are causing huge problems in the environment now by not managing that
well. That is not a criticism, because that is the history, but the world has changed on
these levels too, do you agree?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: So Mr. Moule, I am looking...I see your
background the last ten years have been really focused on transportation. That is awesome
with Lee there and the kind of collaboration that is happening between Departments. It is
a fun place to be, I think as a civil servant. But I am looking for your expertise on these
other environmental engineering kind of issues. Thank you.
Mr. Moule: You are welcome. I will briefly add on the issue
of storm water and retention and filtering. That is something that we are already working.
You probably saw the Civic Center project. It is not our project but the Building Division
where they had the flow in planters and all of that. Two projects that are already managed
by Building as well right now, Hardy Street and Eiwa Street...we are planning similar, and
I am working with them on similar ideas as well with flow through planters trying to filter
out that storm water before it goes to the ocean. We do not yet have in place any sort of
standard yet, but as we continue to work on projects we will continue to look for those
opportunities. As we develop the living streets manual that Larry talked about and update
our drawings we will be thinking about those things and trying to get those elements in,
along with the Complete Streets. I call them "green street elements" as they relates to the
streets which is our rights of way. The other aspect of storm water issues are as they relate
to private development projects. That is another big issue. It is not our specific
responsibility as far as what we own as the County, but we review their grading and all of
that. That may be an area that we can talk about changes to those standards too. That is
probably a little further down the road.
Mr. Bynum: Our Building Division has been a strength of
planning and project management in the Division. My assumption is that Engineering is
going to beef up that portion with this new leadership team coming in as well. Thank you
very much. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Vice Chair Chock.
Mr. Chock: Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to welcome
Michael as well. I got to spend Saturday morning with him this past Saturday on the form
base code. I like the way he thinks. We had a chance to move things around on our own
community development project. I am looking forward to...it is good to have just with the
background that he shared and all of the expertise that you bring, I am hoping and what I
would like to hear that Kaua`i is your home. I did not hear why you came to Kaua`i, but
that you will be here for a while, particularly because we have a shortfall in your
Department and I would love to hear more about what brought you here to stay. In
regards to the vacancies of engineers if you could explain where we are with that in this
budget presentation? As I do see a 2.2% increase in the salaries and how that might be
attributed? Thank you.
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Mr. Dill: Sure. The increase in salaries is due to the
increase...due to the Collective Bargaining Agreements that happened. That is why you
are seeing that increase. As far as vacancies I mentioned that last summer we lost five
engineers all about the same time. We replaced four positions and essentially we have one
funded vacancy right now. There are, I think we have a dollar funded engineer position
which was dollar funded in 2011. That continues to be dollar funded. There is only one
engineering position that remains vacant and funded. That became vacant last year. We
do plan on filling it. I mentioned briefly that we wanted to get our Chief of Engineering on
board to have him give input on how that position is used. One of the things on Michael's
long list of things to do is to assess his Division which he has been doing. We have plans to
get together in the future to assess those plans and make those decisions and recruit for
that position.
Mr. Chock: Could you share which position?
Mr. Dill: It is 1427. That is the Engineering Program
Administrator position.
Mr. Chock: Yes. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: JoAnn?
Ms. Yukimura: Mason mentioned Saturday and I just want to let
everybody know that one evidence of Mr. Moule's commitment along with Larry and Lyle is
the fact that they spent Saturday morning from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at a form based code
workshop, which was very, very good and that was sort of beyond the call. In terms of
compliments or acknowledgments, I am sure you want to hear this positive feedback. The
Civic Center that was mentioned, which is mainly the parking lot on the Post Office side of
the Civic Center is a beautiful job. To hear that it incorporates some environmentally
sound provisions or features as well is very exciting. I never thought I would say that a
parking lot looked nice, but it really is with the native plantings, the accessibility features,
it is very, very nice. Kudos to the Administration for that. Also thank you for navigating
the uncontrollables like the resignations and retirements to use it as an opportunity to
select high-quality people because high-quality people are really the key to high-
performance organizations. Thank you for doing that. My question, the Hanapepe
Parking Lot, is that the one in old town Hanapepe? That is wonderful to hear. Thank you
for that work. The Wailana Bridge improvements, you say by Anne Knudsen Park. Is that
the one in Koloa Town itself?
Mr. Dill: It is actually on Maluhia Road. The bridge is on
Maluhia Road as you leave the park and head towards Koloa Town on the east side of the
road. Right past the tennis courts, you cross the bridge. There is a pedestrian bridge there.
Ms. Yukimura: I understand now, that has been closed?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: That will be done soon?
Mr. Dill: Yes. This summer we anticipate construction will
be complete.
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Ms. Yukimura: Excellent. I noticed that you do not really have
objectives in your goals and objectives. Like specific time, deadlines, and accomplishments.
I have a feeling that you have a lot of them, but I do not know... maybe they are in the form
of projects.
Mr. Dill: All of the projects have goals and timeframes
associated with them. Because the Division has been somewhat in a state of transition for
the last several months you may not see as much as you would like to see in that regard. I
hope to see under Mr. Moule's direction, the next time around we will see a lot of that sort
of thing.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Very good. Thank you. Looking forward to
that. Welcome on board Michael.
Chair Furfaro: Other questions for engineering?Mr. Kagawa?
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you, Chair. Welcome, Michael. You
know, the Engineering Division, they oversee, like flood permits, right?
Mr. Moule: Right.
Mr. Kagawa: I know that we went back and forth about a
couple...I guess flood permit applications that were stuck. I am wondering if we are kind of
looking to improve that? I have heard before it is what it is as far as we have to follow
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) standards, what have you. I do not know
if you have any plans to look at how we can find some type of compromise, where it is not
too extreme? To build a house should not be like a bomb shelter, you know? So I do not
know if you have any thoughts.
Mr. Dill: I will speak to that one. The County is
responsible for managing its flood plain management ordinance, so it is in compliance with
the national flood insurance programs required by the Federal Emergency Management
Agency. We do that in order to make sure that our County remains in compliance with
those things, so then we qualify for subsidized flood insurance on our residents' policies.
Now FEMA of course is very interested to make sure that we are in compliance with their
requirements and so they visit us every so often and do a CAV, a community assistance
visit. They go through our files pretty thoroughly to look at how we are managing flood
issues. In our most recent visits they have gone through things from decades ago and
brought up some concerns at times and I am being a Monday-morning quarterback and
making assumptions about why decisions were made back then, but I think attempts were
made to be flexible for folks and FEMA said you cannot do this and you have to comply with
the requirements. So many of the times and I do not disagree with it, because it appears
that sometimes we are kind of being heavy handed with those things, but at the end of the
day, it is first and foremost our job to make sure that we maintain our compliance in order
to get the subsidized flood insurance premiums on behalf of the County. I will agree with
you that we look for opportunities to do that and be flexible with people, but we need to be
careful.
Mr. Kagawa: I understand that. The bottom line, if you live in
a flood zone, it should not be to the point that our residents...the rules have become so
strict if you have a flood zone property that comes to the point that you cannot build there,
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because you are in the flood zone. Going forward, if we could just take a look at that,
because we have so much...we are covered by rivers and ocean and to make it more
reasonable, I would appreciate it. Otherwise our attitude is going to be, if you have a flood-
zone property, do not even think about building this and I think at some point we want to
just keep working with the Federal government and see if we can get some kind of
compromise.
Mr. Dill: I understand what you are saying, it is difficult
and I believe there is a statement in the flood plain ordinance it is a stated goal of the
County to direct development away and out of flood zones. So that is always our first
choice, no development in flood zones, but of course as you know there are ways to develop
in a flood zone if they meet certain criteria. I will just repeat it is very difficult for us to be
"flexible" on some of those.
Mr. Kagawa: I understand. In those times that they come and
evaluate, if you could just discuss our residents' situation because it is a fact of the matter,
not everyone can afford to build out of the flood zone and I think there are some areas that
are considered "flood zone," that is really great as a flood zone, but some people draw the
maps and say you are in a flood zone or you are not. I think some are really not in a flood
zone, but considered a flood zone.
Mr. Dill: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Larry, we are coming up on wrapping up our
time on the Engineering portion, but since there has been the discussion of form-based code
and how important it is, associated with the implementing Smart Growth, I have a packet
here that Yvette has prepared for me and I would like to make sure that you had this
available at your community desk, so that communities who want to get involved
individually have an opportunity to understand how form-based codes work and creating
very livable communities and being in balance with zoning and building, as well as the
public participation is very important as well. So if I could just...in your Divisions make
some of this material available for the public? Hearing it and not being able to go to a
worksheet or go to a work session, you know, we do want the public to be able to
understand that the parameters that you are setting in the Engineering Department going
forward, if I could ask that, I would really appreciate it.
Mr. Dill: Okay, thank you, I would be happy to.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, we are about 15 minutes over our time for
Engineering. Any final questions from anybody? If not, Larry, thank you very much.
Gentlemen, thank you very much. I think we will go to Buildings next. Do you still want
that 5 minutes?
Mr. Dill: Since the speaker will not be myself, but Mr.
Haigh, we will roll right into the next one.
Chair Furfaro: Okay.
DOUGLAS HAIGH, Chief of Building: Good morning, Doug Haigh,
Department of Public Works, Building Division. I am here this morning to present our
budget for Fiscal Year 2015. The mission of the Building Division is to oversee code
enforcement, facility development, building and construction maintenance, and janitorial
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services. All these programs are responsible for providing the people of Kaua`i with safely
constructing public and private facilities and well maintained County facilities.
Successes and achievements. We have completed the Lydgate Kapa'a Biycycle
Pedestrian Path Phase B. We also took care of Phase A also. We do have a few more punch
list issues with Phase A then Phase B. We are very proud that we have completed those
projects. We extended the bike path from the Lihi to the Foodland/Safeway pedestrian
bridge. We are incorporating that pedestrian bridge as part of the bike path project. With
that, we acquired $400,000+ in soft match, which gave us over $1 million of Federal moneys
to continue to build the bike path. Phase A, we went from Wailua Bridge...river bridge, to
the end of Papaloa Road. Along Papaloa Road, we incorporated Complete Street ideas and
concepts and did quite an upgrade and provided a pedestrian bicycle access where there
never was one before. We are now ready for the final gap to get us connecting from Lydgate
Park to Kuna Bay. That will be the Waipouli area going from Waipouli Beach Resort to
Papaloa Road. We completed the Lihu`e Civic Center site improvements as you mentioned
earlier. Excited about that. It was...the planning for this project at least ten years. Part of
the Lihu`e Civic Center site improvements. We did a master plan many years ago,
environmental assessment, and we were finally able to move forward with this small step.
We plan to continue that on Eiwa Street. We have incorporated further improvements in
the electronic plan review in partnership with Information Technology (IT). We have
challenges there and I will mention that and I will go right into that.
Electronic plan review has been a challenge to implement. We are in the process of
interacting with the users to find out what the issues are and we are looking at upgrading
the system in the near future.
Some of our challenges have been to fill vacancies in a timely fashion. We were
fortunate in the Code Inspection side to be able to use our Revolving Fund to be able to fill
an Assistant Building Inspection position so when we had retirements, we were able to go
right in with a trained person to fill that position. That has been very helpful. Managing
multiple projects with minimal staff. Basically we have one full time project manager and
two part time project managers managing all the Building Division projects, including our
operations funded maintenance major projects. That is a challenge.
Goals and objectives. Take care of our buildings, stay current on the codes, provide
adequate training, development of our staff, maintain clean facilities, repair and maintain
our facilities, and manage construction projects for the County of Kaua`i. Specific goals and
objectives...to complete the Hardy Street Improvement Project which includes relocating
the Lihu`e Bus Stop, which would have us do some improvement to Eiwa Street. We are
going to try to incorporate that in the Hardy Street project. We are going to complete the
Lydgate Kapa'a Phase A 100% and then Lydgate Kapa'a Phase C and D is our number one
priority for bike path projects moving on. We hope to start construction on the Pono Kai
seawall— Moana Kai seawall. We have had tremendous regulatory hurdles to get over. It
is not hurdles in completing work, it is hurdles waiting for decisions. Both the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers and Department of Health regulator processes, when we go into a 401 or
404 permit, which are permits that touch bodies of water...we are talking years, not months
when you deal with Federal or State review of those projects. We have been frustratingly
and continually delayed as we are waiting for permits.
Also a goal and objective is to do better and new performance metrics and improve
upon them. Challenges include finding staff time to work on such. When we have limited
staff taking care of current need it is hard to allocate staff to do better metrics because we
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are taking care of the fires day-to-day. Looking at our budget, basically this was a no-
change budget. Those were our marching orders and we follow our orders. On the Building
and Inspection side the only change is some increase in operational salaries and benefits
directly related to the union agreements to give the first pay raise in four years. So that is
pretty much Building and Inspection.
Operationally, we did cutback our operational projects considerably. Part of that is
the Parks Department has greatly strengthened their ability to manage small projects. So
we have shifted some of the small projects that normally we would manage to the Parks
Department. So that has greatly reduced our operational maintenance projects and due to a
very tight budget we did not pursue other projects. So we are doing some deferred
maintenance, but the reality is that we need some time to catch up on existing projects that
we have. We have three CIP projects that we have been struggling with to get done on the
operational... they are more operational-type projects. Now with a low-budget year that
will hopefully give us time to catch up and get that done. We are hoping that we may be
able to have time to look at some of this metric work. But we will see. Part of our problem
is that our buildings are getting a little more complex with our energy management
systems, with our security systems, our key systems, and our maintenance supervisor. The
Maintenance Section, Management Building Facilities Manager is having to spend a lot of
time on those type of technical issues which really he cannot delegate. So therefore, that
gives us a lot less time to do the basic maintenance project management work. We have
been trying for years to get additional staff and particularly looking at succession issues
because we know we have a potential hole there. With the current fiscal condition, that is
not possible at this time.
Janitorial Section, primarily we are looking at pretty much the same budget. We
are looking at an increase in utilities. Actually the last two years we have been struggling
meeting our electric bill and last year we deferred one month of bills into the next fiscal
year and that has had consequences because we only budgeted for one fiscal year. It is a
challenge for us to meet our electrical bills and we do creative things to do that because we
have to pay them. This year we did increase our electrical budget to $1.6 million. So that is
a challenge really on the Janitorial side. Our Janitorial Staff are really doing good work
and we are getting them the tools that they need in order to do that work. So they are
doing a lot of carpet-cleaning, floor refinishing, that type of work. The staff is real flexible
and we are very pleased with how the Janitorial Division is going, but it does require
equipment and materials to do that. We were not able to cut back on that side. We need to
continue. Just to touch base on the utilities a little bit. We are looking at...we are working
with the Engineering Division and the Office of Economic Development to try to improve
upon our energy efficiencies. Right now we are looking at the Lihu`e Civic Center as one of
our main electrical users. We have budgeted a replacement chiller, but we are coordinating
with the Engineering Division and Office of Economic Development, Energy Division to do a
thorough analysis of our mechanical systems at the Lihu`e Civic Center in regards to our
energy use basis. Rather than go in and replace an existing chiller we want to do a full
analysis of our existing system and this also ties in with the Piikoi Expansion Project. We
do not want to look at that mechanical system in isolation. We need to look at the entire
facility and potential energy savings, because when you reduce your energy use, a lot of
times, especially in lighting, you reduce your heat load and that affects your mechanical
system. So we are looking at the whole system together to try to make the best decision to
have the most energy efficient system we can get for the Lihu`e Civic Center. We have
funded for the chiller but it is very possible once we complete our energy analysis, there
may be some adjustment on what size and the type of chiller we will actually get. We are
going to really focus on putting energy efficiency as our number one goal for the Lihu`e
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Civic Center. It has always been, but we now have some resources in getting some
professional assistance in helping us to move forward with that goal. That kind of sums up
what I have to present today on the Building Division budget and I am happy to answer
any questions that you may have.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. It has been a happy day until this point.
So I am glad to hear that you are happy to answer any questions. But here comes some
bullets from me. When was the last time that we got a building report update?
Mr. Haigh: It has been way overdue.
Chair Furfaro: It is 13 months overdue. Now I take particular
interest in the building report because it is one way that we can trigger how long permits,
for what rationale, by various departments? Whether it is the Health Department and so
forth have been languishing in the Building Division. That is one use. Number 2, it also
gives us an indication on the permits that we are issuing for building, that there is a new
opportunity for some potential revenue, because once that improvement is put on the
building, on the land, the fact of the matter is that there is a new assessment, which
generates new revenue to us. I think you know, Doug, that in 2004, I worked very hard
with Building to re-design that for information that was needed and it is designed after a
particular group of booking tickets that says when the permit went out and when certain
deposits are required, etc. It has just gone dormant on us. We or at least I have spoken to
Larry casually about the fact that we are so far behind. Is there a reason that we are that
far behind on the building report for the Council? It does have value for us. Are we
missing a person? Did someone retire? What happened there?
Mr. Haigh: There has been a sequence of events...I have
been putting my attention to it periodically, trying to get it to move forward again.
Originally it was software/technical issues. Then now we have a situation of a long-term
disability...well, industrial accident impacting our clerical services and the clerical position
working on that report. So we are operating one person short in our clerical side and I have
put the priority on processing permits. We know this is something we need to get on and
the Administration has made that clear.
Chair Furfaro: Could you put something in writing that
indicates what your plan is to get people cross-trained or get us current? I want you to
know it has a lot of value for us. It helps us forecast. So if you can and I am corrected, the
Staff just told me it has been 11 months since we got a report, March of 2013. So I also
would like to ask you where are we on the status of Eiwa Street here and to kind of improve
some of this image of blockades and so forth? Where do we stand on what we agreed on
doing for a period of feedback on the recommendation? At the same time, it would not hurt
me to complement you on responding to the Joe Rosa suggestion about the one-way turning
arrow. That is very much appreciated. Where are we at on this study on Eiwa Street.
Mr. Haigh: My boss would like to respond to that.
Mr. Dill: Chair we have just sent over and I have received
confirmation on April 9th is an update that we will talk about the Eiwa Street Plan, the
Hardy Street Project, and overall Complete Streets-Transportation issues as it relates to
the whole Lihu`e Town Core Plan. You will see Public Works, Planning, and the
Transportation Agency together making that presentation April 9th. On the evening of
April the 9th is scheduled a public informational meeting on Hardy Street that we will be
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able to update the public. Two weeks later, April 23rd we will have a couple of follow-up
traffic resolutions after we have had a chance to present to Council and got public input. I
apologize and appreciate your patience. We have that on an upcoming agenda.
Chair Furfaro: That just came over requesting April 9th?
Because I do not think I have seen it.
Mr. Dill: I just talked to one of your staff and we just sent
it over Friday and I have received hopefully confirmation that April 9th we are on for the
update.
Chair Furfaro: Acceptable. That is fine. One other question
here along this line and I want to ask you, have we put in the electric meter for the
Historical Society yet, so that they can pay their own electric bill and if not, have we
rationalized what we should be increasing their share of the bill to be? Has that happened
yet?
Mr. Haigh: We have not moved forward on a sub meter for
the Historical Society. Part of the reasoning for that, we have isolated most of their plug
loads to a separate panel. So it would not be that difficult to do it. We have a centralized
air conditioning system. So if we just do the electric it would not catch the air conditioning.
Chair Furfaro: They have other chilling facilities that deals with
their archival system. That runs 24 hours, 7 days a week. I will send over another request,
but I would appreciate some individual discussion. Because it is tough to be trying to
measure our performance on electricity over here, knowing that we have the Historical
Society components attached to us. Again, this is a request from the Chairman. I take you
guys serious and I hope you take me seriously. That would be very, very much appreciated
because it is a fixed amount that has not gone up even in the negotiated lease for years. We
need to do that.
Mr. Haigh: We will be...I mean we will work with the
Department of Finance on the lease issues. If it is appropriate to increase their utility
amount and we will provide the Department of Finance whatever information.
Chair Furfaro: I have gone over it. It is appropriate. You just
have to have some electrical engineer-type estimate the kilowatt hours that they are using.
Again, they ran Saturday, Sunday, 24 hours for their collection. It is really important that
we be fair, but at the same time, let us be just. So April 9th I look for the letter on the other
piece, for you folks to be on the agenda. You will respond to us about where we are at with
the building reports? Because again, we use it to forecast potential revenue. So then the
Historical Society and Eiwa Street. Those are a couple of big ones because we have the
celebration of the building coming up in another 45 days or so. So I would like to know
where we are at. I think JoAnn had her hand up first.
Mr. Kagawa: I had a question.
Chair Furfaro: Then Mr. Kagawa and then I will come back to
you, how is that? Mr. Kagawa.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you, Chair. First of all, I would like to
state that it has been...I do not know how long since we have closed Eiwa Street. I
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continue to agree that based on talks with the community, because we are public servants, I
still disagree with the permanent closure of Eiwa Street. But it is what it is. I do not know
where we are going from here, but I think that both walkability and what have you can be
achieved by continuing to let cars travel on this street. I think we are yet to see the true
relationship, I guess, with traffic and just having to turn here. Because I think right now
much of the concern is happening on the main highway. They are just plugged there, so
they are not grumbling about here. I think at some point we do not want to create traffic
congestion, if we can avoid it and definitely one major route being taken out does not help.
But anyway, that continues to be my belief. Regarding the building permit system that is
the third goal in "successes and achievements." Doug has electronic filing of permits...have
you seen some fruits of success as far as being able to electronically get everybody to look at
things all at once?
Mr. Haigh: Not as much as we had hoped. There are
certainly improvements associated with electronic plan review, but we have discovered a lot
of challenges. We have about to upgrade the software, which will make it easier and wider
the use of the platform. It will allow use of Apple computers. So it should be a big
improvement and then we are going to do a "rah-rah" session with the local architects
and planners, to try to bring them back. There were challenges. We have made
improvements and we have further improvements.
Mr. Kagawa: Understood.
Mr. Haigh: We will not give up.
Mr. Kagawa: Understood. I think with something so huge as
all of the permits, at some point it is going to be good that we have everything on the
computer and having to look for rows of plans is definitely old-school, I think.
Congratulations on heading in that direction. But I do hear that we have a long way to go.
So we will continue to support whatever we can do to improve that. Because I think the
primary focus of the public is that if we are going to e-file, everything is going to get
quicker. I think until we deliver that quicker service, we still have to work hard on it.
Thank you. The last question why is the bike path cost so much compared to repaving a
road? If you could reinforce the reasoning.
Mr. Haigh: We have just gone through an urban corridor.
We are doing so much more. The actual cost of the bike path is small compared to all the
other things that we have to do. Lydgate Kapa'a Phase B, specialized drainage system.
Basically, we took an unimproved road, Niulani and provided an upgraded road and
drainage system where there never was one before. That costs money. At the intersection
of Papaloa and Kuhio Highway, in order to get the bike path to fit, we had to move the
drainage inlets and in order to do that, we had to redo the system. In order to redo the
drainage system we had to relocate the water lines. Once we got in to it, everything was
not where it was supposed to be. These types of things are very expensive. Putting down
the concrete for the path is easy. It is not that expensive. Once you go into these projects
there are all these other things that we are doing that make it expensive.
Mr. Kagawa: That is a good answer, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: JoAnn, you have the floor.
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Ms. Yukimura: Just a follow-up to the last question, what was
the actual cost of that Phase B?
Mr. Haigh: I do not remember exactly. I believe it was in the
$3 to $4 million cost.
Ms. Yukimura: What percentage did the County pay?
Mr. Haigh: Zero.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Because our match was a soft match?
Mr. Haigh: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: The soft match was that Safeway?
Mr. Haigh: The Safeway Bridge helped pay for it and our
original property match in the Kealia area and along Papaloa Road we gained some soft
match along there. The Kaua`i Sands, there was an easement along there that they
donated to the County and we were able to utilize that as a soft match and with Lae Nani,
they donated their pedestrian easement and that is a soft match.
Ms. Yukimura: For that stretch there was really no County cost?
Mr. Haigh: That is correct, nothing that came out of our
County General Fund?
Ms. Yukimura: How long was the stretch?
Mr. Haigh: I think if you add the two together, I think about
two miles.
Ms. Yukimura: Well it costs the taxpayer, not the County
taxpayers, but the taxpayers in general $80 million to go two lanes to four lanes from Lihu`e
to KCC. We need to remember that. I want to thank you Doug and your Division, since the
Lihu`e Civic Center was under your Division for that beautiful project over there. It really
was very noteworthy. I walked by and said "wow," like I did when I walked...drove by
Papaloa Road and saw that large sidewalk and it just raises the value of our community in
terms of quality of life, I think. Thank you.
Mr. Haigh: You are welcome. That is why I went into
construction is to be able to start from the beginning and then at the end of the day, look at
something like that. We are really proud of how it came out and the partnerships that went
into getting it done. I really want to give a big mahalo for the support for getting us a
Transportation Planner. Then of course, the hiring of Michael Moule. Lyle has been
really helpful in pushing the Safe Routes to School/ Complete Streets and there is a strong
Department under Larry's leadership. It is so rewarding to be working with a team and a
lot of support there. You know, we get together and go over things. That is why...I will
postpone retirement for a year or two.
Ms. Yukimura: Well, as I have told the Mayor before, you hire
great people and you can fly as a team. The County can fly and I think we are witnessing
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some of that now. It is very encouraging to some of us who have been in the system for a
long time to have this synergy of really great people. Thank you and I do want to give you
the feedback that I am getting from the visitor industry on the eastside. They are so
excited. They come to me and telling me that they started a bike rental program in their
hotel. Their visitors are so excited about having something else to do that is family-
oriented and is so much fun and keeps them healthy. We have gotten great free public
relations (PR) on the bike path. My sister sent me that article from Seattle. So it is having
many, many benefits. Thank you. On the electronic review, which you say has been a
challenge. We do not know how much time it is actually reducing?
Mr. Haigh: We are saving time, particularly in the
commercial...saving time in the total review process. The gateway has been the challenge
of people getting their plans into the system. That is what we are working on.
Ms. Yukimura: I am kind of surprised that the system began
without being able to take Apple computers. I would guess, given the capacity of Apple that
most designers are using that.
Mr. Haigh: I agree with you and that was a challenge.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. So sort of in the planning of systems, you
have to think about the users a bit more. Coming down to your repair and construction
services for all County facilities and prolonging the life and maintaining the value of a
variety of structures...that is a very, very good goal. But similar to our roads system, do we
have a comprehensive analysis? Where are we on preventative maintenance?
Mr. Haigh: We have the system to do it. We have the desire
to achieve it. We do not have the time to manage it.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Haigh: There is a lot of input that has to go into the
system in order to be able to utilize it.
Ms. Yukimura: Which is the same thing that the Roads people
found out, right? So what you are saying, and you said it throughout your presentation
here is that you really lack staff.
Mr. Haigh: Particularly for that task. Because we have a
Building Maintenance Manager and he is basically the one who has brought this system
along and he has done a great job bringing it along. But he does not have the help to
populate the database. With the constant other priorities, there is no way for him to be
able to fall back and do that work.
Ms. Yukimura: Also in terms of succession, he is not going to be
around for a long time.
Mr. Haigh: It is an ideal time...I mean to bring in somebody,
but the fiscal environment does not allow such.
Ms. Yukimura: You know what? Fiscally we cannot not put
adequate staff because if you do not take care of your buildings, just as you do not take care
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of your roads, the ultimate cost is going to be much more. So to me you are being penny-
wise and pound-foolish not to put a position in there. So we need to see or I request an
invite at our next budget an honest picture about what your staffing needs are needed to
make this work. We are going to face a bigger challenge that we are pushing on our
children and grandchildren is what I am saying. When you look at our buildings and what
they are serving now, our seniors, our exercise classes, this building, everything. You
cannot have County operations without buildings. The nightmare to me, we saw, when we
were doing our housing tour and because the State did not take care of their housing, we
are seeing affordable housing locked up because it unusable and unsafe and they have to
reconstruct, not just repair. So to me it makes no sense to not address this issue with
adequate staff. So please at least on my part, I would like to say that would I like to see a
proposal for how we are going to take care of this. If we do not, we are in trouble. Then
going on, I have been really concerned about the acoustic analysis of our buildings at time
of construction and I have sent several memoranda on that. We had to retrofit and I take
responsible for that. The Lihu`e Neighborhood Center was built during my watch as Mayor
and we had to retrofit it for sound, because the acoustics had not been paid attention to.
Our Convention Hall, you know, besides the fact we can hear the flushing of the toilets in
the process of a meeting the acoustics are not good either. If we address acoustics, we could
have so many more uses of that building or that room space. Can you tell me whether that
is put in the checklist of our design of buildings to our consultants?
Mr. Haigh: That clearly is part of the architectural task. So
when we have meeting rooms we need to make sure that they are designed appropriately
for sound issues. Normally we address it with wider walls and more soundproofing to
address meeting rooms that need a more quiet environment. Sometimes you do hit unique
situations and it is important that we look at those. Sometimes we do retrofit repairs,
because there are unforeseen consequences.
Ms. Yukimura: I am thinking that we could save a lot of money
by addressing the issue upfront instead of doing retrofits, which are always more expensive.
Also in anticipating user use, I mean, at the Convention Hall, if we had thought carefully,
we could have concerts. Like small...what are they called? The United Way just had these
little ensemble music...or we could have song contets. That is what I mean, if you
anticipate ahead of time...I am thinking that the Filipino Chamber of Commerce is
thinking that way and of course in our Tech Center...that is a key feature. I am thinking in
every building, this kind of analysis of user possibilities...maybe it is not just a meeting
room but could be used for a chamber music thing. That needs to be upfront by the
designer, but more upfront than that would be by us, the County.
Chair Furfaro: I need a question, JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: I asked a question and about the concern and
need for acoustics being including in our new building procurement or process
requirements.
Mr. Haigh: The answer is for our normal buildings like
police substations, office buildings, etc. we would expect the architect to have expertise. In
doing a specialized building, an auditorium, we would ensure an acoustical engineer is
hired.
Ms. Yukimura: And meeting rooms?
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Mr. Haigh: An architect should be capable of designing
meeting rooms?
Ms. Yukimura: We have many examples that they were not. So if
we include it in our specifications for those consultants...
Mr. Haigh: Acoustical engineers are expensive and in
general I know of only one meeting room that we have acoustical problems?
Ms. Yukimura: Our neighborhood centers?
Mr. Haigh: I am saying that...I am thinking of an office
meeting room. Neighborhood centers is a specialized building and yes, if you do a
neighborhood center with a stage like the Lihu`e Neighborhood Center, then it would be
appropriate to have an acoustical engineer as a specialty building. I am thinking general
office space we would not need to.
Ms. Yukimura: We are talking about public facilities where there
are multiple uses?
Mr. Haigh: The Lihu`e Civic Center is a good example of an
assembly of meeting rooms, Rooms 2A and 2B, and the Piikoi meeting rooms.
Ms. Yukimura: I am not talking about those rooms.
Mr. Haigh: Okay.
Ms. Yukimura: I am talking about the foyer.
Chair Furfaro: The rest of this discussion can be in a new
agenda item, okay? We are talking about design and the agenda item is "budget," okay?
Ms. Yukimura: I just wanted a yes or no answer.
Mr. Haigh: Generally, no. Specialty situations, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: You do not feel any changes are needed
apparently?
Mr. Haigh: No, just from what I said.
Ms. Yukimura: I hope your managers think differently. This is a
budgeted issue, it costs us more money to retrofit and affects the functioning of our County,
even where we hold the foyer in the Piikoi Building, or where the Housing Agency is.
Where we hold our assemblies. Those acoustics are terrible and the Mayor has tried to
have it for his State of the County address, but it is better where we had it recently because
the acoustics are so bad. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: This discussion can be furthered a little bit in
tomorrow's CIP. Okay? There is a difference here that I want to point out. Last year, the
same discussion occurred, I sent to you folks some standard "KEN" fix programs...an
acronym in the hotel business "keep everything new." Millicent in your general public area
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housekeeping...she has responded very well. That is one of the reasons the carpets here are
on a maintenance schedule for shampooing and the floors are buffed because she has this
"KEN" fix list. Do not confuse this list with retrofitting which will actually cost CIP money.
Okay? We also use that list for Lenny when he did the Kapa'a Pool and he did a really good
job in getting a very old pool repositioned to be more functional. Let us make sure that we
know the difference between staffing and repair and maintenance. Okay? On that note,
Mr. Kagawa, you had another question? Mr. Hooser you had questions? Okay.
Mr. Kagawa: Just a short one. Position 1856 Electrician,
Equipment Repair it is dollar funded. Are we trying to save money? Is that why we dollar
fund it or can we not fill the position? How long has that position been vacant?
Mr. Tabata: That has been vacant since July of 2013. We
have been having...we have been able to recruit a qualified electrician for electronic repair
work. So in light of the market not being able to hire somebody we are looking at dollar-
funding for this next fiscal year.
Mr. Kagawa: So we do not intend to try to recruit?
Mr. Haigh: What we have also done at the same time is that
we have provided a maintenance worker to assist the electricians and this is a maintenance
worker who is interested in becoming an electrician. So to kind of bring them up, so an
opportunity within, that he may actually be able to gain the skills, and legal requirements,
to meet the electrician position. It has been very efficient and productive having this one
maintenance worker helping out the electricians because he is helping the productivity of
the crew.
Mr. Kagawa: That sounds great and I have a lot of electrician
friends who tell me that the work is inconsistent and I am wondering why they would not
have applied?
Mr. Haigh: I cannot answer for them, but what I
understand, things are getting busy out there and we are even having problems getting
bids from some subcontractors who are busy bidding larger work. The construction
environment is going through a change.
Mr. Kagawa: You might be talking to other people than I am
talking to. Anyway, nobody is applying? Nobody wants to get 21 days of sick leave?
Mr. Haigh: When you compare the salaries, the dollars they
take home each month, it is greatly less than what the private sector guys get paid.
Mr. Kagawa: I thought the private sector electricians get $60
an hour?
Mr. Haigh: Most of the skilled construction trades when they
work and that is part of the day, that they necessarily do not have constant work. A lot of
them do, but when they work, they make good salaries. We advertised the position and
nobody applied.
Mr. Kagawa: Are you going to actively pursue it?
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Mr. Tabata: We posted for over a year and could not get
anybody qualified and Doug came up with the scheme to have a maintenance worker to
work with the electricians to gain the experience and skill to then serve as a journeyman,
take the exams, and so forth to become a journeyman electrician.
Mr. Haigh: Then the construction maintenance position
would turn into a dollar-funded position, which is kind of what we did. We had a dollar
funded maintenance position and a fully funded electrician position and we were able to
move this one person in as a helper and fund his position.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you.
Mr. Tabata: So in essence we have created our own skilled
trades training program utilizing the people in-house and our own resources to be able to
then get to filling the skilled position.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: We are going to go to Mr. Hooser and then in five
minute we need to take a caption break and then we need to know that we are going move
to Roads next. Mr. Hooser, you have the floor.
Mr. Hooser: I just have a few questions. Very interesting
discussion. Regarding the electronic plan review, is there any incentive for people to use
that? Do they get cheaper permitting fees or any extra value?
Mr. Haigh: Right now we have said we will give priority
review to electronic plan review and we are. Next time we do a new ordinance for the
Building Code, my plan is to have additional fees for hard-copy plan review. Because it is
much more burdensome on our system to handle the hard-copies. So that will be one we will
be proposing, increasing the fees on the hard copies.
Mr. Hooser: Okay. Thank you. The other question, you
mentioned when you first started your presentation, something to the effect that you had
projects pending, waiting for other permits, sometimes it takes years with the Army Corps
of Engineers? Are there funds sitting there, waiting for years that perhaps could be spent
on other projects?
Mr. Haigh: That is correct. At one point we had Pono Kai
and Moana Kai projects funded and said we will fund one of them and it is extremely
frustrating this last fiscal year...we are basically at the same point as we were last year.
Mr. looser: So it is the permits?
Mr. Haigh: It is the permits.
Mr. Hooser: So these are Capital Improvements Projects and
then we will look at perhaps there are funds there that are not being utilized given the
tight budget we are in, to look at similar actions that we may have done in past to use funds
for here-and-now projects and when the permits finally come forward to find new funding
for them?
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Mr. Tabata: We have done that over the last three fiscal years
that we have moved money around, but we have to keep a minimum amount, so if the
project does turn we are ready to go with at least one. That is what we have done, having
funding for at least one of the projects and there are three total in that. One of them is also
Aliomanu.
Mr. Hooser: Thank you Chair.
Chair Furfaro: We will go to Mr. Bynum for a couple of electrical
questions and then take a caption break.
Mr. Bynum: I do not have any questions.
Chair Furfaro: I am sorry. JoAnn, you have the floor.
Ms. Yukimura: Doug you said our utility bill is going up?
Mr. Haigh: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Have we analyzed why?
Mr. Haigh: It is generally increased electrical costs.
Ms. Yukimura: I think we need a careful analysis of it.
Mr. Haigh: We are working with Ben in the Office of
Economic Development, our Energy Specialist. We are doing a lot of analyses of where we
are spending the money. We are trying to come up with ways...that is part of...like I
mentioned the Lihu`e Civic Center...we want to take a look at our existing mechanical
systems to increase efficiencies.
Ms. Yukimura: That is good especially looking at expanse into
the future. But I still say we need a handle on our electric bill in terms of why? And is it
the kilowatt price?
Chair Furfaro: May I interject? We asked the same question
last year and in a year you have added meters and added buildings. Is that not part of the
reason why it has gone up?
Mr. Haigh: Fire Administration.
Chair Furfaro: We have accepted new space in the Big Save
building and so forth, so we have more users, but her point is that we should be keeping
track of kilowatt hours separately from the rate and by meters.
Ms. Yukimura: Do you see that somebody's meter is going
beyond the norm? Or not? I mean, we need to know that and analyze it. Then what about
our photovoltaic system? Is that not helping?
Mr. Haigh: It provides electricity, yes. But at the same time,
we added that, we added Fire Administration.
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Ms. Yukimura: Well, that is the kind...that is why we are asking
for an analysis, so we can see if we added on, as much as photovoltaic is contributing, then
we should be flat.
Mr. Haigh: We have been working closely with the Energy
Specialist in the Office of Economic Development to analyze our system and we are relying
on assistance there to do the analysis.
Ms. Yukimura: So then we can ask them as a follow-up to come
in and address this issue with more detail?
Chair Furfaro: We will do that as a follow-up, JoAnn. Please
note, my point is that we have added units. Now I want to wrap this up, but we have to
take a break, too. Do we have any more for the Building Division at this point? No? We
are going to take a caption break and tape change here. 10 minutes. We will be back with
Roads. Thank you, gentlemen.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 11:06 a.m.
The Committee reconvened at 11:18 a.m., and proceeded as follows:
Chair Furfaro: We are back from our caption break. We are
going to start on the Roads Maintenance Division. Ed is here. Okay. Ed, you might have
heard earlier, there was a red-flag item in some testimony that we got about a metal plate
that is covering one of the roads, perhaps for much longer than expected in terms of time.
We would like to give you the floor, but we would like to hear if there is any particular way
that we are going to address that earlier, rather than later? But I will let you start with
the floor, first. Larry, are you doing the opening? Is Ed doing the opening?
Mr. Dill: Ed will open the presentation. I will give a
30,000 foot level overview of the long-range funding plan that we discussed in earlier
meetings.
Chair Furfaro: Okay.
EDMOND RENAUD, Chief of Roads Maintenance: Good morning,
Council Chair, Councilmembers. Ed Renaud, for the record. I am going to go real fast
through the budget and I want to ask one question, first, Chair are we talking about
Waipouli Road?
Chair Furfaro: Yes.
Mr. Renaud: That is going to be taken care of very shortly.
We are working with the water group that is coming down. That is being designed.
Chair Furfaro: We will come back to that as a question, but it
seems to be a while since it has been addressed and we will give you the chance then. Go
ahead with your presentation.
Mr. Renaud: I am just going to go through our objectives in
the Roads presentation. The Maintenance Management Information System (MMIS)
program is doing real well. The individual supervisors in the field are moving along. It is
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very accountable. It has made things very easy. What we used to do before long hand, this
way we can go back any time and any year and research anything that we need to know,
whether it is a pothole or accounting, what have you. So that system is doing real well
thanks to the Administration and our people here. It is still going on. We have another 12
months to complete that program, but it is working out real great with our people. The
levees and again thank you to our Administration and all of you. It is working out real
well. Grassing is coming out nicely. If you have a chance to look at the grassing and the
irrigation, it is moving along. Both grassing at Hanapepe and Waimea, at Waimea we are
changing the floodgates, five of them at Station A where it did not really open before and
this way we can control the flooding.
Chair Furfaro: I keep watching the screen.
Mr. Renaud: There is nothing that is going to happen there...I
am sorry...my apologies.
Chair Furfaro: Can we turn the lights back on and move
forward?
Mr. Renaud: Then the other thing on bridges and what
not...we are working closely with Engineering and the structure person there and designs
are implemented and looking at all the bridges that need to be maintained immediately.
Another objective that we did not put in, but we are working with Engineering to try to
partnership on being proactive on both Roads and Engineering and with the new Division
Head. It is working out well, thanks to Larry and Lyle. I think I pretty much have covered
the most important parts, and I am going to turn it over to Larry.
Mr. Dill: I am going to go to the PowerPoint now. So if
you could take another chair there, Chair, if you would like?
Chair Furfaro: It is like being back in school.
Mr. Dill: There was some discussion in previous Council
Meetings that we have had, where we have made presentations to you and indicated the
significant expense that we anticipate in repairing all of our roads doing resurfacing
overlays, full reconstruction, slurry seals, seal coats, crack seals, and things like that. We
showed that if we go out today and try to repair everything out there all at once, large and
small, we would come up with in the neighborhood of $100 million in costs. This is an
overview of a plan as to how we can begin to attack some of those costs. A little
background, the County owns about 301 miles of roads. About 134 of those are miles of
local roads. Those roads have to be funded through County funds alone. About 167 miles
are classified as Collector Roads which as you know qualify for 80% Federal Highways
funding generally speaking. In addition to that approximately 154 lane miles of State of
Hawai`i, Department of Transportation owned roads. In addition to that, just for the
record, also private roads are not listed on this. As you know, we have three County
baseyards out of which we base our operations out of for repair and maintenance for all of
our roadway systems on Kaua`i. These are at Hanalei, Kapa`a, and Hanapepe. We have
talked before about the Micropaver software application that we are in the process of
implementing. Using Micropaver will help us to prioritize our limited resources so that we
can attack these roads in an efficient manner. We take a look at the type of magnitudes of
travel and I have listed the various types of cateogies that those fall under for priorities of
roads. We have a priority index based on the remaining service life and pavement and
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condition index. We have presented to the Council in the past. We have already done that
inventory of all of the 301 miles of roads so we have those particular things already
quantified and in the process we are beginning to input that into the Micropaver
application. Following up on those two sets of information, we do a follow-up field
reconnaissance to confirm our visual inspection of the surface status of the road repair wise.
Until you do actual core sampling, you cannot confirm 100% what you actually have out
there in the field. That eliminates all surprises and allows us to get a much better estimate
of costs and scope of work we need to do in the field and of course, we get accurate
measurements. Recently as you know, we came to Council for approval of three Collector
Roads that are also eligible for Federal Highway funds. For those, we did the core field
sampling to verify our assumptions. Finally, various treatments that we pursue.
Reconstruction of a road, by the way, reconstruction is the one element that would qualify
for County Bond funding. The rest would not qualify for Bond funding...pavement
preservation techniques of cracked sealings, seal coats, slurry seals, or overlays. That is a
30,000 foot level of what we are working on through the Micropaver application in the
Roads Maintenance Division.
I wanted to show you at your request, what we are looking at as far as means to
begin funding some of these very expensive items. I have titled this "Draft" for discussion
purposes as there is a lot of fine tuning remaining as to how this will actually be
implemented. Some of the assumptions are our current Highway Fund revenues would
remain flat at $13.3 million. Just for the sake of discussion today. As you may know, the
$13.3 million that we are currently experiencing is based on $4.7 million in Public Utility
Franchise Fee, $4 million in Fuel Tax and $4.6 million in the Vehicle Weight Tax. That is
based on our current revenue stream. Also you will see in Fiscal Year 2015 we are
proposing $12.9 in Highway Fund expenses in your Roads Division and for the purposes of
projections we will assume that remains flat. We are proposing in the concurrent Fiscal
Year, eligible for Highway Funding, $3 million. I am making certain assumptions about
Federal Highway funds being available that you see under "projections," and finally as we
have discussed to Council in the past we are proposing to do a biannual or every two years
to go out with an Islandwide Road Resurfacing Project in order for us to get a better bang
for our buck, because we will have a greater amount of money available every two years if
we do projects and hopefully gain some economies of scale. More assumptions and I want to
mention that our Director of Finance is here and we have been working closely with our
Director of Finance to make sure that he is in concurrence with some of these draft
projections for discussion purposes only. So first, we are discussing a Weight Tax increase.
You probably have seen in the budget that we are coming forward with a proposal to
increase the Vehicle Weight Tax in Fiscal Year 2015 and this is what I am showing to you
is consistent with that. This is also proposing additional increases through the Fiscal Year
2017 as shown there. You get passenger vehicles from one and a quarter cents per pound to
three cents by Fiscal Year 2017 and freight vehicles from two and a half cents up to four
cents per pound in Fiscal Year 2017 and I understand these proposals are not inconsistent
with what the State and rest of the counties are seeing for their taxes. A couple of Fuel Tax
increases nothing in Fiscal Year 2015, but $0.02 increase in Fiscal Year 2016 and a couple
years later a follow-up of another $0.02 increase and I believe again these are not that
inconsistent with what other counties are seeing out. Finally with regards to the Bond
Fund, I do not think that we have plans in the immediate future for a Bond Fund proposal.
I am not ruling that out, but just for the sake of this discussion, not including any
anticipated Bond funding in the projections that I am going to show you today. A lot of
numbers on this screen. Basically starting on the very top right you see a little over $3.9
million of Highway Fund balance forward. The balance available in the Highway Fund to
roll forward to Fiscal Year 2015. The Weight Tax is the $1.179 million is what I just talked
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about earlier, the proposed increase. Contribution to the Transportation Agency would
leave in the Islandwide Road Resurfacing for this year, we plan on expending $2.435
million which is the culmination of two years' worth of appropriations of Council funding.
So that would happen in the current Fiscal Year 2015. The following Fiscal Year, rolling
forward the $79,000 left as a balance forward, additional Weight Tax and then the Fuel Tax
that I talked about, and then you can see Islandwide Road Resurfacing I do not show any
amount in this cell here, zero. Again, we would do a two year appropriation. No Islandwide
Road Resurfacing project in Fiscal Year 2016. This amount would then be available to roll
forward into the following Fiscal Year. What that means...all of the same sort of increases
take into account in Fiscal Year 2017. We would then have funds to do an Islandwide Road
Resurfacing project estimated at $3.89 million in Fiscal Year 2017 which would exhaust all
of the funds in the Highway Fund at that point. There would be no funds to roll forward.
Again, we go through the same sort of scenario in Fiscal Year 2018 and 2019, no Islandwide
Road Resurfacing project in 2018 but we would have, thanks to the rollover of $4 million
and the revenues in Fiscal Year 2019 we would have a little over $8 million available to us
in Fiscal Year 2019 to do road resurfacing.
So finally, I take those same numbers and bring them forward and this is our...the
Chair asked for a ten year projection...this is actually eleven years because I wanted to
show the final...at the end of the second year of that biennual project showing when that
would go out. You can see Fiscal Year 2015 again, $2.435 million is the number. If we take
out of that $2.435 half a million dollars and leverage that against Federal Highway funds,
we would have a total of between County funding and Federal Highways funds of $4.4
million available for roads resurfacing. So the scenario repeats itself through these years
and you can see that at this point the number remains the same. As I mentioned I have
flat projections in there. We have Weight Tax and Fuel Tax increases, which will be fully in
effect by this time. I am not projecting any additional increases for the sake of this
discussion today, beyond that. So this gets us total of just under $57 million of total
funding through the next 11 years. So we feel that this would be a way that we could
gravely accelerate the road resurfacing that we are doing currently and put a significant
dent in that $100 million. Obviously there are tough decisions to be made about tax
increases that would be necessary to fund this. But for the sake of discussion today, we
wanted to share this with you. That is the presentation. With that we would be happy to
open it up to questions.
Chair Furfaro: First of all, Larry, I want to tell you how much I
appreciate the fact that when I asked to you put together a 10-year projection that says
okay, if we isolated our roads inventory especially after we do some coring, you know, what
is our best scenario in addressing our roads in a 10-year period? You have got almost
$57 million that can be available to us for this resurfacing slurry seal and so forth and yet
we might also find some roads after we do some testing that may not be as critical as the
report said. In fact, these reports have a tendency to show you the worst scenario rather
than the actual. So 2015-2025, projected almost $57 million that could go towards road
repair. Thank you for doing that. Thank you very much. We will start with questions.
JoAnn?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. I want to thank you, too. This is towards
the direction of what we have been looking for and it really helps to have the context for the
proposed increases-in fees that you are asking for, you know? We can see how they are
proposed to be used for and that it is moving us towards repair of our roads that are
functioning. So it really helps. I know it was a short timeframe for...in which for you to do
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that, but thank you. A question. The 300 miles of county-owned roads, are those lane
miles?
Mr. Dill: No. As you can imagine, the vast majority of our
roads are one-lane roads?
Ms. Yukimura: One-lane?
Mr. Dill: One-lane each direction.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. So it would be 300...600 lane miles,
probably? No?
Mr. Dill: No. One-lane each direction is one-lane mile.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. All right. Thank you for explaining that.
167 miles of Federal aid Collector Roads that is what is eligible for Federal funding even
though it is in County ownership?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: There are about 300 miles on our island that are
eligible for Federal funding, we would add the 154 lane miles of Department of
Transportation (DOT) owned roads plus 167 miles of County roads that are eligible for
Federal funding?
Mr. Dill: Correct. Approximately.
Ms. Yukimura: So we have about 300 roads? Then your
projections did not...well, actually they were just revenue projections. So you do not yet
know how many roads that would cover?
Mr. Dill: That is correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. So the issue of new roads added is also not
addressed here?
Mr. Dill: That is correct, yes.
Chair Furfaro: May I add something? It also gives us some time
to be thinking about various associations, maybe some assessments for new roads as it
relates to future repair and maintenance? It gives us some platform to be talking about a
different approach, too, for any new roads.
Mr. Dill: Yes, it would give us some data to support that
sort of effort as well. That is right.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you, JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: Lastly on page are 5 your Federal Highway funds
availability is an assumption. What do you mean here? That there will be moneys
available is what you are assuming?
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Mr. Dill: Yes, how much money that will be available is
always the question. We are right now at the beginning of a new four-year cycle for the
Federal Highway funding program and they have been telling us that we can anticipate
that the County of Kaua`i will be eligible to receive in the neighborhood of $8-9 million and
that is not just for Islandwide Road Resurfacing.
Ms. Yukimura: Over a four year period?
Mr. Dill: $8 million per year for four years. That is not
just for resurfacing, but we do road reconstruction and bridge projects all eligible for
Federal Highway funding and we have many projects that are taking up the vast majority
of that funding that was projected on the books today. So part of it relates to support from
Engineering, with the Engineering Division now able to do some work in-house, we are
hoping to be able to develop projects to be "shovel-ready." It often occurs during the Federal
Fiscal Year that funds are available because another project drops out. So that is part of
what we are leveraging and the Engineering Division's ability to get those projects out.
Ms. Yukimura: That is excellent. I think you have examples of
where we were ready and other counties dropped out and we were able to grab that money.
That is wise planning I would say. The $100 million included bridge repairs? The $100
million...
Mr. Dill: No it did not.
Ms. Yukimura: It was just repaving?
Mr. Dill: Just roads, yes, no bridges.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. But the $8-9 million a year of Federal
Highways Administration funding goes for both bridges and roads repaving.
Mr. Dill: On qualifying roads, yes. Collector Roads, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Until we know...we have a projection of our
bridge repairs, we do not really know how much Federal moneys would be available for
repaving.
Mr. Dill: Correct. You will notice on the last slide, I have
estimated again just for discussion purposes $2 million rising to $4 million every other
year. Our total estimated Federal Highway Funding we are being told we can anticipate
$8-9 million per year. So beyond what I am showing in this table what would be eligible
and available for reconstruction projects or bridge projects.
Ms. Yukimura: So your Federal funds on page 8, where you
showed $2 million in Fiscal Year 2015, that is $2 million out of the $8 to $9 million a year
that we would be getting?
Mr. Dill: Correct. So Fiscal Year 2016, I do not show any
Federal Highway funds meaning that the entire $8-9 million could be eligible for other
projects.
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Ms. Yukimura: I see.
Mr. Dill: Fiscal Year 2017, $2.4...
Ms. Yukimura: So you have been very conservative in your
estimate of how much might be available for funding Federally.
Mr. Dill: We do have as I mentioned other projects that
are already eating up the vast majority of the $8-9 million a year and that is part of the
balancing act as well.
Ms. Yukimura: What are those other projects? Are they new
construction?
Mr. Dill: I do not have the list, but they are all CIP
projects that we will talk about in more detail tomorrow.
Chair Furfaro: I have got that note down here for Keith Suga to
give us a little bit more information on that.
Ms. Yukimura: The other thing that I noticed is on page 7 your
assumption is that the amount that goes to Transportation remains the same over five
years?
Mr. Dill: Well over the length of this projection, that is
correct. Actually for 11 years, Fiscal Year 2015 through 2025.
Ms. Yukimura: Right. So our ability to grow the bus system
operationally...well, is not in this scenario?
Mr. Dill: Not in this scenario. That is correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Which is why I have been looking for another
sustainable source, which is why I have talked about the half a percent earmarked and I
know Councilmember Bynum is against it, but the way I justify it is it is a regressive tax.
It really affects the poor people much more, but when you put it into the bus system, the
bus will service those people most of all. They are the ones who need it to get to work, to
get to school. So it goes back to them is how I see it. Rather than being spent on tourist-
related...that is why I so opposed the Council of Mayor's projection to use half a percent for
anything, because it will probably go for tourist-related impacts and I cannot see that
except to the extent that the bus is helping tourism. I think that is the end of my questions.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Dill: I do need to clarify one thing I said...one center
lane mile is two lane miles of road, one lane in each direction.
Ms. Yukimura: So it is 600 lane miles, right?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: The 300 miles of County owned roadsis actually
two-lanes?
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Mr. Dill: It would be 600 miles of road, if all the roads
were one-lane each direction, but we have a few that are more than that. So a little greater
than that, in fact.
Ms. Yukimura: You have some that are actually the width of
one-lane.
Mr. Dill: That is true too. Maybe there is some balancing,
you are correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Still 600 miles...lane miles, just makes it apples-
to-apples. Well, except that the DOT lanes are often wider.
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: You have some you make up that are narrower,
but let us face it your description was not only by doing one-way streets, it was both ways.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: Questions here? Mr. Bynum?
Mr. Bynum: If I ask a question that was asked when I
stepped out, just tell me that and I will look at transcripts. I am serious, I do not want to
waste any time. The Roads Division historically I believe offers lots of manpower and work
and trucks and equipment to other Divisions and that is still the case, correct?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: It is kind of a broad question how that is working
out. My memory, one of the things that we purchased was a mobile stage, that...was it not
the Roads guys that used to build the wood stage and tear it down and put it up and tear it
down? So is Roads still involved in that?
Mr. Tabata: Building Department and the mobile stage is
housed at Parks.
Mr. Bynum: I am mentioning that as an example of an
investment that freed up labor time. You do not have to deal with that anymore, right?
Building stages and storing them and tearing them down?
Mr. Tabata: We still assist with mobilization.
Mr. Bynum: So how much progress are we making on Roads
Division being able to spend the majority of their time focused on their core mission and
less of their time providing assistance to other Divisions? How are we doing with that
generally?
Mr. Dill: Go ahead, you want to speak to that?
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Mr. Renaud: We are doing fairly well. You have to take into
consideration at the two big baseyards we average 12-14 people a day, including the Clerk.
That gives you an idea with an operation of 6-8 men, you kind of have to weigh it out. So
we are fairly helping, I have to say.
Mr. Bynum: So it is part of your Division, you do all of the
road maintenance and all of the projects and put out the bids for the big reconstruction? All
of that is your responsibility, right? In addition to that you have storm responsibilities,
keeping drainages open, like the Olohena Bridge has spouts that core off the road that have
to be cleaned? That is ongoing regular maintenance and that is your Division as well,
correct?
Mr. Tabata: That is part of the software that the Roads
Division purchased for the computerized maintenance information system that they have
and are continuing to input all the data of the County assets, meaning the roads, the
canals, ditches, bridges, storm drains, etc.
Mr. Bynum: That is in Micropaver?
Mr. Tabata: No, that is in the system. We bought two
systems, one for the overall computer management information management system and
Micropaver is a cascade down that just specifically deals with roads index, pavement
condition index, and remaining service life. So they all feed into...it feeds into this
maintenance management. It is kind of like what Buildings has, but more streamlined to
the Roads requirements. So they are in the process of still inputting all of the assets. It is
a work-order system. There is an asset management system that comes out of that, that
allows them to track when was the last time that they did this certain maintenance? Or
reconstruction? So all of the daily needs comes off from the schedule that the system, in the
end after we input all of the data, will create for us. So say roads mowing, they have a
schedule in each baseyard to start from point A and end up back at Z and continually go
and complete depending on the cycle. Of course guinea grass grows 3 inches a day and up
to 5 inches a day during the summer time. You know, we have got our hands tied with
roadside maintenance.
Then we have also created the special construction crew. We bought a whole bunch
of tools for them. We bought a vector so that they can do their own storm-drain cleaning
and they are taking care of storm drain cleaning now with their own equipment. They used
to borrow Wastewater's but every time they borrowed it, they have to clean and sanitize
their truck. So we bought a truck special for the Roads Division. Ed created a special
construction crew that will also do the repair and maintenance of bridges, some certain
things that this crew will do on their own. We also implemented in the last three years to
install guardrails. So as Engineering designs the guardrail, they can install it themselves.
Then recently we received a thermoplastic machine that allows us to do crosswalks and
stop bars. It will not allow the whole length of road, but specific areas and the latest
equipment that we received is the pot-hole repair truck. You saw a little bit of that in the
Administration's presentation, where we have one truck carry all the materials where the
manpower to do specific pothole repairs and to an extent, some of the pictures that you did
see was a little bit larger section of repair.
Mr. Bynum: Thank you for sharing with me the thermoplastic
and I do not have to ask that question. That is my question every year.
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Mr. Tabata: They got a bunch of tools and Ed reorganized the
Division to really move them forward.
Mr. Bynum: So all of these software programs...I am learning
something that I did not know, all feed into Graphical Information Systems (GIS)
eventually?
Mr. Tabata: We hope that it will, yes. It is a part of it.
Mr. Bynum: So if you were here for the Engineering
discussion, you know I am focused on the storm water responsibilities that you have. I did
not know that was part of this maintenance and tracking...that is wonderful and I
appreciate that. I will just use it as an example. One way that I learned about this besides
conferences is when we redid the bike path there is a storm drain at Wailua Beach and we
replaced it with something that catches sediment? Right? That is the right thing to do and
I want to see more of that and I asked the earlier question how we develop a culture in the
County where that consideration is thought of each time? So I do not want to belabor it,
but that is a kind of question that I will be asking if I am here in the future and monitoring
that. Now that we have allowed Public Works to manage these systems on their own
without political influences and without other outside influences, I am very excited about
the presentation that was just given about putting the appropriate tools in the hands of the
workers. I am working on a policy level what we might implement in terms of expectations
for the County? In the future and I want to have the dialogue about the total cost and not
just implementing better storm water systems and thank you again for all the opportunities
I have heard about.
Chair Furfaro: Larry over the next several months, I am going
to be revisiting a lot of these particular things especially as the shifts we have made in
consolidating repairs, those actual costs? The retraining. The re-equipment purchases that
we bought, so the people have the right equipment to do the right job and all of those have
had impact on depleting our funds, okay? We have to tell a good story here, too, that says
the net by the of the spending of those things is that we have these proficiencies. One of the
things that I wanted to share with you and this is good news as well. I am going to share
copies with the members. In the last three years we have improved the overtime and I am
going to touch on some other Departments because they were used for Roads Maintenance
even though they were in Solid Waste, or Disposal or so forth. They have been used for
these improvements. But we have our overtime in Disposal down 46%. Our overtime for
the Collections area is down 85%. Our collection in Recycling is down 53%. This is all good
news because our people are getting the right tools to do the right job and a lot of
automating is occurring and this is setting a really good tone for us when we had used a lot
of people from Roads in Collections and so forth. So I just wanted to point out that we are
on a good direction here and thank you very much for that focus. I am going to Mr. Kagawa
here.
Mr. Kagawa: I want to echo what the Chair said, all the
positive things that have been happening. You know, I agree with Councilmember Bynum,
the Roads Division has a wide spectrum of responsibilities. I know the levees are part of
your work. Do we get any Federal assistance for all of that work on the levees?
Mr. Dill: Not directly, I would say. It is our responsibility
to make sure that the levees are maintained with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and
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when we do, that means they will assist with funding for any repairs that need to happen.
We do not get funding for ongoing maintenance. They built them and it is our job to
maintain them.
Mr. Kagawa: There are two levees that we maintain, Waimea
and Hanapepe. How many...are the hours going...the man hours going up? Or is it pretty
much flat?
Mr. Renaud: There is no overtime.
Mr. Kagawa: I mean the regular man hours. Are those hours
going up because the levees are getting worse? Or is it basically the same? Do we spend a
lot of time out there? Our crews spend maybe one day a week out there, or less?
Mr. Renaud: They spend two or three days a week?
Mr. Kagawa: Just on the levees? Wow. I think I know there
was a request that I made. There is a little before the crossing in Waimea River, before the
swinging bridge. There is an island, a huge island with a huge 30-40 foot tree growing in
the middle of the river. I know Mr. Morikawa knows about it and Mr. Suga, but it was a
concern of the Makaweli Taro Farmers that it is a flood hazard because you should not have
an island smack in the middle of the river. So it is very concerning, I think. If we can look
at it. I know that Mr. Suga mentioned there were all kinds of permits that would be needed
to bring heavy equipment into a flowing river and it requires all kinds of Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) permits and such. I want to know if we are going wait for the
State to address it or the County? To let a 40 foot tree grow in that area means that
somebody has got to do it at some point. That water will be diverted elsewhere and
somebody on either side is going to suffer. I do not know if you can look into that one.
Mr. Tabata: Councilmember that is the Department of Land
and Natural Resources' (DLNR) responsibility and we will be working with them.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you. Last question, I think is the goal
of...I know this is projections only. So I do not want to go really deep into it, but I know we
are projecting to Fiscal 2017 and 2016, and 2018, I am on page 6. I am trying to
understand the implement of Fuel Tax increases. So we are going to go $0.02 per gallon.
So is the Fuel Tax currently $0.02 and we are going up to $0.17?
Mr. Dill: I apologize it is not clear. Currently it is $0.15
per gallon. $0.02 increase to $0.17.
Mr. Kagawa: That is great. I just wanted to check on that. It
is not that it is great, but I am alarmed our gas...I just want to fill up yesterday at the
cheapest place Costco and it is $4.54 and I am like, wow, are we going to hit $5.00 soon. If
we were going to increase $0.15, I was going to have some serious concerns as to whether
we are dealing with reality but it is okay. It is at $0.15 now, that is great. The Vehicle
Weight...so we are looking at the freight vehicles which is the one I was worried it is going
to hit, our businesses and impact them as well as the employees...we are proposing a half
percent this year or half cent this year? So are you saying it is going 2.5 cents to 4 cents, so
are we assuming half cent per year for three years?
Mr. Hunt: On the freight.
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Mr. Kagawa: On the freight?
Mr. Hunt: That would be the projections that...I am sorry,
Steve Hunt, Director of Finance for the record.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you.
Mr. Hunt: As far as the increases that we are looking at,
the current one for Fiscal Year 2015 includes three-quarters of a cent to the passenger and
half a cent to the freight. The following two Fiscal Years 2016 and 2017 include a half cent
in each year both to freight and to passenger which brings us up to the State average
currently for Fiscal Year 2014 which is $0.03 for the passenger vehicle and $0.04 for the
freight vehicle.
Mr. Kagawa: So with the increases to the passengers we go to
up State average of$0.03?
Mr. Hunt: Yes.
Mr. Kagawa: For freight, what is the State average?
Mr. Hunt: $0.04.
Mr. Kagawa: By Fiscal Year 2017 we hit the State average for
both categories?
Mr. Hunt: We would hit the current fiscal average
assuming there is no movement there but we would be where we are at today at the State
average.
Mr. Kagawa: I voted no to these throughout but I think it
sounds reasonable. Thank you. Thank you, Chair.
Chair Furfaro: You are welcome. Gentlemen, Mr. Dill, I do want
to say that I do want to stay on target and we have a preliminary plan for funding on
Roads, but before we break for lunch, I do want to know about the metal plate on the
bridge. Ed, can somebody respond to me? What is our projection?
Mr. Dill: Ed reminds me which particular location that is.
We have been working with the East Kaua`i Water Users Cooperative because the culvert
underneath that road where that is failing serves part of their irrigation system and they
have been indicating to us for sometime that they were working on funding for a program to
repair that. They have very recently come back to us and said they have very quickly
allocated or very suddenly got the funding, but has a very short timeframe associated with
it. So fortunately, thanks to the Engineering Division, because one thing that they said we
need an Engineering plan drawing, a construction drawing and speaking to a smaller
project plan that we need to get out and we are assisting the East Kaua`i Water Users
Cooperative so that they can get that funding and we are doing a joint venture with them
whereby they will be doing a lot of the culvert work and we will finish the road resurfacing.
The initial effort is to get the plans drawn in April, I believe is the date?
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Mr. Moule: Yes. We are trying to get it done by the end of
this month.
Mr. Dill: Okay. So early April. Then we will secure the
funding and follow-up with construction. I do not have a firm timeframe for you on the
construction. I would have to get back to you on that.
Chair Furfaro: Give me something fair and reasonable, not
another ten years, okay?
Mr. Dill: Definitely less than ten years.
Chair Furfaro: Fair and reasonable.
Mr. Dill: Well, it is difficult for me to say, because the
East Kaua`i Water Users Cooperative are the lead on this project.
Chair Furfaro: Remind them that they get money from us, too.
Mr. Dill: So if I could inquire with them and get back to
you Chair.
Chair Furfaro: That is fair, but we would like something that
puts a date out there that we know it is attainable and it is realistic and we will do it
collaboratively. JoAnn, question?
Ms. Yukimura: Questions?
Chair Furfaro: Gentlemen, can I have your attention for
Councilwoman Yukimura?
Ms. Yukimura: On page 4 where you have "treatments." Which
ones come under our repaving contracts?
Mr. Dill: Under our Islandwide resurfacing we are
currently doing reconstruction and I am sorry the last four should be a sub bullets
underneath "pavement preservation" so in your mind indent those last four. Currently the
only one in the contract is the overlay of milling out of a certain amount of road and putting
down 1.5 inches of asphalt. We are looking at implementing these other methods which
would be less expensive implementations to preserve pavement life.
Ms. Yukimura: So the crack seal, seal coat, and slurry seal would
be done in-house so to speak.
Mr. Dill: A combination. If you put it out with the
Islandwide Resurfacing Project, we will probably outsource if there is a fair amount. We
are looking at possibly doing some of these in-house as well, but we are still looking at that
whether to outsource or do it in-house?
Ms. Yukimura: Are you saying that the bulk of our repaving
projects are reconstruction?
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Mr. Dill: No.
Ms. Yukimura: No? It is mainly what? What is it? Overlay?
Mr. Dill: Correct. That is in the context of Islandwide
Resurfacing. We have projects like the Puhi Road project coming up soon which is a
complete reconstruction project. But that is not what we call a part of our Islandwide
Resurfacing. That is a separate CIP project.
Ms. Yukimura: So when we do the every two year repaving
contracts out, it is reconstruction on the really bad parts, but mainly overlay? Is that what
you call"resurfacing?"
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: It includes...well, okay. The crack seal, seal coat,
and slurry seal are?
Mr. Dill: For instance if we resurface the road, or
reconstruct...do a reconstruction of the pavement, we are looking at...we would come back
in the relatively short timeframe, say three years and want to put a seal coat or slurry coat
and maintain it and extend its service life by doing comparatively low-cost maintenance.
Ms. Yukimura: So those are truly preventative?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: I am thrilled to hear about all of the equipment
that our crews are getting because without the proper equipment it is really hard do their
jobs. But I am concerned about keeping the equipment in working and functional condition.
Way back when I was Mayor, one of the issues was operators not knowing how to use it and
therefore, breaking it down and we were looking at shop time and backtracking as to why is
it in the shop so often? So training and care of equipment, like servicing and stuff, that is
hopefully a routine process?
Mr. Renaud: With policies that has changed within Roads,
thanks to Scott Suga, because we have impressed on him and he has impressed on his
supervisors about maintenance. For example, there was a call this morning and something
happened where there was a flat. So I heard him on the phone and they are saying hey, do
you not check your tires before you go out? So he was very upset. So we are trying to train
them and Scott is doing an excellent job on that. Maintenance and all of this because of the
new equipment, this is why we have the special code for those specialized equipment. So
that we can have the same operators on there. Then we are looking also at the other Roads
equipment and the same thing is happening.
Ms. Yukimura: Great. Trained operators, people who know how
to use the equipment?
Mr. Tabata: Specifically when a new piece of equipment
comes in, the manufacturer's representative sent a trainer to train our crew on operations
and maintenance. We recently completed the training for the thermoplastic machine. So
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those are things where the manufacturer's representative comes down and sends their
trainers to train our people.
Ms. Yukimura: That is on the first cut with a new machine, but
if you have new workers coming in, you are still training?
Mr. Tabata: Yes. Our Auto Shop is involved in the training
also so they know if there are specific needs for the equipment.
Ms. Yukimura: I am very glad to hear that those issues are
addressed.
Chair Furfaro: Auto Shop will be next on the agenda after lunch.
Go ahead.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you, Chair. A lot of our complaints about
bad roads, I think we have some pothole problems that perhaps if we patch up potholes
properly, then I think we can extend the life had a little bit more. Glenn was talking about
the regular cold mix and using asphalt with the heavy rain and I have seen where you have
fixed some like Olohena Road and the heavy rains...you can start to see the potholes
developing again. Is there perhaps another way to go? I know you are going to stay away
from hiring a contractor to do potholes, but maybe we can use concrete? Is there another
way or another theory that we can go with that perhaps that can deal with the potholes?
Mr. Renaud: We have picked up this patch mix, which is a
permanent fix. As long as we take out of water and square it, we can use that.
Mr. Kagawa: So it might be more durable than the current
way?
Mr. Tabata: We also picked up, as we mentioned and you saw
the pictures at the Administration's presentation of the pothole repair truck. We can do a
Committee update for you to show you? They did some trials. They have been practicing
on some roads. It is a hot mix.
Mr. Kagawa: A good place to practice would be Puhi Road.
Mr. Tabata: It is a CIP project and we will update you on that
tomorrow.
Chair Furfaro: The offer was made. If Mr. Kagawa wants it in
his Committee we can do that.
Mr. Tabata: Yes, we can show you the new tools that we have
been purchasing over last few years and what the crews are using the tools to do out there.
Some great things that we need to share what we have been doing.
Chair Furfaro: When we come back after lunch, we are going to
go to Automotive and in the afternoon we are doing Wastewater and Solid Waste in the
afternoon. Okay? We are going to break now 10 minutes past 12:00 p.m. and we will be
back at 1:10 p.m. We are on a lunch break.
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There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 12:10 p.m.
The Committee reconvened at 1:14 p.m., and proceeded as follows:
Chair Furfaro: We are back from our lunch break and we are
moving right along to Auto Maintenance Division. Gentlemen, I will have you introduce
yourselves.
LYLE TABATA, Deputy County Engineer: Lyle Tabata, Deputy County Engineer.
DWAYNE ADACHI, Superintendent: Good afternoon Councilmembers, Dwayne
Adachi, Automotive Division.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you. I guess part of my concern in the
Mayor's message was a very aggressive statement about the maintenance of cars and kind
of a car baseyard and so forth. I would like to know how do you folks see that impacting
your Division and then we will let you make whatever presentation you want.
Mr. Adachi: Are you referring to the potential motor pool?
Chair Furfaro: Yes.
Mr. Adachi: Basically the intent is to streamline the fleet and
try to get rid of vehicles that we really do not need. Try to make the fleet more manageable.
Impact wise to our operation, I would not say that there would be a huge impact because we
actually performing maintenance of all these vehicles anyway. All we would be doing is
getting rid of some of the old stuff and consolidating some of the vehicles we already have
into a pool.
Chair Furfaro: How many vehicles all together does your shop
maintain on a regular basis?
Mr. Adachi: Vehicles total?
Chair Furfaro: Just vehicles, yes.
Mr. Adachi: I would say about four hundred (400).
Chair Furfaro: Four hundred (400) vehicles. How many would
we anticipate that is going to be retiring from the fleet? And I assume the four hundred
(400) includes Police.
Mr. Adachi: Police, yes. We are looking at twelve (12)
vehicles right now to possibly retire.
Mr. Tabata: We have been working with Economic
Development, Deputy Finance Director, we have this Committee and we initially identified,
like Dwayne mentioned about a dozen pieces of equipment just in the Lihu`e Civic Center to
begin with. As we see the sengergy of...and what we did was we did a summary of use
daily, how many miles each vehicle has been used, and how many hours a day. Some
vehicles travel short mileage but they are out in the field all day long. We did a survey to
identify potential vehicles right in the Lihu`e Civic Center area. We have a pool identified
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of older vehicles that we are looking to pull off the lot and create this pool. Of course it
relies on a software that will help identify what is available and when so you can go on-line
on your computer in the office a day or a few days ahead of time so that we can preprogram
the vehicles used. Part of it is the older vehicles which many of them are just gasoline
vehicles, so we are looking at monopolizing the vehicles that are electronic or the multi-fuel
vehicle that uses...
Ms. Yukimura: The hybrids, yes, and have them be the vehicles
that get primarily use first versus our gas guzzlers.
Chair Furfaro: So would we say that the goal that has been
portrayed to us by the Administration even though maybe only starting with a hundred
(100) vehicles here in central Lihu`e is the goal about a three percent (3%) reduction in
vehicles? What is the goal about fleet reduction? That was not clear to me.
Mr. Tabata: We cannot answer that right now. Like I
mentioned, I just recently joined the group and they have done the surveys and I think it
would be an answer better served by Economic Development because they are leading the
charge.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, fair enough. It is just that it became a
part of the Mayor's message but there were no quantities in the message. I just wanted to
find out if we have given that much thought but...
Mr. Adachi: We are still in the primarily stages of
development of this project.
Chair Furfaro: I may service the question with George. JoAnn,
go right ahead.
Ms. Yukimura: Could we do follow-up questions on this
particular item?
Chair Furfaro: Sure, go ahead.
Ms. Yukimura: I think it is a good direction that you are going
in. I think the motor pool will give you both more control and enable you to have users use
the most efficient cars. In doing so, it should stabilize the gas consumption unless there is
some expansion of services.
Mr. Tabata: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: And it should also, if you take away your older
cars, cause the repair schedule not to be as great either, right, because your older ones
would need more service.
Mr. Adachi: Reduce maintenance costs.
Ms. Yukimura: That is the best way to say it, okay. I think those
two (2) advantages would be excellent. Not to mention, you might eliminate unnecessary
parking as well.
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Mr. Tabata: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Why is Economic Development the lead?
Mr. Dill: Because it is an efficiency government
streamlining effort, so they are coordinate those things.
Ms. Yukimura: Of course, okay, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: . So, that is how George gets all those
assignments.
Mr. Dill: That is right. He gets all the interesting ones.
Chair Furfaro: Mr. Adachi, I will let you start making the
presentation on any particulars you would like to share with us.
Mr. Adachi: Okay. Would you guys like me to go over the
whole...
Chair Furfaro: Maybe go through the highlights.
Mr. Adachi: Basically at the Automotive Division, our focus is
to manage and maintain the County's vehicles and equipment fleet. In Fiscal 2014, we
were able to meet the repair and maintenance demands of all Agencies and we were also
able to procure some new vehicles and equipment to modernize the fleet. We got the fuel
master computerized, the fuel management system installed and operating, and we are
currently in the process of installing a new fuel storage tank and two (2) new fuel dispenser
pumps at Kapa'a Baseyard. We also filled some vacant positions: one (1) Welder, and one
(1) Heavy Equipment Mechanic. We basically continuing with repairs and improvements to
our facility maintenance and creating more space. We are addressing our space issues. All
of this should help us continue to provide vehicle and maintenance and support for all
County Departments. Do you have any particular questions?
Chair Furfaro: I would like to throw one (1) out and then I will
give the floor to Mr. Kagawa. A year ago, when we were having some manufacture issues
with the roadside collection vehicles for Solid Waste, have we been able to work out some of
those issues with the manufacture?
Mr. Adachi: Do you mean warranty issues?
Chair Furfaro: Yes.
Mr. Adachi: Yes, those are all resolved. We do not have any
problems now.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, great. Thank you for staying focus on
that. Mr. Kagawa, you have the floor.
Mr. Kagawa: Thank you. You said you added a Welder and a
Heavy Equipment Mechanic?
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Mr. Adachi: Yes.
Mr. Kagawa: Last year I think we were short one (1) space,
maybe? You said it would be good if we had another space...
Mr. Adachi: A working area?
Mr. Kagawa: Yes.
Mr. Adachi: We still have the same amount of space.
Actually, I had three (3) vacancies and we filled two (2) of them.
Mr. Kagawa: So, how much more space is there for everybody
to work efficiently?
Mr. Adachi: Right now, we can operate.
Mr. Kagawa: Okay.
Mr. Adachi: As we are right now.
Mr. Tabata: Last year we mentioned that we moved a column
to create an extra bay to work with. We had Engineering Division to help us design the
structural requirements to move this column that opened up another bay for us so he has
effectively has one (1) more bay to use.
Mr. Kagawa: So that is still has to be completed?
Mr. Tabata: It is completed. Another part that he is talking
about in creating more work space is Engineering Division is also helping us design a
mezzanine floor in the shop to move storage from the ground level to a mezzanine level so
that more floor space can be opened to do the production work.
Mr. Kagawa: With this new equipment that we were recently
buying, is that creating more problems?
Mr. Adachi: No. It is actually beneficial to the operation.
Mr. Kagawa: My last question is, with these electric vehicles
that we are buying, do those tend to need servicing or break down similar to a gas or is it
much better?
Mr. Adachi: Not much. You run into the normal stuff like tire
pressure, windshield wipers, turn signals, things like that but because the vehicle is
electric, no engine, so there are very little maintenance in that area.
Mr. Kagawa: Oh, wow. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Good news. JoAnn, you have the floor.
Ms. Yukimura: I really want to commend you for doing more
with less. I was impressed last year when you came up with the ideas of creating more
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space in your existing footprint. I see you finished phase one and phase two is under
design, yes?
Mr. Adachi: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: Anyway, I find it very commendable and I really
appreciate that. You said that the installation of the fuel master computerized fuel
management system is complete?
Mr. Adachi: Complete.
Ms. Yukimura: How is it working?
Mr. Adachi: It works great. We do not have too much
problems with the system.
Ms. Yukimura: Would that give us the total liquid fuel usage in
the County?
Mr. Adachi: Yes. We can run all different types of reports.
Ms. Yukimura: Do we have records of what our fuel usage is
from... say the past five (5) years so we can monitor?
Mr. Adachi: Yes, we can get that information.
Ms. Yukimura: Really?
Mr. Adachi: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Is it your sense that it is going up?
Mr. Adachi: Fuel consumption?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Adachi: I would say that fuel consumption might be going
up a little because we are adding some new equipment to the fleet.
Ms. Yukimura: And our buses are going more often starting...
are they not?
Mr. Adachi: I am really not too familiar with the bus fuel.
Ms. Yukimura: Does this include our bus?
Mr. Adachi: No it does not.
Ms. Yukimura: So, it is not the full liquid fuel budget then?
Mr. Adachi: No, just the vehicles that fuel at our site.
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Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Tabata: Transportation has their own. They keep track
of their own.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Tabata: Those vehicles that fill up at the Center
Petroleum Automotive Fuel stations, we can get that information.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, maybe OED is tracking that from an energy
use standpoint but I would like to see just what it looks like over five (5) years, if you have
that information.
Mr. Adachi: The bus information?
Ms. Yukimura: No, no...your fuel master. Or whatever you
have.
Mr. Adachi: We can get total fuel consumption not through
Fuel Master but there is other ways that we can do that. Fuel Master has just been
running for about a year.
Ms. Yukimura: I see, okay, but over time we should be able to
get good data through the Fuel Master system?
Mr. Adachi: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: In your challenges you say, "operating
productively within our limited space has become a daily battle." Will completion of the
second floor expansion solve your problem?
Mr. Adachi: Somewhat. Not totally but it is one of the few
options we have.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Adachi: We are just trying to work as effectively as
possible with the space we have.
Ms. Yukimura: Well I am just thinking that if it is not
addressing your problem than at some point in the near future you are going to be meeting
the real limits of that place and may need to start some log range plans.
Mr. Adachi: We are actually there already.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, you are already doing some long range
planning?
Mr. Adachi: Well...
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Ms. Yukimura: Oh, you are at the place with no space but you
are making the adjustments but do you see them as mainly a temporary fix?
Mr. Adachi: Temporary.
Ms. Yukimura: And so how long?
Mr. Adachi: Short-term solutions.
Ms. Yukimura: How short? When will you be pressing up
against the problem big time?
Mr. Adachi: We are already there. We are already facing
these problems and this is the best we can do to address the problems that we facing right
now.
Ms. Yukimura: Is there like a long range planning process that
needs to be initiated?
Mr. Dill: We do not have a formal process but we have
been certainly looking at options. We are essentially talking about finding a new site to
develop a new shop and obviously there are significant costs with that.
Ms. Yukimura: Significant?
Mr. Dill: Dwayne has been doing a good job in making
maximum use of what he has available to him but we have been looking and obviously
acquiring land and building a new facility is a multi-million dollar pursuit. We have been
looking for opportunities.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay because like you said if we have a plan
ready to go and funding shows up, we are much better off if we did the planning.
Mr. Dill: That is true.
Ms. Yukimura: I do not know how you could dovetail with the
bus system but their baseyard is full and either you look together and you can access
different sources of money that way or bus moves out to a larger place and Automotive
takes over there but you do not know what combinations until you start looking.
Mr. Tabata: They did take the small engine repair away from
us last year. So, that opened up a little space. If you look at Dwayne's objectives, item
number five, he has in there, analysis of the workplace facility capacity. He and I had been
in discussion to possibly move some of the repairs in the shop and relocate certain repairs
to utilize space more efficiently and of course try to do a study for the long-term needs.
Ms. Yukimura: So the analysis of workplace facility capacity,
thank you for pointing that out and thanks for being forward looking, that does not have a
date for completion or some scope of time. That is not in the works right now?
Mr. Tabata: Well that is something that we hopefully want to
embark on. I think the more short-term needs as he is looking at possibly shifting personnel
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in the shop say to heavy equipment versus from the automotive side, with the pool that will
be a short interim (inaudible) we will reduce some of the workload.
Ms. Yukimura: Hard.
Mr. Tabata: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Lastly, on your objectives, the last one. Repair
and maintenance service interval on time completion, I mean we were so impressed last
year with your statistics or there is another word for it but anyway you were currently
eighty percent (80%) at doing on time completion, is that what this is saying?
Mr. Adachi: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Yes, great.
Mr. Adachi: That is an average.
Ms. Yukimura: I was looking for other statistics on your other
objectives but...oh, average vehicle and equipment repair turnaround time currently four
(4) days.
Mr. Adachi: Yes, that is an average too.
Ms. Yukimura: And your objective is to improve that turnaround
time?
Mr. Adachi: Well, we are trying to hit that four (4) day
turnaround time.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, just to maintain?
Mr. Adachi: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: That is important too. Okay, well thank you
very much.
Chair Furfaro: I do want to be very clear on some presentations
that have been made to us if we are... I heard maybe sharing central services or
piggybacking on whatever we can with the bus for the Automotive Shop as well, I
remember the bus plan under Charlier was to put bus facilities on the outside of town to
have satellite service on the outside. If this thinking changes, please advise us well in
advance because you are using the term, if this facility might be millions and we have a cost
and revenue center that does not have enough revenue to cover its own operating expenses.
I just want you to think that through and make sure that we have one (1) outline for
automotive and another outline for bus transportation and where they can merge, I am fine
with that but I understand the savings is having outline buses and not having to run buses
into town that have no ridership on them. Other questions for Automotive? Go right ahead,
JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: On page twenty, you are showing an increase on
thirty-nine percent (39%) in benefits.
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Mr. Tabata: Remember last year when we came to Council,
we carved out the non-highway cost items?
Ms. Yukimura; Oh, I see.
Mr. Tabata: With that took some labor, benefits, and
materials out of the Automotive. We found that we had a few glitches with record keeping
to do that so we bought everything back except there is a General fund line item now in the
Automotive Shop. We are not comingling Highway Funds with General Fund expenses.
Ms. Yukimura: So, it is not an actual increase in benefits. It is
due to the record keeping transition that you are making.
Mr. Tabata: We distributed to the Departments last year and
now we are just bringing it back under his management.
Chair Furfaro: It is just a reallocation.
Mr. Tabata: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: And the vehicle lease line item of a hundred and
thirty-nine percent (139%) increase...
Mr. Tabata: That is also bringing that same control back
under the Auto Shop.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Other questions for Automotive? Vice Chair, you
have the floor.
Mr. Chock: My understanding, as you mentioned,
Transportation with the buses are separately cared for, is there any overlap between
Departments? I know Fire has their own mechanic and so forth. So, there are no shared
resources involved in any of the maintenance?
Mr. Adachi: Not really. Not on the everyday basis.
Mr. Chock: Okay. Totally separate, yes?
Mr. Adachi: Yes.
Mr. Chock: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: Any other questions? If not, Mr. Adachi, thank
you very much for another outstanding job in our Automotive Department. Larry, next we
have Wastewater?
EDWARD TSCHUPP, Chief of Wastewater: Good afternoon. You have our
budget proposal which is consolidated with the remainder of Public Works. I guess I would
like to start off with our mission. Our mission is to protect public health and safety and the
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environment through operation of the County's wastewater facilities. We had some
successes and achievements this year. Several significant projects have gone out to bid,
contracted, and awarded. Some of them are currently on the way and one of them is just
about wrapping up. The significant project include a round of improvements of Wailua, we
are just getting ready to...actually Notice to Proceed has been issued for a similar batch of
improvements, equipment upgrades at `Ele`ele, the Coco Palms pump station which was
turned on last week. It needs to be dialed in a little bit on the next go around with the
equipment manufactures representatives and our SCADA project is executing for contract
signatures, it has been awarded so there is significant amount of work, most of which is of a
capital nature which is the Division has currently handling. We have been fairly successful
with getting low cost funds through the SRF program as well as some Federal grants
through EPA. I want to always put in our thanks to the Federal EPA for their funding
assistance and the State of Hawai`i Department of Health for their funding assistance. One
of the projects that is also just kicking off was Federally funded through an EPA grant as
the Waimea Wastewater Treatment R-1 distribution system where we have hired the
consultant to initiate that and Notice to Proceed is this April.
We had several challenges, this year the Division had four (4) retirements plus a
significant...one of our Engineers left and we were successful in recruiting someone to
replace him but anytime you have that kind of turnover, our Superintendent retired this
year over the four (4) plants and then one of the Chiefs or the Plant Operator, responsible
operators also retired at the end of September. We had quite a bit of impact of staff
turnover and retirement. Another significant challenge for the Division this last year was
every five (5) years we renew our National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System
(NPDES) permit for Wailua and this year the Health Department is ratcheting down the
limitations on (inaudible) and that has some significant consequences for the County.
Chair Furfaro: In particular for Wailua, Ed?
Mr. Tschupp: Yes. That is the only plant that we have that
has an NPDES permit. We established some goals, generally speaking one of them is we
want to improve and enhance our safety program. We are getting some assistance on that
through hiring of CIH...one of those industrial hygienist kind of person who is assisting us
with some of our safety program development. We are constantly trying to improve and
maintain and upgrade the facility maintenance. We do have the same maintenance
management information system that roads have and with the staff turnover that there is a
whole new re-education that needs to happen with our new management on that program.
Continued Regulatory compliance is an ongoing challenge and then we do cover most of our
cost from our users, we would like to cover a hundred percent (100%) of our costs from our
users, we are not quite there yet, but we do have a small user base so that is always a
challenge.
You got the charts. For this upcoming year, we found that our utility costs were a
little bit under budgeted in prior years. The cost of electricity and water are going up. That
is reflected in our budget proposal for this year. We are actually looking at two (2)
positions: one (1) being the Operator Assistant to bring Waimea Plant up to the full staffing
level of a grade 4 plant and the other is a Equipment Operator which we are expanding our
service area. The pumper truck discussion that has been, I think has been discussed
broadly here of having the County takeover the responsibility for pumping County parks
and the home for that piece of equipment and operator, I think, logically falls within the
Wastewater Division. So, those are the two (2) positions. I do not really have any other up
front comments.
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Chair Furfaro: Ed, are there any changes in any Federal or
State laws that put more... are more sensitive than others of any disposal of any solid
waste material that come from the plants, is there any changes there?
Mr. Tschupp: That is something that we would very much like
to work with our Solid Waste people because all of our bio-solids are currently going to
landfill. There are options that and we have been exploring them but one of the problems
that we run into is critical mass. We have had over the years have had many people come in
and say that they have this wonderful process that can handle all your bio-solids then they
look at the amount of bio-solids that we actually have collectively amongst the four (4)
plants and it is, well, not enough. That land application is probably one of the best options.
Other options may be composting. There are Federal requirements on how that is handled.
Actually I think the only permitted land application site on Kaua`i this year stopped
operations. That was a privately run facility. Our options other than the landfill are
somewhat limited although we continue to be actively interested because it something
would be mutually benefit to solid waste if we could divert that to some other use via
energy production. Right now Economic Development has taken the lead of...and you will
probably hear more about this from the Solid Waste people, landfill gas, but they have
thrown into that analysis also looking at the anaerobic digesters we have at the Lihu`e
Plant and can we possibly start handling some food waste there and co-digest through the
existing anaerobic digesters. Getting back to your question about anything ratcheting
down on us, really the biggest thing that we see coming down the road is embodied in the
new permit requirements. They have us on a 10-year compliance schedule to meet the new
ammonia nitrogen effluent limits that were imposed in our new permit. We will talk more
about that when we get to the CIP but that 10-year compliance schedule has, "do these
studies, design this solution," and that is one of the things that is driving our CIP budget.
Chair Furfaro: Mr. Bynum has a question.
Mr. Bynum: I have not checked in with you for awhile, nice to
see you, and I am going to ask some real quick questions. I also want to know more about
this NPDES permit. So, you talked about turnover key engineer position, who was that?
Mr. Tschupp: That was Eric Agena.
Mr. Bynum: Val was before?
Mr. Tschupp: Val was before.
Mr. Bynum: That position is unfilled now?
Mr. Tschupp: No, it is filled. Jason Kagemoto started with the
Division in February, beginning February.
Mr. Bynum: Oh, yes. He is an experienced individual.
Mr. Tschupp: Jason was with Brown & Caldwell consulting
company that we use for about ten (10) years.
Mr. Bynum: Right. So, that was another good hire, right?
Wailua, the issue has to do with because we have outfall discharge into the ocean, correct?
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Mr. Tschupp: That is correct.
Mr. Bynum: Can you give me just a really brief overview of
what the issue is and what our plan is?
Mr. Dill: Councilmember as mentioned we intend to give
you more than a brief overview tomorrow during the CIP because we have some CIP funds
allocated. If that is okay with you, we can address that tomorrow?
Mr. Bynum: That is fine. Let me pass now and think about
what those other things were because that is what I wanted to drill down on. May I pass,
Chair, but I may want to come back.
Chair Furfaro: Yes, of course. JoAnn, did you have questions?
Ms. Yukimura: First of all Ed, I want to say that when I look at
your successes and achievements, they are quite extraordinary, they are very substantive
and so thank you for your work during this year. I wondered with the EPA grant funded
project for development of R-1 distribution system for the Waimea Sewage Treatment
Plant, are you developing rules and regulations?
Mr. Tschupp: We will be certainly considering the State Reuse
Guidelines. That is a framework, it is a guidance document that the State has had for
several years and they are actually in the process of updating it. That is one of the sets of
standards, if you will, it is guidelines but it essentially establishes standards for things
like...we have to work with the Water Department too because things like back flow
preventers have to be there on any parcels that are using reuse water. In addition to that
this preliminary engineering study and basically EPA at this point could grant us funds to
get up through an inclusive of the environmental documents and preliminary engineering
work needed to support that. They could not go beyond the environmental documents
because you do not want to do your decision making backwards. Include though in that
preliminary engineering is sort of the structure, the utility organization that would be the
mechanism for purveyance. The Water Department is not particularly going to be who
reads our meters. We are also doing this in corporation and in conjunction with Kikiola
Land Company. They have some infrastructure that is important to this distribution of the
R-1 water. So, there is an inherent public/private partnership between the County
Wastewater and Kikiola Land and other potential...the State Hospital, State schools end of
becoming our users.
Ms. Yukimura: Someone said that there will be revenue
generation, quite likely.
Mr. Tschupp: That would certainly be nice. It would be nice to
assess a fee.
Ms. Yukimura: Right. Which puts you in a new role instead of
selling services, you are going to be selling a product...basically water. That brings on all
kinds of...it is a new paradigm, so to speak, and how you charge and how you create these
agreements with your consumers or users is a new ballpark.
Mr. Tschupp: That is correct.
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Mr. Dill: What Ed is talking about, I think, the first step
is we are trying to figure out what sort of"utility that would be, who will own, operate the
power, and how it will function." But it will have to, at some point, have a "tariff' to
establish the rules and regulations for how it works with its customers.
Ms. Yukimura: Well you have a good background having run
Princeville system, Larry. But, yes, we are entering into a new arena and I just want to
make sure that we do it with our eyes wide open and do not miss the opportunity if there is
an opportunity to get revenues and recognize this wastewater as a resource.
Mr. Tschupp: Absolutely. In the State, Maui County has really
taken a leadership position in purveying reclaimed water. We certainly have them to look
at.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Tschupp: That is fundamentally part of our preliminary
engineering study, which is to look at that structure and how we do that.
Ms. Yukimura: Great. In your objections you have diversion of
sludge from the landfill that is your estimated outcome and you objective is to improve bio-
solids handling to develop a beneficial alternative for bio-solids management to reduce costs
and save landfill space. That is certainly very good objectives. Do you have a timeline for
this?
Mr. Tschupp: Actually it has been very hard to pin down a
timeline for that. Especially when the land application site actually ended up closing this
year as I said over the years we had venders come out and say, "I would like to get your
sludge." We get into this chicken and egg thing because we need a safe place for the sludge
to go and they need a feed stock contract and so who jumps first? They do not have a
facility. How do we sign an agreement with them to send our sludge to that non-existent
facility? And yet they need some commitment before they can actually finance the project
to build the facility. That has been the classic challenge.
Ms. Yukimura: Tell us what your end in mind is. You have
sludge that your Sewage Treatment Plants produce?
Mr. Tschupp: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: That is called bio-solids here, yes? And you want
to find a contractor who will take the sludge and transform it to some usable use?
Mr. Tschupp: That could be energy production.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Tschupp: It is possible...we have had some discussions
with the New Wood Fire Power Plant that is being built. They do not want to run this in
their boilers. They do not want to run the sludge into that...
Ms. Yukimura: They are biomass plant, right?
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Mr. Tschupp: Correct and in concept we have biomass.
Ms. Yukimura: Right but it is very different kind.
Mr. Tschupp: One of the things that they would be interested
in is using our sludge as a fertilizer for regrowth of the trees.
Ms. Yukimura: So you may have an intermediary... do you know
how Maui is doing it?
Mr. Tschupp: I think they are doing some composting. I do not
really know.
Ms. Yukimura: I think it would be a good idea to go over there
and see what they are doing. I believe John Harder has background on this but I think at
Maui the County...they may have a contractor involved but they are taking the sewage
sludge and turning it into a very high level of soil...
Mr. Tabata: I can answer that for you. When I was working
for Aqua Engineers, I did that for the County of Kaua`i. Like Ed mentioned...
Ms. Yukimura: For the County?
Mr. Tabata: Yes. I went to Maui and I did a study for the
County of Kaua`i and it all boils down to critical mass again. Having the right volume of
sludge and greenwaste to compost to make it be a profitable operation for a private
contractor. Consequently Maui ecosystem does do the Maui project however right now they
do not have a buyer for their material so they got piles and piles of material because the
development in Hawai`i since 2008 that everybody knows, tanked. So, nobody is building
golf courses anymore and that was their primary export of sale of that product.
Ms. Yukimura: Try the Dairy.
Mr. Tabata: It all boils down to the critical mass.
Ms. Yukimura: But the sewage sludge produced on this island is
only half from County, right?
Mr. Tabata: That is right.
Ms. Yukimura: What is Po`ipu?
Mr. Tabata: And that is why I looked at every private and
County entity and there was not enough and there is not enough green waste because there
is no way to force all of the green waste facilities to bring their green waste to our site.
Ms. Yukimura: But we have a green waste problem and I have
heard complaints just recently that our processing of green waste is costing too much.
Mr. Tabata: That is not enough.
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Ms. Yukimura: Have we looked at putting those two together?
Mr. Dill: We would have the same challenges as Maui has.
Green waste processing by itself is an expensive proposition, using feedstock and combining
it with sludge is a little bit more costly. As Lyle mentioned at one point the Maui operation
was doing very well and they were scrapping it off the ground to sell it but for the last five
(5) to six (6) years they have mountains just sitting around, they cannot move it. And so
they are not seeing the revenue that they used to see and it is obviously tied to the cycles of
the economy. Sometimes it is a great option and sometimes it does not work as well.
Ms. Yukimura: But we are importing so much fertilizer and soil
conditioner you would think that someone could figure out the link between the non-golf
course market and this resource. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Before I recognize Mr. Bynum, what does our
green waste cost us, Larry?
Mr. Dill: I do not have that number with me but the Solid
Waste guys that are coming up next...
Chair Furfaro:" It is one point three million dollars ($1,300,000).
It is a big number and we got to find a source so we can recover some of that. Mr. Bynum,
you have the floor.
Mr. Bynum: This is just the issue that I wanted to talk about.
I just visited a facility in Southern Oregon that I visited ten (10) years ago. It is a City run
facility in collaboration with the County there, it mixes bio-solids with green waste and like
Maui, even including ground up pallets and other problem materials. They had it for
twenty-five (25) years run by the City. I just visited them on the week they shut down after
twenty-five (25) and here is the story really briefly. The community was responding to this.
They are going to continue to receive green waste at that site but ten (10) years ago the
County was informed about new environmental standards and they had to put in drainage
and other systems to keep it. I learned a lot. The community was really upset that they
could not get this soil amendment anymore. They could still drop green waste but they are
going to handle it differently because the City did not invest in that next level of needed
environmental things. Of course the Engineers wanted that. That is what they wanted.
They thought this was the best thing going and it worked. I am very interested in this
issue and I appreciate that you are taking an initiative to look how we can do it. I know
about this history Lyle, about finding critical mass, and what I want to ask you...you are
doing a cost benefit analysis because that is your job but there is a larger social purpose
and potential for our island. We have very depleted soils, goals, and CEDS programs to
bring more farming and more sustainable Ag that need these soil amendments. You do the
cost benefit analysis if it costs more to go this direction, there is benefits which diversion
from the landfill being a huge one and creating soil amendments that are meaningful and
important. Do you agree with that analysis?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Hopefully this is a dialogue that we will continue
to have about how to best handle these bio-solids. Did you say that we loss a spreading
place...that is what Princeville traditionally done with their bio-solids, correct, Larry?
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Mr. Dill: Princeville was taking their bio-solids to the
landfill and right about the time I left was at the time this private operation had
established operation on the South Shore and Princeville was a client of that South Shore
operation. I do not know since I am not there what they are doing now. I am assumed they
are taking it to the landfill again.
Mr. Bynum: Was it not a period that it was spread on
Princeville lands on the North Shore?
Mr. Dill: Historically since Princeville Wastewater
Treatment System in the early 1970s, Princeville was doing land application prior to the
Federal rules being written on the North Shore, I think.
Mr. Bynum: Right and generally speaking land application or
some reuse is a better environmental model than land filling, correct?
Mr. Dill: I would agree.
Mr. Bynum: I just wanted to see if you agree that there is a
larger social purpose perhaps that would motivate us to move into that direction even
though there is not a direct cost benefit analysis because of these benefits that are harder to
quantify. How are we studying this? Is this in-house?
Mr. Dill: We have been looking in-house right now.
Mr. Bynum: I just really applaud that discussion and get that
collaboration and maybe even relooking at that kind of situation because critical mass
clearly is an issue. If you have private contributors as well as the County, that makes that
more possible. It is the kind of the thing we did with composting. We have now pretty
strong relationships with private sectors on both sides, is that correct?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: I remember when the separation was pretty
distinct and we work through those, right? We have now win-win collaborative
relationships, is that correct?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: I did not know Wastewater was thinking about
this along with Solid Waste. That is the kind of collaborative stuff that is great. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Anymore questions for the Wastewater Division?
Mr. Hooser, you have the floor.
Mr. Hooser: It is an interesting discussion about waste and
sludge. It appears to be a resource—the sludge.
Mr. Dill: If we find a customer, yes.
Mr. Hooser: And critical mass is an issue. In my mind it begs
the question, can we store this at a separate section of the landfill or something that can
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be...you know, we find a customer and it gives us critical mass in terms of our side of the
equation. You do not need to answer this now but I do not know if the landfill specifications
are the same but it maybe something to consider. If it is a potential resource and all we
had to do was find a customer and they are going to need a lot of it, it seems to make sense
if we can put it somewhere if it was safe and met legal requirements.
Mr. Tabata: I was involved in the permitting of that private
facility also and it was the only one in the State at the time. It requires daily cover just like
our landfill because of the pest associated with the operation, the vector control issue, so it
required daily cover. It is a long drawn out permitting process and in fact I did look very
thoroughly for a composting facility and it is the cost upfront. Just like what Ed mentioned,
all of these different companies come to us with these promises but when they look at our
size and our volumes, it does not pass along. You cannot get funding to do it if you are a
private company.
Mr. Hooser: Right now it is mixed in with the rest of the
landfill?
Mr. Tabata: Right.
Mr. Hooser: All thrown together and covered on a daily basis.
Mr. Tabata: Yes.
Mr. Hooser: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Further questions for Wastewater? If not, I want
to thank you folks very much. We are going to move now into Solid Waste Division. Larry,
is there a particular protocol that you want us to follow for your people?
Mr. Dill: Solid Waste, we will continue the same theme
pretty much. I will have Division Head Troy and Allison. Troy will speak to the budget
presentation and Allison will participate in the waste division components of that. He will
touch on some of the highlights of the budget presentation that has been provided to
Council and we will open it up for questions.
Chair Furfaro: I see Donald in the back. Is he not going to
participate?
Mr. Dill: Not directly as part of the first presentation but
certainly during the questions and answers, he will be available.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. What is the chain of command here for
us?
Mr. Dill: Chain of command?
Chair Furfaro: In this Division, who is the Head of this
Division?
Mr. Dill: Troy is the Head of this Division. Donald as the
Environmental Services Officer has oversight over both Solid Waste and Wastewater.
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Chair Furfaro: And I noticed with Wastewater he was not at
the table also.
Mr. Dill: Well similar to right now, he was available to
any questions that came up.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. You answered me. Thank you. You have
the floor, Troy.
TROY TANIGAWA, P.E., Environmental Services Management Engineer: Good
afternoon Councilmembers. As Larry mentioned, I would like to touch on some of the
highlights for the Division and I will start off with some successes and achievements that
we have had recently. We enjoyed a reduction in overtime. Evident in FY 2013 we saw
reduction in approximately two hundred eighty-eight thousand dollars ($288,000) in overall
overtime costs. That was achieved by some of the measures that were put in place.
Chair Furfaro: I shared my responses from Finance on the
savings and overtime as it relates to Solid Waste and so forth. So, everybody have those
particular answers.
Mr. Tanigawa: Okay, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: I want to thank you for getting that for us.
Mr. Tanigawa: You are welcome. We also had success in
achieving continued landfill capacity at the Kekaha landfill. We recently secured the
vertical expansion permit from the Department of Health. It allows us to operate the
landfill for approximately another five (5) years. We also had success and progress in our
efforts considering development of the new landfill this past...recently was the publishing
of the final environmental assessment EIS preparation notice. That was actually in
February 2013. We had further progress in all the very special studies that had to be
conducted for that document to be properly prepared. In waste diversion, we saw an
increase in overall waste diversion. In FY 2013 we have a waste diversion rate of forty-two
percent (42%) which includes County's waste diversion as well as waste diversion efforts on
the private sector side. Recycling education and awareness, there are a lot of things that
are going on in that area. We have staff that is working really hard and diligently. In
summary, the quality and scope of our public awareness information has increased. We
made significant progress in that area. Electronics recycling events, we now have monthly
electronic recycling events for residents at a central collection put in Lihu`e — the Kaua`i
Resource Center.
Chair Furfaro: It is now monthly?
Ms. Fraley: Two (2) days a month.
Chair Furfaro: Do we know which days?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes. It is normally the second Friday and
Saturday. There is a Friday and Saturday which is the consecutive second weekend, it is
usually scheduled then.
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Chair Furfaro: So, it is monthly now and it is usually the second
Friday and Saturday of each month?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: And it is at the?
Mr. Tanigawa: Kaua`i Resource Center.
Chair Furfaro: Kaua`i Resource Center at the airport?
Mr. Tanigawa: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you.
Mr. Tanigawa: Our residential refuse collection assessment, we
are into approximately the third year of implementation and we see continued success in
implementation. It has helped us reduce the burden on the General Fund to help us run
our programs.
Some of our main objectives are here and I would like to go into a little bit of detail
regarding the objections. One of our main objectives is to monitor our proposed
construction and demolition diversion ordinance to make sure we maintain the momentum
on that and we implement that on a timely basis. We would like to see a completion
date...effective date of the ordinance by July 2014. Our intended outcome, we are looking
at hopefully increasing a diversion by about four thousand (4,000) tons per year. Another
objective is to monitor a commercial recycling ordinance or business recycling ordinance to
establish recycling programs for designated recyclables. This ordinance and the one above
will require a new recycling specialist position. At the time of implementation we hope to
secure Council approval for the new position to help us further that program as well. With
this diversion business recycling ordinance, it is projected to possibly divert another
additional eight thousand (8,000) tons a year. We hope to continue...along with those
ordinances we are looking at providing technical assistance to the commercial sector as well
as private recyclers to help further that effort. Our main outcome is to obtain maximum
compliance with those ordinances. We are projecting completion of full automating refuse
collection program by July 2015. This will involve automating another nine thousand
(9,000)_households completing areas from KOloa through Kekaha. Another major initiative
is implementing the operation of a Material Recovery Facility (MRF) to sort single stream
recyclables. We are currently looking at an implementation date of July 2015. The major
thing that that will help us with is to facilitate curbside recycling for our residential
customers which will further increase our diversion rate. Last but not least, increase public
education in schools and to the community at large. Basically, that helps us achieve a goal
of increasing public participation and...
Chair Furfaro: Is that why you were trying to get his attention,
Larry?
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Mr. Tanigawa: Excuse me. I got distracted. Just to complete the
public education statements, it is to increase program participation and the quality of
materials that are collected. Basically decreasing contamination while increasing the
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amounts being recycled. I would like to make a correction, if I may, the projected
implementation date for the MRF is 2017, not 2015 —July 2017. Sorry. Also, I jumped over
one of our main goals...and that is the pay-as-you-throw program, we are looking to
implement that ordinance by July 2015 — the pay-as-you-throw ordinance by July 2015.
That was the 2015 date.
Mr. Bynum: So, that is correct?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes, at least the first phase. Pay-as-you-throw
actually has two phases. So, first by July 2015.
Chair Furfaro: Before I give the floor to Mr. Bynum for
questions, on this discussion we had about providing educational opportunities and so forth
as it references increase to the community at large. Can you measure this better? How
many hours a year do we have community education out there through the schools and so
forth? Do we do five hundred (500) hours a year and we are going to increase it by twenty-
five percent (25%)? I think this is the second or third year I am reading the same thing of
"increase, increase." Increase from what?
ALLISON FRALEY, Solid Waste Program Development Coordinator: Aloha. As far
as the public education budget this year, we are talking about increasing it because the
current fiscal year our budget is only ten thousand dollars ($10,000) and we are proposing
to increase the budget to the previous level of sixty thousand dollars ($60,000) and that
would allow us to do more radio ads, newspaper ads, and other things like that that
actually costs money. We do provide community outreach, free of charge to organizations
upon requests, we go to schools upon request, and we use existing staff to do that. There
are certain costs items that do require a larger budget to continue a high level of awareness
in the community.
Chair Furfaro: I guess what I am trying to find out is, I just do
not want to measure the dollars that we are spending on it. I want to measure how much
actual educational benefit is out there? For example, we are going to all the fourth grade
classes in the County of Kaua`i—three (3) public schools... how do you...
Ms. Fraley: We do track that and we have that information
as I said, those things actually we have staff in place to do those presentations to schools.
What the increase would be is paid advertisements in newspapers, publications, radio ads,
and things of that nature that do have costs. We can track that and provide you with that
information.
Chair Furfaro: I do not need it for this budget but I would like it
in the near future because if we are going from ten thousand dollars ($10,000) this year to
sixty thousand ($60,000), are we going to increase public awareness by six (6) times?
Ms. Fraley: I see what you are getting at, yes, these are costs
items that would be adding, yes.
Chair Furfaro: That is the big piece. How much is actually
getting them to the classrooms, the living rooms, the newspapers, and the radio ads about
promotion? Then we can measure six times the amount that is being budgeted. I am going
to give the floor to Mr. Bynum but you have a follow-up question? Troy, did you have an
extended answer?
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Mr. Tanigawa: Yes, if I may, Council Chair. Because we have a
substantial increase in our budget comparing 2014 to next proposed FY, I wanted to
highlight the areas of increases and summarize what they are about. First in our operating
budget under disposal section, we have an increase of roughly one point four million dollars
($1,400,000) to one point five million dollars ($1,500,000). That increase is primarily due to
our contract with Waste Management for operation of the Kekaha landfill as well as our
financial assurance amount. The amount that we set aside to the landfill for every ton of
material that goes into the landfill. That increased substantially. About three quarters of
a million dollars. Roughly half of that increase is because of that because we see a need to
increase the contributions to meet the closure amount by the time we project the landfill to
be closed and we are going to require the money to close the landfill. Those two (2) items
and we have proposed a bulky item shredding pilot project to increase efficiencies at the
landfill. The reason why we feel that money will be well spent at this time is that it will
help us save air space. Air space is not something that comes cheap. To create air space
takes a significant amount of money because of creating a baseliner unless you are able to
go vertical on the landfill but right now at Kekaha landfill we pretty much maximized the
footprint on lateral expansion areas. We have identified pretty much where we think we
can go feasibly. The last area that we are looking at expanding laterally is (inaudible) that
is currently being evaluated and designed.
Chair Furfaro: Where would I find that and on what page? I
was reviewing page 38.
Mr. Tanigawa: Page 39 and 40, Chair, in the presentation.
Chair Furfaro: And that is covering goals Roman numeral
number 4 and it is on page 39 and 40.
Mr. Tanigawa: 39 is the bar charts.
Chair Furfaro: But there is no narrative there. It is just like
being able to read the bar charts and so forth.
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: There is no strategic thinking narrative in there
as you just presented it to us.
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes, I wanted to highlight and there is another
area in addition to the area that was just mentioned, in our recycling programs...
Mr. Dill: If I could, Chair, on page 40 there is some
discussion of the items that Troy mentioned.
Chair Furfaro: There is one paragraph.
Mr. Tanigawa: It summarizes it but it did not go into the
explanation as much as I did.
Chair Furfaro: But no two-day turnaround but within reason,
could you summarize your narrative for us in just a follow-up with memorandum?
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Mr. Tanigawa: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: I do not need it in two-days but I would like to
have something because we need some real measurable here.
Mr. Tanigawa: The other area of significant increase that I
wanted to highlight is in our recycling budget. We had a requirement to reduce our budget
when we were in budget discussions for FY 2014, the current budget we have. To meet
goals to hit a maximum budget amount total for those programs, we had to cut areas of our
budget to include removing programs as well as cutting back for funding for programs just
to enable us to continue those programs into the FY 2015.
Chair Furfaro: Is that in that one paragraph narrative too?
Mr. Tanigawa: It is summarized in there in a couple sentences
also.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, I do not really see it but because we did
that and we cut back, we also eliminated programs, what we proposed this year is to add
back the programs that we eliminated to include used cooking oil programs, collection
programs, and recycling grants. Those programs have resulted in a lot of positive feedback
from the community but we are also seeking full twelve month funding though which we
really require to continue our programs into next FY. If we do not get that funding, we will
probably lapse those programs at least for a period of time until 2016 funding becomes
available. That is all I have.
Chair Furfaro: What were those amounts that...
Ms. Yukimura: I think there in your line item budget. Are they
not?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Because we are looking in this and it is not in
here.
Chair Furfaro: There is nothing in the narrative but that is
what the narrative is supposed to be. It is supposed to help us direct into some line items
so that we can...excuse me, if I can finish here? You are telling me things and there is no
narrative in the line item budget and this does not sing the blues to me.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, it would have helped.
Chair Furfaro: So, if you can give us some summary of what you
just said and I do not need it in two days but I would like to have it in a reasonable time
because basically this says for the 2015 budget request reflects the full twelve (12) month
funding estimate for the Divisions and the service contracts which will be necessary to
avoid a lapse in services. Who are all those contracts that will lapse?
Mr. Tanigawa: We can give you a full list of those items...
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Ms. Yukimura: It is page...
Chair Furfaro: Excuse me, JoAnn, I am asking him a question.
I know you are telling me that it is a line item there but that is not what I want. I want to
hear the narrative that says what is going to lapse. You listed everything over here that
JoAnn is referring to but in the narrative you're saying that it is going to lapse. What
contracts will lapse?
Ms. Yukimura: All.
Chair Furfaro: All of them?
Mr. Tanigawa: No. Can you speak to this?
Chair Furfaro: I do not need it right now but put it in a
summary.
Ms. Fraley: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: It is not all of those line items that will lapse is
it?
Mr. Tanigawa: No, not all the line items but just a few.
Chair Furfaro: Tell us what they are.
Mr. Tanigawa: We will respond to that.
Chair Furfaro: I appreciate that. Mr. Chock, you have the floor.
Mr. Chock: I think we are on the subject of education and
just to follow-up with what the Chair's request was. I think what I am hearing, and correct
me if I am wrong, but we need some measurements in terms of the outcomes we are looking
for. If you are saying six (6) times and so forth and in any educational environment I would
expect that there is some sort of way to measure that like a questionnaire to see what the
mindset is for our community. Are we changing our habits? How often? How much
knowledge are they retaining? I am sure that is part of it but I am curious what that might
be. It is not a judgment of the presentation. I could see a use of that actually in many of
the presentations that I am reading, in terms of how we are reaching our goals, and
specifics on how we are measuring those outcomes. That is all I wanted to mention.
Chair Furfaro: You can put that in the same response. Thank
you for the summary, Vice Chair. Tim?
Mr. Bynum: (inaudible) the ordinance is forthcoming?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: You are hoping that the ordinance, the draft,
what you are sending over is effective July 2015, right?
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Mr. Tanigawa: The goal is to present the ordinance to the
Council in a timeframe that will allow implementation to have that date.
Mr. Bynum: Are we talking the next couple of months this
ordinance is coming to us or next year?
Mr. Tanigawa: There are a few more steps that have to take
place before we can submit it. We are working with stakeholders and that might take a
little while. What we are projecting is probably submittal by July of 2014.
Mr. Bynum: And that is true these are separate construction
demolition and commercial recycling, two (2) separate ones?
Mr. Tanigawa: Two (2) separate bills.
Mr. Bynum: And then pay-as-you-throw is a third ordinance?
Complete full automation it says ordinance. Is that because it is a money bill that requires
additional funds to finish the automated collection, what kind of ordinance is that?
Mr. Tanigawa: That is probably a typo that we have ordinance
connected to completion of automated. We already have an ordinance in place to address
all of automated collection.
Mr. Bynum: We have pay-as-you-throw ordinance...there is
no need to revisit that?
Mr. Tanigawa: There will be a bill to enact pay-as-you-throw.
Mr. Bynum: But your goal as you are announcing to us is that
that bill will be effective July 2015?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: So this is one, two, three, four separate
ordinance.
Ms. Fraley: The automation is not an ordinance is what we
were saying. That may have been a typo.
Mr. Bynum: You are just saying that your goal date is by
2015 but you do not need any further action from the Council.
Mr. Tanigawa: What that goal is related to is just to begin
automotive collection on the South and West side.
Mr. Bynum: Are we on track with that?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Okay. As part of my communication related to
the tipping fee bill earlier, I asked for a simple kind of chart, 2008 goals when we adopted
the Solid Waste Plan and an estimate of completion, right? Some of those goals would say
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that we decided not to pursue this or whatever. But something really simple and clean
without all of the policy explanations of why the things were delayed and just get a sense of
what our original goals were and what you are estimating and I would appreciate that in
the forthcoming future. So, pay-as-you-throw, the next step would be...I have these cool
little pictures of when I was in Oregon, the little brown cans that are thirty-two (32)
gallons. You go all over the County, you do not see anything but those little thirty-two (32)
gallons for disposal. I shared some of this with Larry, the citizens pay a lot there to
dump...when they go to the landfill a pick-up truck that we can dump for free, I forgot it
was like twenty-five dollars ($25.00) a load and the resident pay that and they are okay
because their culture is "we take care of opala without doing environmental damage," and
we are headed in that direction. I appreciate that. What is the next step to pay-as-you-
throw?
Ms. Fraley: The next step is when we introduce the
automated refuse collection to the whole island we would offer the option of a sixty-four (64)
gallon container. We will talk about rates when we propose the ordinance but we are
looking at keeping the fee the same at twelve dollars ($12.00) a month, if you opt for the
sixty-four (64) gallon cart size and if you want to keep the ninety-six (96) gallon cart size
which is what is out there now, that you would pay a higher rate. We are looking at
twenty-one dollars ($21.00) a month but like I said this would be decided by Ordinance.
Mr. Bynum: And I do not need to go into further detail. I am
just trying to get a sense of what Council actions are forthcoming in the next couple years.
Clearly, these two (2) ordinances are coming to us sooner rather than later, right?
Mr. Dill: All three (3) ordinances, yes.
Ms. Fraley: In the next few months.
Mr. Bynum: But I mean before the end of the calendar year?
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Okay. Thank you. I am waiting for these steps.
The new position for recycling that is tied to these ordinances will come with the ordinances
or a separate money bill? Is it in the budget?
Mr. Dill: That would be part of the FY 2016 budget
proposal.
Mr. Bynum: I see. So, you are just letting us know now that
this is coming. Part of my question was, could you not use that position to anticipate those
things going onboard, you are going to have this new position right when the ordinance has
become effective? Where is the start up time? I could be really critical about how the
education has gone because I think it could be so much better but I also know what the
budget realities are so how can you be critical. But this goes back to me for when we
implemented the plastic bag band, we did not put any in my view, we did not put sufficient
effort into educating the community about it. It was such a good idea in my mind it rolled
out and we did not have any big major problems. What we missed compared to Maui is the
people of Maui because of the education program, "bring your own bag (byob)," remember
those great logos and stuff, they were out there before the ordinance telling the people why
this is a great idea, how it is going to benefit them financially and environmentally and so
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the community got to feel great about it because of the education effort. I do not think we
can show any statistics of compliance was any different because the bags are not available
but I can tell you the sense of the transition and the feel that the community had, the key
was education. Well, that was just "feel good" but this education was about compliance.
When we get to our three (3) can system, people have to know how to use mixed
recycling...anyway I am a big fan of the education effort. I am glad that you have a budget
that is more reasonable and hopefully we will find a way to support that.
Mr. Tanigawa: Just for clarification to add to Councilmember
Bynum what you were saying, we are planning to have a one (1) year period where, from
the time of adoption of the bill and creation of the ordinance, a one (1) year timeframe
where folks will be able to wrap up and develop their programs and become effective in
doing the type of diversion or recycling activities that they need to comply with the
ordinance. The one (1) year period would start from adoption of the ordinance and during
that period of time a Recycling Specialist would be out there pounding the pavement, going
to these companies upon request, and helping them with technical assistance to get them
prepared.
Mr. Bynum: To be prepared for the...
Mr. Tanigawa: For compliance one (1) year after the ordinance is
adopted.
Mr. Bynum: I really appreciate that answer. Did you finish?
Mr. Tanigawa: I was just going to mention that part of the
requirements of the ordinance is reporting and that Recycling Specialist would be helping
those businesses under what the reporting requirements are and what is going to take to
complete the forms.
Mr. Bynum: You really answered my question quite well, I
have not thought of that but it is also like... okay, you have an ordinance that becomes
effective and then there is a year before the requirements to come in and...what if you pass
the ordinance in the next few months and you put that person in the budget, and you made
those requirements happen sooner? Do you know what I am saying? Then you put the
person in and say, "the ordinance has passed and..." anyway, I know you need to phase it in
and understand. This will be the second round... I am back to pay-as-you-throw for minute.
I appreciate your explanation, Allison, I was hoping to hear that we go to thirty-two (32)
can for twelve dollars ($12.00) and sixty-four (64) and ninety-four (94) would be more
because I think we need to be that aggressive. I do not think it is far from the norm but the
other alternative is the twelve dollars ($12.00) to go to sixty-four (64) and then maybe three
(3) years from later twelve to thirty-two or twelve and if I picked the thirty-two (32) now,
give me an incentive.
Chair Furfaro: Hold on just a second, all of this is in theory and
Mr. Bynum had agreed that is not something he needs within two (2) days.
Mr. Bynum: Of course not.
Chair Furfaro: But we are talking about it here and we want to
see something in writing that kind of say, "what is your future concept of that?"
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Mr. Bynum: Well, that is why I am asking the question.
Chair Furfaro: I want to make sure that they understand what
you said because I have two (2) pending questions that I do not need the answers in the
next two (2) days but I would like to understand them more. For example, how do we
measure the educational systems and so forth. So, this is great information but this is a
budget discussion and we can have more of this discussion on a Public Works item but
please note we would like to get that in some kind of a narrative. I do not want to get it to a
place a year and a half from now and we forget what we said a year ago. I will give the
floor back to Mr. Bynum but please note that we are expecting some of these ideas that he
is talking about to be sent to us in writing.
Mr. Bynum: I think I am almost done. Do you agree we need
to be somewhat aggressive at meeting these goals because of the challenges that we face?
Ms. Fraley: Definitely and I just want to say that we have
the pay-as-you-throw plan that has been developed by our consultant and the plan does
have an aggressive point and that would be when customers have the option of curbside
recycling/diversion and then we do go to the thirty-two (32) gallon at that point. That is the
way the most pay-as-you-throw programs work. We are actually being really aggressive by
introducing a first phase before we even have curbside recycling in place.
Mr. Bynum: Very good point. Thank you very much for that.
We are behind on every goal that we set and that is not criticism; there are various reasons
for that, right? But we are and so anything we can do...because we are hitting these
deadlines, you know, are we going to have to handle our trash in some extraordinary
manner because we do not make a successful transition between Kekaha landfill and a new
landfill. That is the big giant question out there and everything we do that accelerates our
recycling diversion and solid waste plan, can potentially lengthen that period of time and
keep us from avoiding that crisis, right?
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Is this a decent analysis I just did, is it?
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: I just wanted to underline to how serious I am
about moving expeditiously as humanly possible with these issues. I thank you and I look
forward to the follow-up answers but you have reminded me that pay-as-you-throw does not
end with this next move. Thank you very much. Closing comment, I spent three (3) or four
(4) days in this southern Oregon community again for the second time in ten (10) years
focused on solid waste issues because that area of the Country is way far ahead of us. So, it
is not like we should be there and that is also not a criticism but they have experienced the
change in community norms, right, that we would have to go through. We are used to
throwing our trash and having no cost connected in our minds. Our County is like, "just
throw it at the curb and we will take it all." It is tough to think that we have to pay for this
now and I cannot just do it like I used to? Those are tough things. In the communities
where they made that norm, the community is proud of it, and they are not complaining
about paying to throw their trash. Thank you.
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Chair Furfaro: Okay, so you understand the three (3) item
between Mr. Bynum and myself. We are looking for some future response on... those were
not questions for the next two (2) days. Mr. Hooser, I will give you the floor but I have a
housekeeping announcement before I do. We are going to have to take a caption break in
about ten (10) minutes or so and at that time for Councilmember, we will be passing out
material at the break regarding information for the CIP discussion tomorrow and there will
be more to come. So, make sure today you have gathered your piece. Mr. Hooser, you have
the floor.
Mr. Hooser: Thank you for your presentation. I appreciate all
the good work that you are doing. My question is regarding the overtime, it looks like for
Solid Waste Disposal in 2011 the regular time was two hundred thirteen thousand
($213,000) and now it is budgeted for seventy-five thousand ($75,000). For Solid Waste
Collection in 2011 it was four hundred fifty thousand ($450,000) and now it is budgeted for
seventy thousand ($70,000) and so if those are real numbers that is really good information.
Are those the actual overtime? So, we actually dropped from four hundred fifty thousand
dollars ($450,000) in 2011 to...you expect to spend seventy thousand dollars ($70,000) in
the coming year? Is that with savings? Can you explain how we got there, if it is real?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes, that is a reflection of real savings. We
continued to see based on the projected overtime by the time we reach the end of FY 2014,
this current FY. We have continued the drop in overall overtime expense. The reason why
that savings could be obtained is primarily to our drop in overtime collection units. When
you compare overtime numbers in FY 2010 compared to where we are now, it is an even
more dramatic drop. FY 2011 is when we implemented the first phase of automated
collections. That one additional crew took majority of the overtime on the East side. Then
when we implicated phase two (1) of the automated collection, it pretty much absorbed the
remaining overtime on the East side. The reason why we have overtime in refuse collection
is based on requirement in the collective bargaining agreement, for manual collection, every
unit over six hundred (600) units per day/per crew is paid on an overtime basis. Because of
the number of homes that were counted being serviced at that time, each collection crew
had between a hundred (100) to three hundred (300) units additional on a given day. There
was one (1) driver and two (2) collectors on the back of the truck. When you transition to
automated collection, we were able to increase the daily collection amount to a thousand
(1,000) units and our employee count from three (3) down to one (1) truck driver. The
efficiency went way up and we were able to absorb a great deal of overtime units. Another
reason why the contributors to overtime were cut was the fact that we had implemented the
residential refuse collection assessment program. When we did that it required collection
service to only be delivered to permanent dwellings in the County. So, we saw a dramatic
decrease in our numbers too, our collection unit numbers because of that. So, with the drop
in units the overtime costs basically went away for the East side. The West side, we still
have some collection units that are over the count so we are still paying a little bit of
overtime but we did away with the majority of refuse collection related to overtime on the
East side. Another reason for the drop in overtime is that we reduced our operating hours
for the refuse transfer stations in the landfill from ten (10) hours to eight (8) hour days.
That allowed us to schedule staff better so we are able to absorb times when the staff is on
leave. We can pretty much meet our minimum daily manpower requirements a lot better
and that has allowed us to reduce the overtime call outs.
Mr. Hooser: Thank you and congratulation on doing that.
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Chair Furfaro: I think in all fairness we also want to make note
that that discussion about three (3) years ago and yes, we are saving the overtime here but
we also had some other costs associated with getting us to the program. For example, four
hundred thousand dollars ($400,000) for the containers, we also had the leases on the
equipment and so forth. There is some investments to get us into particularly targeting
overtime and the whole return has not been realized yet because of that but it is only fair to
point out the other investments that we had to make to get us to the point that we reduced
the overtime. JoAnn, you have the floor but would you mind if I ask that we take the
caption break now and I gave you the floor when we come back? I am going to be leaving
and I am going to turn the meeting over to Mr. Chock. We are coming back to you folks, we
are passing some CIP stuff for tomorrow as well but we will continue the rest of the
afternoon on this subject matter.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 2:52 p.m.
The Committee reconvened at 3:02 p.m., and proceeded as follows:
Mr. Chock: Councilmember Yukimura, you have the floor.
Ms. Yukimura: I wanted to understand how you calculated the
recycling rate and you gave me a sheet that we are making copies of, so, I am good with
that. Congratulations, we are actually at a forty-two percent (42%) recycling. With the
projected four thousand (4,000) and eight thousand (8,000) tons diversion, where will that
put us? You are projecting with a couple of ordinances.
Ms. Fraley: I am sorry I do not have that answer right this
second but if I get that sheet back, I can do a quick calculation.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright, waiting for that then. The Pay-As-You-
Throw is proposed for July...so, approximately a year from now, you are going to put that
into operation?
Ms. Fraley: Yes, we want to bring that to Council in the next
few months and then have the effective date be July 2015 and that would coincide with the
completion of automation.
Ms. Yukimura: What people will get for the Pay-As-You-Throw is
they will get to choose a smaller container?
Ms. Fraley: Correct. That is actually part of our public
education money which is to be able to educate people about their choice and to let them
know about the new program.
Ms. Yukimura: Then you have plans to address dumping?
Ms. Fraley: Illegal dumping?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Ms. Fraley: The same as what we have done at this point.
The program is not changing really.
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Mr. Tanigawa: Maybe I can just...
Ms. Yukimura: I see, the people are still paying fees anyway?
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Mr. Tanigawa: If you are referring to folks being limited to the
container size and with an incentive to go to the smaller container...
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Tanigawa: There were a lot of the same concerns, actually,
when we went to automated refuse collection. A lot of times you saw a lot of containers set
out on the curb side and there was concern that if a homeowner did not want to purchase
service of a second ninety-six (96) gallon container, that you would have a lot of illegal
docking. We actually found that there are more people that are very conscientious about
where it goes and we have not seen a big problem with illegal dumping.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. That is very good to hear. On you
preparation for the EIS for the new County landfill, I am sorry to say I have not read the
notice but are you doing...is the EIS covering the Resource Recovery Facility on private
land?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes, the alternate RRP site on private land will
be addressed on the EIS as well as a co-located RRP site with the landfill.
Ms. Yukimura: So, there are two (2) options?
Mr. Tanigawa: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: It is not just on private land?
Mr. Tanigawa: That is correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, very good. What is your time table for the
Materials Recovery Facility (MRF)? You said 2017, but why is it taking so long? Is that a
CIP?
Mr. Dill: No, I do not think that we have any additional
funds proposed in the CIP budget this year.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay then, please explain.
Mr. Dill: So right now we are... actually I will ask Allison
to give an update on where we are with the current efforts for the MRF. We are currently
doing some work going on with the MRF, some consultant work. The challenge, today, has
been the same as it has been for a while is securing a site. We identified a possible site, I
think as everybody knows adjacent to the existing Lihu`e Refuse Transfer Station. It is a
site that is under control of the University of Hawai`i, it was intended to one point to be a
tropical fruit disinfestations facility. I am not familiar with the details but I know
ultimately they did a feasibility study which indicated that such a facility was not feasible
at that site. The tropical fruit facility was being done by the ADC under authority of the
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University of Hawai`i (U.H.), they had a lease for this site. Once the feasibility study was
shown that it was not going to be a practical there, ADC looked to get out of that property.
They had no further use for it and so we immediately approached U.H. about acquiring it
for the purposes of a MRF. Initially, we received some pretty positive feedback that it was
a strong likelihood and so we have been planning around that site. Since that time though,
the Department of Transportation —Airports, Lihu`e Airport folks have also come into the
picture and indicated a strong desire to acquire the site for their own purposes.
Ms. Yukimura: What purpose?
Mr. Dill: I believe they identified the site in some study in
the early to mid-1990's as a possible future maintenance facility but I cannot really speak
for them. It is some airport related use that they are looking at right now. Obviously for us
being right next to the Kaua`i Resource Center and the Lihu`e Refuse Transfer Station, we
have a lot of solid waste activities focused in that area, that would be a great opportunity
for some synergies between those things to enhance our solid waste goals. It makes a lot of
sense to centrally located area that already got access and things like that. It makes a lot
of sense for us so we continue to pursue that and we have been in touch up as high as the
Governor requesting his support for us to acquire this site. We have been very frustrated
with the lack of progress in securing this site and finalizing that. I think I have stated to
Council before and I will say it again that we still feel that we are very close to being
successful at acquiring that site for the purposes of siting a MRF there.
Ms. Yukimura: Has the Mayor talked to the Governor?
Mr. Dill: Yes. I want to bring you up-to-date with that
side of it but in the meantime I will ask Allison to speak briefly to what we are doing with
the MRF to further that goal.
Ms. Fraley: We have a contract with Cal Recovery and they
are conducting some conceptual design work. At this point, they are almost complete with
task one of the contract which is to provide detailed recommendations on facility sizing,
process flow, and the layout. We have received a draft document that would provide us
with that information. We are getting pretty close to where do need it to be site specific in
order to move forward. The next tasks on that contract...
Ms. Yukimura: So you know what, since everybody wants to
leave...can you provide the timetable for the MRF assuming site control?
Ms. Fraley: Okay.
Ms. Yukimura: Are you guys actually waiting, somebody has
said they will respond to the request from the County by a certain time?
Mr. Dill: We met with our State Legislators very recently
about this, within the past couple of weeks. We are awaiting their response right now on
the issue of the site control of the MRF in that location.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. You know sometimes it helps to know
what the Department of Transportation (DOT) really wants to see if they can find an
alternative site. Why could they not move down a little further? Is that not DOT land too?
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Mr. Dill: It is. I do not disagree with you. I think as they
have shown with me, their goal is generally speaking to be in control of all lands around the
airport. They just feel more comfortable with an airport vicinity that is under their control.
I do not think that they are that specific, in my opinion.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, they have a lot of land.
Mr. Dill: I do not disagree with you. They do have a lot of
land. I am not real familiar with their needs and wants out there. It is my uneducated
opinion that there is plenty of land out there that they need to accomplish their goals.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright. Thank you. Page 39. I want to
understand Troy what you were trying to say. I think you were trying to explain the $2.4
million plus figure from last year's budget to this year's budget. Is that correct? By saying
that $1.5 million of that is an increase in waste management?
Mr. Tanigawa: The $2.43 or $2.44 million dollar difference is
made up of primarily increases in the budget amount for Kekaha Landfill operations. That
is our contract with Waste Management. The financial assurance amount, that is the
amount that we set aside based on the tonnage that goes into the Landfill. That is kept in
a County account as a reserve for future landfill costs. The bulky item shredding...
Ms. Yukimura: How much is that?
Mr. Tanigawa: That is $750,000 is the increase.
Ms. Yukimura: That is setting aside for eventual closure of the
landfill?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. That is additional to what we have been
putting aside each year?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes. That is a cumulative amount that has been
building up over the years.
Ms. Yukimura: Then why is it showing up as a plus in the
budget?
Mr. Tanigawa: What plus figure are you referring to?
Ms. Yukimura: Operations goes from $6.3 million to $8.7 million.
Is that not what you are explaining to me? What the $2.4 million is?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes. What happened is, when you compare the
amount set aside...the text item for financial assurance for Fiscal Year 2014 and you
compare that with the figure that we are proposing this year, there is a big difference. The
reason for the difference is...we saw a need to increase the rate at which we contribute to
that find.
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Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Alright. I think Ernie and Steve
explained that to me. We are boosting the amount over and above the amount that we
normally set aside, correct?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: That is because as we get closer, we can get
better estimates of how much it is going to cost. In doing the estimates, is that correct? We
are seeing that we need to boost the amounts so that by the time we have to close it, we will
have the amount that we need?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. So that is $750,000 and you are going to
tell me the other things that add up to $2.4 million.
Mr. Tanigawa: Okay. The other item was $240,000 more for our
Kekaha Landfill operations contract.
Ms. Yukimura: $240,000 you said?
Mr. Tanigawa: Additional.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. Okay.
Mr. Tanigawa: So if you look at the text item in this year's
budget it is $2.4 million, compared to last year it was $2 million.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and why are we doing this?
Mr. Tanigawa: We anticipate additional costs. There is an
increase to the unit price based on consumer price index. Like I mentioned earlier, the
amount that we budgeted in the past for the various contract was reduced just to allow the
contracts to expand into the fiscal year. It is the same for this contract. This is a full
twelve month funding that we feel at a minimum we need to continue this contract through
the fiscal year until we reach Fiscal Year 2016 funds.
Ms. Yukimura: I am getting the feeling like we did things in the
last year's budget to look like we were reducing things but it was not real genuine
reductions because it just got shoved into the next year because we actually needed the
amount that we did not put in there.
Mr. Tanigawa: No, what it was is we had several months of
overlap into the Fiscal Year, this current Fiscal Year, overlap as far as contract term. Now,
from what we understood, we had to meet a certain budget amount so that we could reach a
balanced budget. There was only so much money available.
Ms. Yukimura: Well, that is what I mean.
Mr. Dill: We did deliver the "short fund," we just funded
enough to get us through the Fiscal Year because many of these contracts do not coincide
with the Fiscal Years or did not in the past. We just funded them through the end of the
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Fiscal Year and then into the next one a little bit in order to give us enough time to execute
a new contract. I want to remind you that we did mention that at Council. Those were
deliberate contentious things that were done and we have mentioned that at Council, that
was the measure we were taking in order to save that money and when the next Fiscal Year
came up and here we are now, we would have to budget for the entire twelve months in
order to keep those contracts from lapsing.
Ms. Yukimura: Not you folks deceiving... but we are just
deceiving ourselves, you know, by not really putting in the budget what we need. So, this is
not anything out of the ordinary? It is not like Waste Management came and said that you
owe us more because you are not reading the contract right, we need more per unit price,
you can see here in the contract that we have a consumer price index increase and you
have to increase it?
Mr. Tanigawa: We have some new equipment at the facility that
has been upgraded.
Ms. Yukimura: But that is under "equip," "vehicle equipment
and leases" is another line item.
Mr. Tanigawa: It is another line item but as part of that landfill
operating contract, we also saw some small increases for maintaining the updated
equipment at the landfill. All those costs combined consumer price, the need to fully fund
the contract for a full twelve months, and the additional equipment maintenance costs at
the landfill, those costs combined to what we feel is a good budgetary estimate for the
amount of money that we need to fund that contract.
Ms. Yukimura: What the thing I get is that this is an extremely
complex contract and how are we going to manage the new landfill. I hope we are learning
everything we can from this contract so that when we do a contract, if we are going to do a
contract, I mean the other thing is to manage it in-house and good luck. But we already
keep taking the liability, I think, or how do you divide all of this up and learn from all the
difficulties that we may not have, and I take responsibility, I think the initial contact was
probably my Administration but learning over these past twenty plus years about that
contract, somebody should be gathering all that knowledge so that when we write up the
next contract or do an RFP or whatever, we know what we are doing.
Mr. Dill: Your point is well taken, Councilmember, and I
think that when the time comes and we have the opportunity to do things a little differently
in framing that contract, we will certainly seek those opportunities.
Ms. Yukimura: Well, somebody should be writing it down
because what if the people who are doing it are not here, then what?
Mr. Dill: Thank you. We will take note of that and do
that.
Ms. Yukimura: So I got up to about a million, so where is the
other two million?
Mr. Tanigawa: I do not if I mentioned the four hundred
thousand dollars ($400,000) text item for bulky items shredding.
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Ms. Yukimura: What is that?
Mr. Tanigawa: What that involves is shredding bulky items that
reduce our ability to efficiently compact the waste.
Ms. Yukimura: Too bad Councilmember Rapozo is not here. Is
that not what he suggested?
Mr. Tanigawa: Well the thing is that it costs a lot of money.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, it does. It is almost half a million dollars.
Mr. Dill: Along those lines, it is exactly along the lines...
well I do not want to say "exactly" but along those lines with what Councilmember Rapozo
was promoting. The difference is that the way it was originally presented to us was that we
would do it for all the waste that comes into the landfill. We have been working with the
contractor and now we are going to do it more selectively...
Ms. Yukimura: Very good.
Mr. Dill: So, we will take advantage of shredding the
items that are most problematic for us where we will get the biggest bang for our buck.
This is sort of a pilot program, if you will, to see how effective it can be.
Ms. Yukimura: It is kind of a difference between a dirty MRF...
Mr. Dill: In a way, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Because you are more selective about what you
apply the technology to.
Mr. Dill: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: What is the last half million? Oh no, it is
another million that you have to account for.
Mr. Tanigawa: Councilmember Yukimura, you were talking
about the bigger cost items and I can cover. There are some other small items that I did not
cover but it amounts to about a hundred thousand dollars ($100,000).
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Tanigawa: I will move on to the bigger more costly items.
Ms. Yukimura: A hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) is a lot
but compared to a million dollars ($1,000,000), no.
Mr. Tanigawa: The Kaua`i Recycles Program there is a big
difference what we budgeted for last year and this year because this we are requesting a
full twelve months worth of funding. That is four hundred twenty-five thousand dollars
($425,000).
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Ms. Yukimura: Is that the Kaua`i Recycles Program is the one on
page 263 in our line item budget?
Ms. Fraley: It the first item on the Recycling Program.
Ms. Yukimura: So, that is "other services?"
Mr. Tanigawa: Other services, page 263.
Ms. Yukimura: Three million dollars ($3,000,000)?
Ms. Fraley: Yes, that is total other services budget is three
million dollars ($3,000,000).
Ms. Yukimura: But compared to last year it is a million dollars
($1,000,000) more?
Ms. Fraley: Yes and that is because of the short funding
issue of various contracts within that budget.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Tanigawa: So, you have the difference with dealing with the
Kaua`i Recycles Program text item with four hundred twenty-five thousand dollars
($425,000). We have fifty thousand dollars ($50,000) difference for the recycling promotions
text item.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, so how much diversion is this line item of
three million dollars ($3,000,000) responsible for? Can you tell?
Ms. Fraley: Yes, I can give you that. Approximately twenty-
six thousand (26,000) tons a year.
Ms. Yukimura: Twenty-six thousand (26,000)?
Ms. Fraley: Yes, a little less.
Ms. Yukimura: Out of your total recycle...
Ms. Fraley: And the total diversion rate is about fifty-six
thousand (56,000) tons a year.
Ms. Yukimura: So, it is half?
Ms. Fraley: Yes. So private sector programs contribute to the
remainder of that total diversion.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. If we really stop these programs, we are
going to really stop or harm our diversion effort?
Ms. Fraley: Yes, it would be cut by half.
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Ms. Yukimura: Alright, thank you. I think that is all I have.
Mr. Chock: Councilmember Hooser.
Mr. Hooser: I want to say quit while we are ahead. I just had
a fundamental question in terms of the percentage of the budget that is General funded and
tipping fees, both percentages as well as the dollar amount. And the second question would
be, if we wanted to fully fund it strictly through user fees, what kind of increase that would
be? If you can answer now, I would appreciate that.
Mr. Tanigawa: Based on Fiscal Year 2014 numbers, thirteen
million a one hundred twenty-one thousand (13,121,000) was the overall budget. We had
six point three, three, seven million in revenue, so the percent of subsidy was fifty-one
percent (51%).
Ms. Yukimura: What was the revenue?
Mr. Tanigawa: Six point three, two, seven (6.327) million.
Mr. Hooser: So, about half is General funded and half is...
Mr. Tanigawa: Correct.
Mr. Hooser: And so to make the math easy, we would have to
double our tipping fees to get a hundred percent (100%) funding?
Mr. Tanigawa: Tipping fees, collection fees, across the board.
Mr. Hooser: And the proposed increase is? Ten percent
(10%), five percent (5%)?
Mr. Tanigawa: Are you talking about the landfill tipping fee?
One, nineteen would be...
Mr. Dill: Thirty-two percent (32%).
Mr. Hooser: So, we are asking or a thirty-two percent (32%)
increase roughly?
Mr. Dill: But that is only landfill tipping fees which would
only effects the commercial deliveries to the landfill. It does not address things like the
residential refuse collection assessment, fees we generate at the transfer stations, so that is
only one (1) component of our revenue stream. You would have to double all of those fees,
again, your rough numbers like you said to achieve an enterprise fund.
Mr. Hooser: So, if it was all funded by user fees directly then
that would free up six million dollars ($6,000,000) for operating funds which is a significant
amount of money but it is also a significant increase also. It is good information to have, so
thank you very much. So, every dollar we increase tipping fees and other fees related to
freeze up General funds? Okay, thank you very much.
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Mr. Chock: Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: Quick follow-up. The place where people do not
pay anything for tossing is at the transfer station for residents, right?
Ms. Fraley: Well actually that is part of the base fee for the
residential refuse collection assessment. It is six dollars ($6.00) a month is the base fee
that any property owes.
Ms. Yukimura: I see.
Ms. Fraley: And then if they want collection services, they
will pay an additional six dollars ($6.00) a month, for residents, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Do you know how often an average person uses
the transfer station for dumping?
Mr. Tanigawa: No, we do not keep those statistics.
Ms. Yukimura: It might likely be very modest, six dollars ($6.00)
if Tim is saying, in terms of actual cost of a truck load of garbage to be dropped at the
transfer station.
Mr. Dill: Absolutely, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. An interesting factor that you mentioned,
Allison, is that when you look at commercial versus residential, the diversion rate is about
the same.
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Even though the business community has pay-
as-you-throw basically, the more you throw, the more you pay but their diversion rate is the
same as a residence where that is not yet true until you go to pay-as-you-throw.
Ms. Fraley: Residents have access to County subsidize
programs too, so that is probably why they have the higher... you know, rate that is the
same.
Ms. Yukimura: Well it would be really wonderful when we can
do curbside recycling, that should really boost our recycling rates.
Mr. Tanigawa: I think the commercial ban on different items:
metals, cardboard, green waste, etc., has contributed significantly to that programs.
Ms. Yukimura: I am sure it has. So, we are really headed in the
right direction but I think the quantum leap is going to be that MRF.
Ms. Fraley: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you.
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Mr. Chock: Councilmembers, any further questions?
Mr. Hooser: Just a follow-up, if I could?
Mr. Chock: Councilmember Hooser.
Mr. Hooser: Just to plant a seed or let you know where I am
going with this, we are obviously in a bad, challenging...no, I should say "bad" budget
situation. We are faced with those choices of raising various fees and taxes across the
board in many areas. My personal preference is to focus on fees, charges, and taxes that
could be passed on so if a commercial hauler have to pass it on to their customers, that kind
of thing, rather than to residents who have no source of passing it on. I am going to
sending over something that asks for, and you can maybe comment now, other sources of
revenues besides tipping fees that fit into that which will not effect, let us say residents
going to the transfer station to deposit their rubbish. Again, they have no way to pass that
cost on. What other source of revenue and it will free up General fund money. So, besides
the commercial tipping fee, what other fees could be passed on?
Mr. Dill: That would be one, Councilmember, that I prefer
to respond in writing to put some good thought into the response.
Mr. Hooser: Okay, good. That is why I wanted to raise that
question. I appreciate that. I acknowledge that it would take some thought. Thank you.
Mr. Chock: Councilmember Bynum, did you have something
that you wanted to share?
Mr. Bynum: Really quick. Remember six (6), eight (8) years
ago the transfer station in Kapa'a was just a disaster, remember that? It is awesome as of
right now. The guys are proud, to drive up is clean and organized...I just wanted to say
that...good job. I looked up this thing, when you go dump at Josephine County, Oregon,
small pick up about twenty-five dollars ($25.00), large pick up forty-five dollars ($45.00),
car tires two dollars fifty cents ($2.50) each, truck tires five dollars ($5.00). and the thought
that you would dump trash on the side of the road would be considered a high crime there.
It is not that big of an issue. It is people trash accumulated in other people's private
property is the issue, right? Anyway, I just wanted to share that. Thank you. I am not
proposing those fees, I am just saying to put it in context.
Mr. Chock: Councilmembers, any further questions? Seeing
none, thank you for your budget presentation. I will call this section over. We are going
into recess until tomorrow morning and take up Public Works—CIP projects.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 3:34 p.m.
April 1, 2014
Department of Public Works—
Operating & CIP (lc, aa, mn, dmc)
Page 1
The departmental budget review reconvened on April 1, 2014 at 9:05 a.m., and
proceeded as follows:
Department of Public Works (Operating& CIP)
Honorable Tim Bynum
Honorable Mason K. Chock, Sr.
Honorable Gary L. Hooser (present at 9:07 a.m.) (excused at 11:16 a.m.)
Honorable Mel Rapozo
Honorable JoAnn A. Yukimura (present at 9:07 a.m.)
Honorable Jay Furfaro, Council Chair
Excused: Honorable Ross Kagawa
Chair Furfaro: Aloha and good morning, today is April 1st, April
Fool's day so I want to make sure that everyone stays very focused on the details at hand
and the testimony that we would like to cover today as it relates to CIP Project
Improvements. As stated earlier the sequence will be Auto Maintenance Division, followed
by the Building Division, followed by Engineering, followed by Road Maintenance, Solid
Waste and Waste Water division after that. As indicated I particularly want to start today's
discussion about Wawae Road and so I will take testimony on all of these CIP items today
but then I would like to ask Mr. Dill to come up particularly on an update as negotiated two
weeks ago on Wawae Road. Covering expectations and any source of monies for funding and
so forth and from there different members can determine if they want that into a future
Committee meeting.
When we are finished with Wawae Road and the update, we can go back in the order
that is posted in the order of the day being the Auto Maintenance Division, Buildings
Division, and Engineering, the rest of the Roads Maintenance, Solid Waste and Waste
Water. To start this morning I would like to see if we could have public testimony on all
items first and at approximately 9:45, I will be turning the meeting over to Mr. Rapozo,
Vice Chair, Committee of the Whole as I have to leave for some appointments. This
afternoon I will be in and out meeting with some Department Heads on other items yet to
come up. Is there anyone in the audience this morning that would like to give specific
testimony on any of the items covered in CIP this morning? Come right up...
ANNE JANELL: Good morning, Anne Janell, Wawae Road
Kalaheo. I just wanted to make a couple of statements as I continue on my quest to make
sure our road doesn't slip anywhere it shouldn't go and that we try to get some action on a
barricade in particular. I am not sure maybe Mel has been out there and maybe Ross knows
the condition of the area that is in question that we tried to do something to protect the
Citizens and anyone else that might be on the road. Also maintenance was supposed to
start today per the last meeting so I am here again trying to make sure that I stay rounded
for my Community.
Chair Furfaro: Okay and as I stated we're going to have Larry
come up and give us an update on that and find out because yesterday we had a discussion
on roads, CIP monies as well so he can give us an update on where he's at in looking for
money.
Ms. Janell: Okay.
April 1, 2014
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Page 2
Chair Furfaro: We're going to take all testimony from the public
this morning first, and then we're going to do Wawae Road and go on to the other areas.
Ms. Janell: I appreciate that.
Chair Furfaro: Okay thank you. Any questions for Ann? Okay
thank you.
Ms. Janell: Thank you.
SALLY JO MANEA: Good morning Councilmembers,
Sally Jo Manea from Kapa`a. I am here on behalf of Kaua`i Path, I am not sure where in
your program this morning this requests fits but here I go. Kaua`i Path Leadership
Members have noticed over the last several months that there are cyclists that are riding
unsafely in Kapa`a, probably in Lihu`e. I do not live in Lihu`e but it probably happens here
too so it concerned us enough to want to create a bicycle safety campaign. We understand
that there are funds that are collected from bicycle registration that are available so we
come to you with a request for thirty thousand dollars ($30,000) and this money would be
used for three (3) items involved in the bicycle safety campaign. (1.) First monthly bicycle
safety education classes for either adults or youth and we already have a track record with
these classes, many people have taken them is called traffic skills 101. We have proposed to
do that on a monthly basis and we have certified-qualified instructors. (2.) Second would be
a youth bicycle helmet safety education with a helmet as a reward. It would involve the
same thing in teaching them bicycle skills but providing a good helmet for them and
teaching them how to use it. (3.) Third would be a multi-media public bicycle and motorist
safety education campaign using radio or whatever media we would need to use, posters
flyers, and interviews whatever. You have a paper on front of you that shows the budget it
is rough of course and we would be able to provide you a more detailed budget if you
requested it, but ten thousand ($10,000) for personnel instructors and trainers whom we
already have and operating expenses as well as buying helmets to use to benefit for those
kids taking the helmet safety classes, and also for the multi-media campaign, ten thousand
($10,000) for funding. That is our proposal to you.
Chair Furfaro: Okay let's see if there is any for you, hold on just
a second. Mr. Bynum you have the floor.
Mr. Bynum: Good morning Jo?
Ms. Manea: Good morning.
Mr. Bynum: I really appreciate you being here and like I
mentioned earlier I didn't know about this proposal so I requested it and you happened to
be here during budget hearings (inaudible). There is a bicycle safety fund currently about
thirty seven thousand dollars (37,000) and I am very interested in how about that works.
My question is that your proposal talks about fuel cost so I wanted you to share what assets
the Kaua`i Path requires from the communities putting prevention to work because I think
that is part of the proposal. You already have assets that you want to keep within the
community. So can you explain something more about that?
April 1, 2014
Department of Public Works—
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Ms. Manea: We have bicycles, many bicycles, children and
adult bicycles. We have a van that they are mobilized within. We have certified instructors;
we have a based group of volunteers that have already conducted helmet education
programs. The van needs insurance and of course it requires fuel to get from one place to
another and if we want to service the whole Island than that means getting the van around.
Mr. Bynum: So in short of this funding, how do you keep
those assets in service? How do you keep it stronger and going? Have you explored other
alternatives?
Ms. Manea: Well Kaua`i Path does the turkey trot each year
which is a bicycle ride on Thanksgiving morning which is growing.
Mr. Bynum: Are those fundraising?
Ms.Manea: Well it is not really but it turns out to be because
it is popular so we started off with it being free but it would be easy enough to ask for a
registration fee.
Mr. Bynum: Well my guess is that the budget has some place
to put those funds now and to ask those questions this would perhaps be the most
appropriate use of funding. These are fees that people pay to register their bicycles to
comply with our bicycle registration and in compliance of, so I will ask Finance in a follow-
up as to what's the revenue forecast for that fund. Have you or Kaua`i Path approach the
Mayor about this proposal prior to today?
•
Ms. Manea: No.
Mr. Bynum: It seems like a really, really appropriate request
for an appropriate set aside for an appropriate meeting. So I will follow up and thank you
very much for your testimony today.
Chair Furfaro: Mr. Rapozo is next but let me get some
clarification. The fund you're referring to in CIP has a balance in it of forty-two thousand,
five seventy seven ($42,577) not thirty seven thousand ($37,000). Mr. Rapozo.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you Mr. Chair and thank you for being
here and I appreciate the written request. I guess the first question is... these monthly
bicycles classes are free for the children?
Ms. Manea: They would be, they could be if we had funding.
Mr. Rapozo: Are you doing it now?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: How does that work now?
Ms. Manea: They go to a school and arrangements are made
through the school and it is done on a Saturday on a non-school day. They have done Saint
Catherine's School and Saint Theresa I believe. They have the kids come and they have
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helmets available from various sources, the car insurance companies have donated helmets
in the past. They set up cones and they set up little obstacle courses and they teach the
children how to ride and they talk to them about...
Mr. Rapozo: That is done at no charge to the children?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: You brought up a good point about the helmets. I
am wondering if there is any way we can get the helmets donated from the insurance
companies, from the bicycles companies. Have we tried too?
Ms. Manea: Yes in the past.
Mr. Rapozo: And no luck.
Ms. Manea: Well they have been. We have usually
collaborated with other agencies in these rodeo situations, the bike education situations. So
yes there has been a collaboration effort established already.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay so if the funding isn't available you could
still get the helmets?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: The Kaua`i Path, what's there budget every year?
What's there Annual Budget?
Ms. Manea: Sorry I can't tell you I mean it depends we've
come off of Federal funding for an establishment of those training sessions in getting people
trained. We have some donations that come in, we have small grants. We get grants from
the Department of Transportation, the state Department of Transportation for bicycle
safety education in schools.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay that would help.
Ms. Manea: Various small funding areas.
Mr. Rapozo: That would help me if I could see that. As you
can imagine we get a lot of requests. We get requests from youth basketball, I mean
everybody wants to put on clinics and they want the County to help and it is tough so if
there is other ways of getting these funds we can try to work that route. Yeah so maybe
your budget from the last three (3) years I think would be sufficient for me. Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Vice Chair and then JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: Can you just clarify that this is a bicycle fund so
it is not...
Chair Furfaro: That is what I said and again there is a separate
bicycle fund that is identified in the CIP.
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Mr. Rapozo: But Mr. Chair, I am assuming the request is not
to use the bicycle fund, this is an additional thirty thousand ($30,000).
Ms. Manea: No, no. This request is to use funds from the
bicycle fund.
Mr. Rapozo: Oh okay.
Ms. Manea: Not from your CIP Fund.
Mr. Rapozo: Is that our call or the Administrations call?
Ms. Yukimura: It is a statutory.
Chair Furfaro: I would think it would probably be both of us by
statues. Okay Mr. Chock and JoAnn then will come back to Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Chock: I just wanted to clarify so we have five hundred
(500) it will be affecting five hundred (500) children?
Ms. Manea: Pardon me?
Mr. Chock: You would be certifying in the safety program
five hundred (500) children? And in terms of the personnel...how many hours does this ten
thousand ($10,000) cover?
Ms. Manea: It depends on the budget. It depends on how
much we have to work with and one class normally takes two hours unless it is the adult
riding class is half a day, I think its four hours maybe five. So this is rough and we can
provide you with more details if you request that. This is an estimate of what we might
need in order to put on a more specific program.
Mr. Chock: Okay well thank you I appreciate a more detailed
if we move forward on the request. I particularly would like to see the cost per child to get
them certified and if you can break that down on your future budget that would be great.
You also mentioned there are concerns on the pathway, safety concerns. Can you mention it
specifically in regards as to how you are addressing it with certifying the children?
Ms. Manea: Well what sort of prompted us to start thinking
about how to approach the public and get people to understand that there are rules and you
got to go by the rules. We all know there are traffic rules for cars but everybody kind of
forgets that there is these traffic rules when you get on to a path so we see people walking
five across on the multi-use path when there is bicycles going back and forth. We see cyclist
weaving in and out and people are kind of like...whoa...so that kind of education would
come from having a flyer or some kind of a plaque or something where the people who are
using the multi-use path will have a set of guidelines written down on a piece of paper that
a bike rental agency might hand to a renter... That is one situation; the multi-use path is
one situation. The other situation is local cyclists and possibly visitors too because now the
path extends into Waipouli and you have a path along the side of the road and you have the
lanes. You are not supposed to ride a bicycle on a sidewalk in an urban area but that is not
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really defined so in Lihu`e town and Kapa'a town you're not supposed to be riding your
bikes on a sidewalk. What happens is you have Mom's with strollers, kids on skateboards,
pedestrians and bicycles all vying for very limited space on a sidewalk in an urban area. So
we see people going in the wrong direction so that kind of thing is addressed by radio
advertisement or interviews on radio's, talking to the kids when you give classes, everybody
who you give a class too receives information about the proper way to ride, the safe way to
ride. So whoever you address in the public receives the same messages about how to ride
safely such as this...something like this...bike smart, a plaque on a bus if there is space, or
a poster in front of the store you go too but also talking, radio, however you need to get the
message out.
Mr. Chock: So this program would be Island wide?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Mr. Chock: People from all communities not just people on
the East side?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Mr. Chock: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: JoAnn.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you Jo for being here. I've seen a lot of
times recently bikers going contra to the traffic and I understand that researchers show
that is very dangerous and so I can see the need for education. We are always trying to
think how we can best stretch what we have so I would imagine and my question is as you
and I know this is a rough scoping but as you develop the details of a program you would
use as much match money as possible and use this money to kind of expand the funding
sources for yourself?
Ms. Manea: We are constantly doing that.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Ms. Manea: As I said we've made use of the Department of
Transportation funds that were available were safety traffic.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay so this is really a safety proposal?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: To promote safety on the streets.
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: So do you right now have monthly educational
classes or are they more at hawk?
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Ms. Manea: They're at hawk when we have resources to
provide those classes, generally it is about 3 or 4 times a year so I would say quarterly.
Ms. Yukimura: In the spirit of expanding your resources, would
you folks consider a small fee from the participants or is it important to you that it be
totally free?
Ms. Manea: It would depend on...it would depend for the
adult education classes we have charged fees in the past.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Ms. Manea: Fifty dollars ($50.00) for half a day course which
is maybe high for some people.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Ms. Manea: But for the children we would like to make that
free.
Ms. Yukimura: So you could develop a framework where you
charge a fee but you have scholarships for those who can't afford?
Ms. Manea: Yes and actually we've done that in the past too,
we've awarded scholarships.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and I guess do you have a way of
monitoring the results of your work like, how are you sure that people actually learn from
these classes?
Ms. Manea: I do not know if they have.
Ms. Yukimura: I mean you have certified trainers so there is
some kind of a science behind this course. It maybe that you can look into these pre and
post to test what knowledge they have before they begin the course, they are usually one
sheet papers and to test what they've learned because we are always interested in making
sure that the monies we give out...we're still learning but gets the results that we say we're
going to get.
Ms. Manea: We have applied for Federal grants and State
grants and therefor are required by those grants to provide that information, I am just not
an instructor so I am not aware of the methods they use for determining those but if this
request needs to have that information included...that can be done.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes and I think it would be good for you folks too
to know that the program is having an impact but it sounds like you are already doing that.
Your multi-media campaign...have you ever done that before on Kaua`i or is this a pilot?
Ms. Manea: We have done.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
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Ms. Manea: But it is been pretty specific in the past and it is
been fairly short term. It is just been the use of PSA's and not paid advertisements and that
is a big difference when you pay for advertisement.
Ms. Yukimura: You can place it.
Ms. Manea: For example our radio stations will give you, if
you buy this much time they will give you this much time so you double in time.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Okay Tim did you want to do a follow-up with
her.
Mr. Bynum: No.
Chair Furfaro: No, okay. Jo, first of all thank you very much and
I think really now that you've presented all of this to us the next step is really for you to
begin some dialog with Economic Development and the Finance Department because it is
really amounting for you folks to apply for a Grant from an ear marked account. I want to
tell you right now I have one red flag item in your proposal here and I've sent that over
from a commercial standpoint as it is dealing with the bike path. Your request includes an
insurance premium and what I want to make sure you understand is that I am pursuing
right now for those that have commercial activities on bicycles; they should be paying their
own insurance and naming the county co-insured. The County should not be paying any
premiums to have our self-insured for somebody else's business operation, so I would think
in my criteria this portion here ear marked for insurance is something you probably need to
re-think. The asset is owned by the County and obviously if there is something that
happens on the path-way with a commercial venture, they should be naming us co-insured
and the cost of that insurance being their own. But we're not here today to discuss that I
am just telling you that I have a problem with that with other commercial accounts that
currently use the path so it is something you might want to pursue. You should engage the
Administration in your request and they will probably direct you to the Office of Economic
Development and so that is the next step I think.
Ms. Yukimura: Chair, I have a question?
Mr. Furfaro: Yes go ahead.
Ms. Yukimura: It is just a clarifying question because the Chair
has raised an important issue. The insurance you're talking about is for the classes?
Ms. Manea: No the insurance I am talking about is for the
van that carries the bikes that goes back and forth to give the classes all over the island.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and I think...
Chair Furfaro: But my point is it should not be something that
is in the grant, it should be in reverse. You have insurance and you're naming us co-insurer
so for I think that is all where we need to go with this discussion.
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Ms. Yukimura: Yeah there is good feedback in terms of how you
can structure or tweak this. Thank you.
Ms. Manea: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you Jo.
Ms. Manea: Thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: Am I assuming you're going to share this with
the Administration?
Ms. Manea: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, thank you very much. Is there anyone else
that wants to give public testimony on anything on today's agenda? If not I am going to ask
Mr. Dill to come up and give us an update as it relates to WaiWai Road but also as it relates
to CIP Transportation and Roads.
LARRY DILL, COUNTY ENGINEER: Good morning Council Chair and
Members of the Council, for the record Larry Dill, County Engineer. My request to you
Chair would be I could certainly give you an update on WaiWai Road but we had planned
around the schedule we had provided for you today so if it is okay with you I would like to
certainly present on the status of WaiWai Road project, than we can go back to automotive
and work through the schedule.
Chair Furfaro: Yes than we'll work through the schedule.
Mr. Dill: Okay thank you.
Mr. Chair: We will work through the schedule but I think
you all recall that I had advised people that April Pt we would have this on the agenda so...
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: So let's try to accommodate that.
Mr. Dill: Absolutely sure. Our engineering division has
been out to WaiWai Road a few times to take a look at safety issues and safety would be our
first concern out there as was mentioned Ann who has been out there with our guys a
couple of times to look at issues that she was concerned about. They have identified some
guardrail locations at the time we were already in the CIP Budget process and so at the
same time we were requesting the assistance of our CIP Manager, Keith Suga to find out
how we could fund this as well as all of the other CIP Projects. You will notice I think that
he forwarded to you this spreadsheet that I am showing you so if you take a look at Page 8
of that spreadsheet the second project listed there is the Wailapa Kilauea Stream Project.
That is a project that is complete you will see in the status notes over to the right and you'll
notice that this is the project we're proposing on using the remaining encumbered balance
which is about $112,000 that was identified there so...
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Chair Furfaro: It is on page 8?
Mr. Dill: Second project from the top. So we do not have a
project in the CIP Budget that was submitted to you but our plan is as we identified these
funds kind of late after we have already submitted to council is to in the May submittal
come back to you and we've done some final scoping for where we've planned to install the
guardrails and use that $112,000 form this project in order to fund that work. So that
addresses the Guardrails and we have Ed here and he will speak to the maintenance issues
that have been done along the road with regards to concerns about overgrowth and
vegetation etc., that we've been out there taking care of. Additional concerns that may come
up that we still do not have plans for the budget this year fiscal year 2015, but we may
come up with future investigations. We will take a look at drainage issues and obviously
also as far as any resurfacing when we come back to Council with our plans for the island
wide resurfacing, than that road will be considered of course along with other roads in the
County priority wise to see if we can include that in the island wide resurfacing plan.
Chair Furfaro: When will that be?
Mr. Dill: I am aiming for by the end of the first quarter or
perhaps the second quarter of Fiscal Year 2015 we will be back with the proposal of the list
of roads to you.
Chair Furfaro: Okay.
Mr. Dill: And with that I will turn it over to Ed and ask
him to speak to of the maintenance work that we have been doing out there so far.
Chair Furfaro: I just want to summarize what I just heard.
Mr. Dill: Sure.
Chair Furfaro: From the Kilauea project you have identified
about $112,000 worth of carry over which can be used for the guardrails for WaiWai Road?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, and in the evaluation of the first quarter
of the roads repaving projects, there will be any balance carry-over will be directed to the
resurfacing of these roads?
Mr. Dill: No I am talking about right now we have
proposed in this year's budget; there is about 2.4 million dollars for an island wide
resurfacing project.
Chair Furfaro: Right.
Mr. Dill: So we list and prioritize all the roads County
wide to see which ones would be the highest priority so this road will be considered among
those to see if they make that priority list or not.
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Chair Furfaro: Okay so, it would actually be considered at
making the first go around list?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Okay got it it is not a carry over?
Mr. Dill: Right.
Chair Furfaro: Got it okay. So the guardrails will be a carry over
and the road resurfacing is attempting to make the criteria for the first go around?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, thank you Ed?
ED RENAUD, CHIEF OF FIELDS OPERATIONS & MAINTENANCE: Good
morning Chair and Councilmembers, Ed Renaud for the record. On the maintenance
concern on the vegetation, we are completing the research of the properties that the dead
trees are on and shortly we will be moving in that area. As for the rest of the vegetation we
should be there in a month or so after talking with field operations they are trying to
complete another in Kalaheo and they'll be moving over and hopefully will be planning also
the guardrails because there is a lot of vegetation in that area and that is where we're at.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, so it would be fair to make the assumption
on the vegetation cut-back and maintenance schedule for that would be addressed within
the 30-45 days?
Mr. Renaud: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: On your regular schedule?
Mr. Renaud: Correct.
Chair Furfaro: Okay, JoAnn you had a question?
Ms. Yukimura: It is mainly about the capital monies. What is
the total cost that you see of WaiWai Road?
Mr. Dill: Well for the guardrails we plan to utilize the
$112,000 dollars.
Ms. Yukimura: The $112,000 dollars?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and that will cover it you think?
Mr. Dill: Yes that will take care of all the (inaudible)
priority wise.
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Ms. Yukimura: And is it mainly the installation of the guardrail
or is it the shoring up of the side of the ravine?
Mr. Dill: It will be the installation of the guardrails and
anything we need to do in order to install the guardrails.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright, so you think it will cover that and you're
not looking for anything else at this time?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Any further questions from the gentlemen as we
have some commitment on the vegetation cut-backs of the trees in the next 45 days? The
carry-over of a $112,000, earmarked for guardrails and making the first priority list for the
first quarter of next year for the road re-surfacing. That is a current update and I believe
Mr. Kagawa in kind of his follow-up and Mr. Rapozo's follow-up they will probably want to
put this in about 3 months they would want to put it in as a committee follow-up on
progress. Thank you gentlemen, I will encourage Ann to stay in touch with you and that we
have some commitment here on these items and this was good feedback. Thank you so
much. On that note we will be going back to our regular program which is the Automotive
CIP and I am going to ask... I guess Keith... are you going to come up?Are you going to join
Larry up here? So Keith Suga. So we're going to do it in the outline that was laid out
starting with CIP updates on the Auto Maintenance then the Building Division and
through that list. Do you have this list by chance Keith?
KEITH SUGA, COUNTY CIP MANAGER: Yes. Good morning Chair, Good
morning Vice Chair and Councilmembers, Keith Suga, County CIP Manager. Chair if I
could take a few minutes in the beginning here to kind of do an overview of the CIP
Program?
Chair Furfaro: Yes.
Mr. Suga: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: And first of all before I...I just want to tell you
how very pleased we are with the work you've been managing for us. The contributions, the
spending, the project completions and in fact two projects this year that actually came in
under budget so I wanted to just say that you certainly have been a big contributor to our
success in getting these done and so I personally thank you.
Mr. Suga: I appreciate that, thank you.
Chair Furfaro: And also on that note I need to turn the meeting
over to Mr. Rapozo from here but you go ahead with your overview first.
Mr. Suga: Councilmembers I believe this chart was handed
out to you folks yesterday so I want to start by identifying back in fiscal year...back in fiscal
13 for the entire fiscal year 13 of the 64 million dollars budgeted in CIP. We spent or
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encumbered about 23 percent and to date currently for fiscal year 14 of the 49 million
budgeted appropriated for fiscal year 14 we are at 40 percent spent or encumbered, with
still 3 or 4 months left with the FY-14. If you look at the table or the bar chart in front of
you, the purple is what is encumbered balances and the blue is what was spent or
encumbered and I we have it broken down by the Departments... Public Works, Parks, and
Miscellaneous comprises all of the other departments within CIP. For Public Works by
doing the math the percentages comes out to about 40 percent of Public Works budgeted
dollars that they have spent or encumbered. For Parks the 6 million that was spent or
encumbered equates to about 42 percent and in the miscellaneous category there is about
38 percent that has been spent or encumbered to date for FY-14. I think that kind of shows
a trend in a good way and the improvements that have been made across the various
departments within the CIP Program of trying to get projects out in an efficient manner
and being able to encumber and also spend the monies and move the projects along.
We can go to the second page. Now this speaks more to the proposed Fiscal Year 15
CIP Budget and I am just showing a breakdown of the total dollars appropriated, Public
Works accounts for about 53 percent, Parks accounts for 32 percent, and Miscellaneous all
the other departments account for about 15 percent. If we go to the next page it is just a
further breakdown within the Public Works Department itself and you can see the various
divisions and their breakdown of the 21 million or so that resides in Public Works. The last
page is really just a breakdown of Parks and their breakdown is of the various districts, all
the projects in the various districts and the percentages that kind of shows the spread out
of the funds throughout the various districts. With that what I would like to do at this point
is maybe go over this worksheet that I provided for all of you, all of the projects and dollars
that are on this worksheet are similar or exactly the same as what is proposed in the
ordinance that the budget analysts provided. I feel that this layout helps us go through the
projects in an order that is easier to review and follow along and the order that the Chair
represented earlier is exactly what is shown in this worksheet so we'll start with auto and
go into building and engineering and so on and so forth. Just to give you a brief description
of this worksheet, the first column project is just a project description or a project title. The
second column would be the project i.d., that identifies the project, the third column the
managing agency is the department who is managing the project, the next column over is
for funding and shows the different funding sources for the projects, the3 next column is the
unencumbered balance as of 1-21-14, next column over is the project manager responsible
for the project. The status column shows the current status of all the various projects, the
next column over which is entitled change would represent the pluses or minuses that are
being proposed in front of you for fiscal year 15 budget and the far column on the right
would be the total including those changes. The projects that are highlighted in yellow are
the new projects being proposed so that helps identify it for you folks. Like I said we will
proceed in the order as Chair mentioned and the first set of projects that we'll get into is the
Automotive Division and I think Larry wants Dwayne to come up.
DWAYNE ADACHI, AUTOMOTIVE DIVISION: Good morning
Councilmembers, Dwayne Adachi, Automotive Division. I am here to speak about the CIP
Projects we have. We can jump down to the third one on the first page, that is a project that
is currently underway right now and we are in the process right now to bid for a contractor
to install the components of the fuel system, which includes the fuel storage tanks and two
fuel dispenser pumps and upgrading the electrical infrastructure. The next one above that
is the second phase of that same project and we are asking for $170,000 to address the
issues at the Hanalei fuel site. It would be pretty much doing the same thing, replacing the
pumps and the tanks to upgrade the infrastructure. The last one, the first one on the first
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page would be the completion of the installation of the aim units on all of the county
vehicles to complete the fuel master installation project. Do you have any questions? I can
answer them for you.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: So on these fuel tanks both at Hanalei and
Kapa`a, is this diesel fuel?
Mr. Adachi: We would actually be replacing two fuel tanks,
right now we have two storage tanks at each site, one for diesel and one for gasoline. We
would be replacing those two with one tank with split compartments. One would be for
diesel and the other for gasoline.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh I see, and that serves... does it serve Police
and Fire and Public Works?
Mr. Adachi: It would be anyone who fuels from the County
fuel sites, right now it is everyone except Transportation and the Water Department.
Ms. Yukimura: I am just aware that we are looking for base yard
sites for the bus and my one thought was could we expand that parking lot by the...I just
had it so it is totally un evaluated but by Hanalei Police and Fire is there any expansion
space for a bus base yard? And could we share the tanks? I mean $170,00 dollars is a lot of
money, do we have to do that somewhere else to put in a base yard.
Mr. Adachi: I am not sure there is enough space at that sub-
station.
Mr. Dill: There is not enough space to have a bus base
yard in that area.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, okay. How much of an area are we looking
for in a bus base yard?
Mr. Dill: I have to refer that to transportation.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, alright.
Mr. Rapozo: Let's focus on auto shop.
Ms. Yukimura: Well I was just looking for opportunity thank
you.
Mr. Dill: May I add that Dwayne needs to replace all of
his four fuel systems at the four locations so of course rather than doing it all in one year
we're trying to do one every year for the next four years so these are the highest priority
ones. So Kapa'a is underway with Hanalei to follow and will still have to do Lihu`e and
Hanalei and that is reflected in the 6 year CIP so.
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Mr. Rapozo: Hanapepe.
Mr. Dill: I am sorry Hanapepe and Lihu`e.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Chock.
Mr. Chock: Do you know how old they actually are and the
life span for these tanks?
Mr. Adachi: Oh how old the tanks are...I think we've had
them...we had to dig up our underground fuel tanks and I think this was back in the
eighties maybe and so we replaced them with the above ground storage tanks and right
now the problem is the storage tanks are, the vent pipes are all corroded because they are
not stainless steel pipes so they are embedded in the concrete tank and so actually the
tanks have lived their life and we need to replace them.
Ms. Yukimura: Are we installing stainless steel?
Mr. Adachi: We are.
Ms. Yukimura: Very good. So what kind of life do we expect from
that?
Mr. Adachi: Well it is hard to say these tanks are a different
type of construction they are not like the tanks we have now are steel tanks with concrete
encasement and the tanks we are moving to right now are steel inside tanks with a concrete
encasement wrapped with steel. So that steel outside will require a certain amount of
maintenance in 3 or 4 years just to protect the steel from corroding but with the proper
maintenance we should get at least 30 years out of those tanks.
Ms. Yukimura: Excellent and the key was with the proper
maintenance so I know you will set that up so it will happen. Can we ask about the fuel
management system? That is yours too right? Is that okay?
Mr. Rapozo: Yes fine.
Ms. Yukimura: Procurement vehicle modules, I am sorry but
what does that mean?
Mr. Adachi: It is the main modules that we install in each
vehicle. The A-Modules is an information storing device that is mounted on the vehicle that
communicates with the fuel site and transmits data and stores data and it lets the site
know which vehicle is at the pump, which vehicle is requesting fuel and what the mileage is
and all of that specifics.
Ms. Yukimura: And when we retire the car...
Mr. Adachi: We take the module out and we install it in
another vehicle.
Ms. Yukimura: You put it in another vehicle?
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Mr. Adachi: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay great thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Any other questions?
Mr. Dill: I have a question? I just want to mention there
are 4 more automotive projects that we listed on the list that Keith provided for you. The
next one motor-pool development will actually leave that to OED, to lead that discussion
and that will be deferred to their presentation. The next is the FEMA Match Projects that
was back from the March, 2012 storm when we experienced some damage to these vehicles
and so they have kind of run through the auto shop as they coordinated the efforts of the
repairs but those are completed so there done.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Rapozo: OED?
Mr. Dill: Automotive (inaudible)
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, why would that be in OED?
Mr. Dill: They were the agency determined to coordinate
with all the agencies that would be affected for setting up the motorpool, again it is sort of
efficiency effort organization.
Ms. Yukimura: Energy.
Mr. Rapozo: Energy?
Ms. Yukimura: Energy efficiency.
Mr. Rapozo: I can by that for some reason, energy efficiency.
Ms. Yukimura: It will be.
Mr. Rapozo: It is a place holder for the funds.
Mr. Dill: Yes but they are the lead agency in the way it is
working out.
Mr. Rapozo: But I am assuming that motorpool would be...I
mean who's going to run motorpool once it is been established?
Mr. Adachi: We're still in the developing process of the project
so...
Mr. Rapozo: I am assuming it would be you?
Mr. Adachi: We would have a certain amount of...
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Mr. Rapozo: Certain?
Mr. Adachi: Yeah.
Mr. Dill: I think it will be Dwayne and Dwayne is
involved, very deeply involved in the project and the development of the project.
Mr. Rapozo: Please consider that.
Mr. Adachi: What it is we actually maintain the vehicles
anyway regardless and actually what it is we are trying to streamline the fleet, reduce and
get rid of all the older vehicles we do not need, get rid of those and down size the fleet and
try to pull all the vehicles into one.
Mr. Rapozo: Dwayne I think that is been my suggestion for
many, many years to copy the military. I think I brought that up many years ago but my
question is...I mean if you need the motorpool-the vehicle experts to run that program I
guess is my concern.
Mr. Adachi: Well there is a certain amount of involvement
from us but actually it is not entirely up for us to run that pool because a lot of it will be
done by software. It is almost like how a rent-a-car is run like scheduling the usage of the
vehicle.
Mr. Rapozo: Right and the marketing department of the
rent-a-car do not run the fleet.
Mr. Adachi: Right but to burden us with all of that and the
responsibility...
Mr. Rapozo: And again Dwayne, I am not saying to do it with
your existing staff. I am saying at the time we are ready to unroll this new program it is
going to have to come with the support there is no doubt about it. So, I am not saying you
have to take on this new program without any additional resources but I realize we're in
the developing stages right now.
Mr. Adachi: We are trying to get this done with the least
amount of additional personnel as possible. We are trying to...
Mr. Rapozo: And OED...what does OED have?
Mr. Adachi: We can let Steve...
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, please. I am just confused because it makes
sense to put the vehicles in the vehicle section.
STEVEN A. HUNT, Director of Finance: Yes. Steve Hunt, Director of
Finance, for the record. The actual initiative started with Finance and we looked at this as
a cost savings measure. To the point where we have it today, we still view this as a pilot.
We are not looking at every vehicle or every car coming to the pool. There is going to be
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restrictions. If we pull in some Public Works vehicles or trucks that are Highway funded,
only people who are in the Highway Fund can use them. So, there is a lot of variables that
go into that. Initially, we looked at cars that were being under-utilized, also cars that are
older and requiring a lot of maintenance to come out of the fleet and that is where we are
starting with. I think we have identified about twelve (12) cars that we would like to retire
from the fleet, and get to the point where it is actually somewhat self-managed. The site
location will be in the back of where Brandon's Information Technology (IT) office is,
towards your building, the parking lot in that area. The intent is to actually have the
either the Frequently Operated Button (FOB) key or card. The same frequency will
actually go up to the door and be used to open the vehicle. The keys will be inside. So, we
will be using that and we will have a tracking mechanism with that as well, Global
Positioning System (GPS), so that we will know if someone is speeding. There will be other
information we will be able to get from that, but because we are initially starting as a small
project, we do not anticipate additional labor at this point. The only concerns we have, and
I think we have addressed is, the washing of the vehicles, the cleaning or the vehicles, as
well as the regular service. When you are pulling a motor vehicle out of the pool for a
certain period of time to have them serviced, there is going to have to be a runner
essentially to take them to the automotive shop because it will be physically located in the
Civic Center area and we need to get them to the automotive shop, but the actual software
itself will identify conflicts with the vehicles. So, if any one specific vehicle is not available,
it will tell you. We will have to work again, on enforcement policy. If someone checks it out
from 8:00 a.m. until 12:00 p.m., but does not bring it back until 2:00 p.m. and someone had
a back-to-back on that vehicle starting at 12:00 p.m., how do we deal with trying to have
those buffer zones or enforcing? So, again, because it is in its pilot phase and because OED
has been very helpful at looking at energy savings and trying to identify the hybrid
vehicles, trying to identify ways to save money, it has been really a joint effort between
OED, Finance, and Public Woks Automotive. If it gets to a much larger capacity, then we
will likely put this under Public Works Automotive, I think, is the location that we are
looking at, but until we actually need bodies and resources to do that, we are trying to keep
it within house and do it without additional staff.
Mr. Rapozo: Well, I think a successful motorpool program
would help this County a whole lot more money than what it would cost in resources to run
the program. I mean, that is just a given. I can tell you that. It is just that I have
personally, through my own experience with the military and motorpools, it is just I have
never ever seen anything like that, that in fact the base yard would be at the shop. It
makes no sense to me to even go take a vehicle to the Civic Center and then it has to go
service and you have to go get a runner now to leave their job to go take the car down. It
just...and I understand it is a pilot and I will play along with this for as long as I can
stomach it, but it just makes sense. I do not know if we even have any motorpool policies.
Do we have motorpool policies from anywhere else that does it or maybe the military?
Mr. Hunt: Again...
Mr. Rapozo: We are just going to try and wing it on our own?
Mr. Hunt: We are going to try and to establish our policies
on that.
Mr. Rapozo: How about we copy somebody that is working?
Then, I think we can...I mean, the pilot is good, but you copy somebody.
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Mr. Hunt: We are. We have reviewed other policies.
Mr. Rapozo: Any other questions?
Mr. Dill: And Councilmember, we do not have any room to
store the County vehicles at the automotive shop anyway. That is one of the realities we
are trying to deal with.
Mr. Hunt: And most of the people that will be using it are
based in the Civic Center anyway. So, getting to adhere to a different base yard would be
somewhat problematic unless we are shuttling people, which again, how it staffed an
additional vehicle.
Mr. Rapozo: Any more questions? Any more questions for
automotive? If not, thank you, Dwayne. Good job, as usual.
Mr. Adachi: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay, Doug. You want to do an overview of
Buildings and then we will open it up for questions?
DOUGLAS HAIGH, P.E., Chief of Buildings: Doug Haigh, Department of
Public Works, Building Division. Our CIP program is fairly modest thus year. Actually, a
lot of our projects are not shown on this, which are primarily the bike path projects. Our
key projects this year, we have finally finished all of our Americans with Disabilities Act
(ADA) projects from I guess, about fifteen (15) years ago. The Kapa'a Hockey Rink project
was our last contract that we did in coordination with Parks Department. So, that has been
a long process. `Eiwa Street and Hardy Street improvements. We are trying to merge the
two (2) to some degree. We will be before you folks hopefully in a couple week...April 9th.
We will be doing a presentation talking about both projects and Lihu`e altogether. We are
looking at `Eiwa Street, we are calling this a transit mall concept actually. We are looking
at an opportunity to utile the Federal funds with the Hardy Street project to do some of the
initial improvements into `Eiwa Street, and primarily that would be relocating the bus stop
from Hardy Street to `Eiwa Street and providing the ADA connections from that bus stop to
hardy Street, Rice Street, Historic County Bridling, and the Pi`ikoi Building. Then we will
be giving you a lot more information on that very shortly. Hardy Street improvement
project. It is under construction. This is a design-build project. The unappropriated
surplus is our contingency funding and that project is moving forward. We are actually
supposed to receive our fifty percent (50%) design drawings tomorrow and we are looking at
an early start to take advantage of the elementary school summer vacation. So, we are
looking at an early start in May. We also have a public information meeting scheduled for
the evening of April 9th also. So, that project is moving along. We are coordinating with
Hawai`i Department of Transportation (HDOT) and Federal Highways on the issues for the
project. Yes. I invite you all to come to that meeting on April 9th. It will be at Wilcox
School.
Mr. Rapozo: You folks always schedule it on a Wednesday.
Mr. Haigh: Excuse me?
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Mr. Rapozo: It is always scheduled on a Wednesday, the
public meetings. I do not know why.
Mr. Haigh: Well, we are trying to encourage you to keep
short Council Meetings.
Mr. Rapozo: I like that.
Ms. Yukimura: And not ask you questions at the meeting?
Mr. Rapozo: I will.
Mr. Haigh: Historical County Building. We finally closed
the contract for our improvements here. Lihu`e Civic Center site improvements project.
Same. Actually, that is kind of rolled into the `Eiwa Street, which is the next phase of the
Lihu`e Civic Center site improvements project. Kapa'a Base Yard. We are completing that
project. The Kapa'a Base Yard structural renovations. We are in the final close out phases
of that project. Moanakai Road Seawall construction. This project is pending our
401 permit and it actually will be the 404 permit also. We are waiting for the United States
(U.S.) Army Corps of Engineers for their final approval. The date of that approval is
uncertain. It has been pending for about a year now. The last correspondence, the last
submittal we mad to the U.S. Army Corps requirement was a year ago and we are waiting
for their response. This also kind of ties into the Pono Kai Seawall. We made the decision
to put the funding in the CIP budget to Moanakai Seawall, but the strategy is whichever
one comes available first is the one we will try to move forward. So, it is possible we may
come back with a request to Council to shift those funds to the Pono Kai Seawall project if
that one becomes available first. We have the same type of permitting issue with the Pono
Kai Seawall. Actually, we did get our permit, but we revised the design to greatly reduce
the construction cost and we will be going back to Department of Health to amend our
permit and we are not certain how long that process will take. Hopefully, within a month
or two (2), we will be going back to the Department of Health. Pi`ikoi Retrofit Project. We
are closing that one out. Security renovation, Mayor's Office. Small project, ongoing
changes. Kalaheo Fire Station and the KOloa Fire Station are two (2) similar projects,
which we are working on finalizing our bid documents and going out to bid on. Kaiakea
Fire Station. We are working...this one, we have been dealing with a lot of corrosion issue
and hopefully we are getting them resolved and be able to close out this project. That is a
challenging site. The Island-Wide Bike/Pedestrian Path Fund which was discussed earlier.
My understanding is this fund, actually in the CIP budget, does give the Administration
authority to expend it for bicycle safety programs. So, I believe the presentation this
morning would be something that would be within the Administration's authority to spend
if it is designated appropriate by the Administration. That is kind of the highlight. We are
working on Kapa'a Substation User Needs Study that was funded. We got our initial draft
report in this week and we are reviewing that. We are not going forward with any requests
for construction money at this time for that project or design moneys. We are going to
digest the user needs and then from there, probably the earliest we would be doing is
coming back in Fiscal Year 2016 for a design and construction money, if that is deemed
appropriate. We have done a lot of improvements to the new location for the Kapa'a
substation, which is at the Kapa'a Armory. Sorry, for some reason I was forgetting that.
There are challenges with utilizing that space and it is a time limited lease. Hopefully, it
can be renewed, but we are working through some of the challenges of utilizing that space
at this time. That is an overview. Yes, I did skip Salt Pond. That one, we are working with
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Parks and Parks is taking the lead on that project. The Parks Department has really
stepped up on their project management and they are doing a really good job, their
managers. We help them a little bit, but they are doing it. So, with their capabilities
expanding, there is less requirements for the Building Division to assist them. We have
been assisting them as-needed basis.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Just one (1) clarification. Moanakai
Seawall. On you chart it says R.M. Towill Corporation contacted the in COE in January
of 2014and was told that there permit will be issued.
Mr. Haigh: It will be issued, but the timing of when it will be
issued...actually, I have done follow-up phone called with U.S. Army Corps of Engineer and
the project manager involved. She has everything. I offered to write up her letter for her,
have our consultants...because that is what we do with Federal Highways a lot. Our
consultants take care of a lot of the grunt work, but she said, "No, I have to do it on my
own." She has to do kind of like a mini Environmental Assessment (EA) in the final
documentation of the project and it is just a matter of her getting the time to do it.
Mr. Rapozo: But we have met all the requirements and we
should be okay?
Mr. Haigh: Yes, we should be okay. I would be very
surprised if some issue came up.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Hooser.
Mr. Hooser: Yes, thank you, for the presentation. I noticed
that there a lot of projects, quite a few actually, that is using general funds. So, what I will
being doing is sending a communication over. Any projects that are general funded where
legally, they could be bond funded assuming there was the money available, I would like to
get a copy of that. The Pi`ikoi Engineering, I think, is a big on. The Complete Streets,
Koloa-Po`ipu, it is three hundred thousand dollars ($300,000) of general funds. Something
like that if it could be bond funded. Again, assuming the funds were available. I
understand that we are moving things around. There are a few specifics. Again, Pi`ikoi
interior renovation. It says a mixture of bond and general funds. Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) matches for road repairs, that kind of thing. So, would you
be able to provide a list like that, of any general funded CIP projects where legally, we could
use bond funds if they were available?
Mr. Haigh: Yes. Our CIP Manager works very close with the
Department of Finance on those issues and some of our funds are fairly restricted, the Bond
Funds but they can best address that question.
Mr. Hooser: Okay so and yeah in the parks also there are
some areas so if you can do that and I will put it in writing to you. That will show us
whatever flexibility we might have if the bond funded projects that aren't going to be able to
be done we can make project shifts some of those funds into the general funds and free up
general funds.
Mr. Dill: Councilmember can I ask that you direct that to
the CIP Manager, he would be the appropriate guy to respond to that.
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Mr. Hooser: Okay great, so we will send something over in
writing. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: Can you explain the Kalaheo Fire and Koloa Fire
Station improvements.
Mr. Haigh: This was a project that started several years ago
and traditionally it would have been funded under the operational budget but there was a
movement at the time to try to shift that. Since it is in the CIP Budget when we look at and
this is part of our repercussion of our limited project management staff. It just kept
dropping in the priorities so it is taking a lot longer to get it to the ready to bid and
basically it is a major painting, roofing, that type of project, significant improvements that
could possibly be added to the asset value.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay so it is maintenance in a big way sort of, it
is major maintenance?
Mr. Haigh: Correct and traditionally it will be in the
operational fund and a one year decision was made to throw it into the CIP.
Ms. Yukimura: I see and again I like it because if it is sustaining
or lengthening the life of our buildings that is which I presume it is doing right?
Mr. Haigh: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: That is very important especially if it is an
essential service like fire protection. Keith I just want to ask you first of all I really like this
format thank you very much. Bond 05 and bond BAB, did we float the bond in 05?
Mr. Suga: That is the bond 05 is the bond issuance from
2005 and the build America bonds, the build America 2010.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh it is build America, okay, okay, great. Thank
you I understand that than. I just want...since we're closing out the Historic County
Building, just say a big thank you because as I have said before it is a pleasure to work in
this building and it was a really well done job as it has created beautiful space and
preserved this very Historic Building so thank you for that.
Mr. Suga: You're welcome.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Councilmember Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: Yes thank you for this report and I do really like
the format and the consistency of reporting, thank you. I just want to go back to this issue
before where the dividing line is between repair and maintenance that is in the general
fund right and projects that meet the criteria for CIP. So we're pretty clear now in our
current practice like where that dividing line is and where the criteria is.
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Mr. Haigh: Yes I believe a project like Kalaheo Fire Station
now would be funded through the operational budget.
Mr. Bynum: (INAUDIBLE) usually every year I look at that
really closely (inaudible)
Mr. Haigh: It met critical needs but we did greatly reduce
the amount of operationally funded projects. One way we reduced it was shifting to the
parks department, some of the buildings that we traditionally would have taken cared of
they are the managers of and now they are taking care of the renovation projects. Also we
really need...we were getting fiscal restraints and we're getting a breather to get caught up
and our goal too is to further populate the data base of our maintenance program so that we
do have a stronger programmatic maintenance program.
Mr. Bynum: Similar to the (inaudible)so that is good work
and I agree. Thank you very much.
Mr. Haigh: You're welcome.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you. Any more questions for Doug? Doug
you mentioned that the bike path projects weren't included in the spreadsheet?
Mr. Haigh: That is correct.
Mr. Rapozo: Can we get a spreadsheet that includes those
projects?
Mr. Haigh: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: Any reason why it wasn't submitted?
Mr. Haigh: Because it is not utilizing bond funds/general
funds.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay.
Mr. Dill: No county funds.
Mr. Haigh: Yeah it is really kind of outside of the budget to
some point.
Mr. Rapozo: Right but if you could get that.
Ms. Yukimura: That would be good.
Mr. Rapozo: Yeah so we could see the scope. Go ahead
Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: Yeah coming back to Hardy Street and Eiwa
Street. What is the total amount of construction for Hardy Street?
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Mr. Haigh: I believe we are at about 7.5 million dollars and
that actually is designing construction because it is a designed built project.
Ms. Yukimura: And it is a STIP Project?
Mr. Haigh: Yes it is a STIP Project.
Ms. Yukimura: So that 7.5, is not all county monies?
Mr. Haigh: Eighty percent Federal Highway Funds.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, okay.
Mr. Haigh: And we are trying be able to pick up the Eiwa
relocated bus stop portion so we can utilize the Federal Highway Funds so we do not have
to spend a 100% county funds.
Ms. Yukimura: And on the ninth which is next week Wednesday,
you're going to come back to us and report on the results of this experiment that we've done
here and tell us what your plans are for the actual circulation and design?
Mr. Haigh: That is correct and also we will be reporting on
the interim during construction phase as far as what sort of circulation we're expecting.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright we will wait until next week. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, any other questions? Thank you
Doug.
Mr. Haigh: You're welcome.
Mr. Rapozo: This spreadsheet really makes it easy, thank
you.
Mr. Suga: No problem.
Mr. Rapozo: Engineering, Good morning, If you want to
introduce yourself and give us an overview of your projects than we'll have questions.
MICHAEL MOULE, Chief of Engineering: Good morning I am Michael Moule
and I am the Chief of Engineering and Larry and I are going to tag team just a little bit
since I am new. I just joined the County about a month and a half ago so I am still getting
up to speed on some of the projects.
Mr. Rapozo: Oh we have to give him the "new-be" the
"new-be" treatment.
Ms. Yukimura: And what's that?
Mr. Mole: I am not sure what that means either.
Mr. Rapozo: It means you're in the hot seat right there.
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Mr. Moule: So yeah Larry and I are going through these and
Larry's going to lead and I'll talk on a few specific projects, but he's going to talk on most of
them this morning, so I `ll turn it over to Larry.
Mr. Dill: So we're starting from the top at Aliomanu Road
is a project we've been pursuing for a while and we have the necessary permits now. The
one thing we're trying to resolve as soon as the construction of that road involves some
encroachment under the DHHL Property we've been working with and to acquire the
necessary rights be that conveyance to the land right eventually or a grant of easement. We
do a lot of work for DHHL already as you are aware by our revised statues we are required
to maintain their roads for them. They are looking for a little bit of extra work we can do as
a little bargaining if you will and so we are negotiating that right now. So by completion of
that we will get the right of entry and we will be able to put this project out to bid so we
anticipate that will happen as you can see by the spreadsheet by the middle of next Fiscal
Year, Fiscal Year 15. The `Anini Bridge Project, this is a project that we are looking at
doing the design in-house and so we have been working on those plans but also the
construction plans have turned out to be a little more involved than we anticipated due to
access issues. We thought we would be able to provide access by another means which
didn't turn out to be possible so we're going to have to build this bridge likely one lane at a
time in order to provide continues access for all of the residents out at Anini Beach Road. A
little more complicated than we had originally thought, the original access plan didn't pan
out unfortunately.
We are working on those plans and hoping to get construction bid out and I do not
think it will be now the second quarter Fiscal Year 15, but it might be. Auto shop
improvements and I think Dwayne touched about this actually during his operating budget
session. This is another project we're doing in-house and we anticipate that the construction
drawings will be finalized this month or actually next month in May and be out to bid by
first quarter Fiscal Year 15, and that is coming up pretty soon as well.
Mr. Moule: The next one is the (inaudible) bridge inspection
and I just talked with our bridge engineer here and a little update on what's written here.
We have evaluated the resumes and we've selected a consultant and the Attorney's Office is
re viewing the contract now so that is where that is. This is an ongoing thing we do this
every year, inspect the number of bridges and that one is every two years... sorry thank you
Keith. The next one the Complete Streets Projects —Koloa-Po`ipu Projects was actually one
that I worked on as a consultant last May before I joined the County this Year on the
charrette that happened last May. As I understand it the people that I work with is the
other consulting firm that worked on that is working to finalize the charrette report on
that. The funds that are shown in here are for matching the construction funds with this
and it will be a STIP Project, it will be 80% Federal Funding and 20% match on that and
the funds from that... go ahead.
LYLE TABATA, DEPUTY COUNTY ENGINEER: Yeah and we wanted to
clarify, Lyle Tabata, Deputy County Engineer for Councilmen Hooser even though it is
listed as General Funds its CFD Funds which was transferred in the money bill so we
cannot use this fund, it is not accessible.
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Mr. Rapozo: I think we will need Finance... not now, later
let's finish this spreadsheet and highlight your little blocks and we'll come back so we do
not get distracted.
Mr. Dill: Okay and speaking real quickly these funds
came from the Community Facility District Funding that was provided by the developer
and there were actually three projects that they provided funding for and this is one of the
three identified projects by that CFD issuance.
Mr. Moule: The next one our complete streets safety
improvements on Waikomo Road. This includes some re-striping to improve walking
connections to Koloa School as well as some minor widening of pavement to also add a
pedestrian walkway along the road, all the way from Po`ipu Road out to Wiliwili Road I
believe. It does require some widening and the design of work is largely being done in-house
and we anticipate doing the construction on that in-house as well although we haven't
worked out the final details on that. The next one Complete Streets Safe Routes to School
for Kawaihau Road is in conceptual design right now and that is taking place at this time.
The funds here are for final design and we have this in the Federal Fiscal Year 2015 for
Planning and Design steps so that is what our funds are to match those funds for final
design. The status on that right now is the consultant is finalizing similar to the
Po`ipu-Koloa- Complete Streets Project, finalizing the information that came out of the
charrette for that project and into a poster and other information about what's proposed
and the actual designs that can be moved towards final design.
Mr. Rapozo: The fact that it is in bold should that mean
something?
Mr. Suga: Oh yes thank you for reminding me. The bold
and underlined projects are the Mayor's Holo Holo Projects.
Mr. Rapozo: Oh okay, Thank you.
Mr. Dill: The next project is the driver's license (inaudible)
renovations and we're doing some safety improvements essentially over in the building
where the driver's license building is.
Mr. Suga: Kapule.
Mr. Dill: Oh Kapule Building thank you, Just forgot that
yes and so the designer work is complete for that and the $40,000 is for construction and we
anticipate that going out for bid this month on those improvements. The next 3 items are
the Hanapepe Bridge and this is actually the Hanapepe Bridge and Pedestrian Walkway
Replacement. We want to go ahead and rehab the bridge essentially will be making a bridge
and also the pedestrian bridge. We have spoken to (SHIPTY) the State at Heart
Preservation Division about this project, it is a federally highway funded project by the way
and had understand that we had concurrence from them but recently received
communication from them that they were drawing their previous comments, because they
had some comments from some folks in the Community that was very concerned the way
the pedestrian walkway was being handled on the bridge. Our intent now and we're still
working with Federal Highways, DOT and SHIPTY, our intent is to change the scope of this
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project to address only the vehicular portion of the bridge because we want to make sure we
get that worked on. We will likely have to come back with a separate project addressing the
pedestrian walkway only and re-visit that from the start probably. So the funding you see
here is just so we can move forward in the vehicular portion of the bridge.
Mr. Moule: I will talk about under the road re-surfacing
which is again one of the Mayor's Holo-Holo/20/20 projects. This project, the scope has been
expanded from just resurfacing to really looking at complete streets at this point. We have
awarded the design contract to A-COM and I do not know if that is actually finally signed
yet but we just went through it about 2 weeks ago with the final contract negotiations in
trying to change just the scope a little bit, just to base it on new staff and including myself
being here, in reducing some of the upfront aspects in the complete streets analysis and
evaluation and hopefully getting more product into the conceptual design. I want to further
develop conceptual design out of this so this funds here are for preliminary design and
ultimately we will need to be getting more funds for construction obviously it is in the
Federal Fiscal Year 2016 for construction. It would be a STIP Project and we would need to
identify later some funds to match that but not just yet.
Mr. Dill: One thing I will point out on there is you'll see
that Keith has added a Project Manager Column and you'll see Project Manager Lee there
and that is Lee Steinmetz, he is a Public Works Department Employee and we've been
working a lot more closely on some of these projects that include community input so during
the planning phases of the projects the planning department might actually be the lead
with public works support as it moves towards design and construction that changes
whereas public works will be the lead with planning support. I think that speaks to the
communications between our departments to achieve these sorts of projects. The Hanapepe
Town Parking Lots Improvements, this is a project we did the design in-house and actually
I just signed the notice to precede letter this morning so they will be proceeding with
construction the middle of April...the middle of April I think the 14th so we're moving on
that one. The Kamalu Bridge Stream erosion are the next two line items actually and that
project is underway and the contract started October 13, Construction work is anticipated
to be complete this month it being April. Kamalu Road culbert replacement, this is a project
and we're also doing the design in-house...I am sorry did you want to speak on that one?
Mr. Moule: Yes sure. We are doing this design in-house and
the design is mostly complete we're just trying to work out details but the railing for this
because there's going to be a retaining wall so the cars won't fall off so we're trying to work
out that and the detail out the railing which I think is the last piece we're working on right
now, we were just working on that last week and that is about ready to go. It will shoot out
to bid next month is the plan and so we're just trying to get the final drafting done at this
point.
Mr. Dill: Kanaele Road. This is a design project and we've
awarded the design contract and the consultant is R.N. Towell, as you can see in the notes
that it involves 24 rights of entry agreements for us to negotiate in order for us to get on
site and do the necessary evaluation of the property. As you can see we are halfway through
the process of signing off on those agreements and as soon as that is done we will be able to
move forward with this project. The Kapahi Bridge Replacement, we are working on the
final permits and clearances for this project and we're trying to get this done in a fairly
short order in order to meet the deadline for the Federal Fiscal Year 15 funding. I just want
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to let you know that it is a challenge right now and I am not quite sure we're going to make
that deadline but right now...
Mr. Moule: I did just receive a copy of the plans this morning
so I haven't had a chance to look at it yet but things are moving.
Mr. Dill: Okay, things are moving so that is still a plan
and it will be challenging to meet the deadline.'The Kapaia Bridge Replacement, this is a
project that is been ongoing as you know for a little while and we've spent a lot of time
lately in trying to secure legal access to this property. As you know Kapaia Bridge was built
by the Board of Supervisors many years ago and although the County owns the structure
itself but it doesn't own the land it sits on, it has no legal access to the land. In order for us
to complete this project we have to secure legal access so we have been working closely with
our Attorney's office in order to secure all those rights of entry and easements, etc., to make
that happen then we will be able to move forward with this project.
Mr. Rapozo: So Larry that 2 items that is not the main
bridge?You're talking about the swinging bridge right?
Mr. Dill: Yes, correct that is the swinging bridge.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you.
Mr. Dill: Keapana Bridge replacement, I confess I am
actually not familiar with this one and this is an old project that is complete. Kokee Road
resurfacing is a project also that is complete. We resurfaced the road from Kekaha up to
where it intersects with Waimea Canyon Drive in two phases so this is the second phase
that is complete. That is the next two line items there...Koloa Lighted Crosswalk, that is
another project that is complete, provided the rapid rectangular flashing beacons at Koloa
School. Koloa Road safety improvements in the next 2 line items as you can see it actually
has a typo there the first line says out to bid construction early 2014 and its actually early
fiscal year 15 is what that should say there consistent with what's in the second line down
there.
Mr. Moule: Lae Road safety improvements are a guardrail
project essentially to protect a few slope areas along the road. It is been awarded contract
for construction and it is going out to bid this month so it is ready to go. The Lihu`e Bypass
Feasibility Study, we have a contract for this feasibility study that is being done right now
by (SSFM) is the consultant on that and I've worked with him a little bit and I am familiar
with what they're working on and it is moving right along at this point. We are waiting at
this point; they are preparing the draft study essentially.
Mr. Dill: The Niumalu Bridge replacement is the bridge
down at Nawiliwili. This is another bridge that came back with a poor inspection report so
we have a steel plate on that bridge right now while it is waiting for us to re-design or to
design and construct. We plan to do the design in-house as well for that bridge. The next
line is the Koloa Bypass, I think if you're aware we've completed all the EIS work and there
was funding for that provided by the developer. In order for us to complete the project... not
the project but the environmental and acquire the land, we have exhausted the developer's
funds and have almost $32,000 left there which is necessary enough for us to complete that
transaction. Opeaka'a Bridge replacement and I will mention several (inaudible) on Puapae
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Bridge replacement and two of our County Bridges in Kapa`a. We are close to finalizing
both of these projects so we can see where anticipating the environmental assessment
findings of significant impact both later this year. Right now we are both scheduling in the
next cycle for the STIP funding construction for both of these for STIP funding in Federal
Year 16, so you would see us coming back next fiscal year 16 for county funding for these
projects. The Piikoi interior renovation we have selected the consultant here and in the
process of executing the contract there has been some delays on this project as we try to
finalize the scope of work as you know, Big Save came into the picture and there were
different uses that came into the picture that were purposed to Big Save for a period of
time. Those have finally been resolved so now we can finally move forward with this project
because we finalize what is going to be and what is not going to be this far, so finalizing
that contract and we will be moving forward this fiscal.
Mr. Moule: I will talk about Puhi Road and the construction
and rehabilitation it is a complete not just resurfacing but complete reconstruction of the
pavement surface because it is really torn up as you probably all know if you've ever been
out there. In the last week or two we've been working with the consultant to do some design
adjustments to better incorporate complete street elements in to that and we're still
anticipating getting this done by May and we are working with them in making the
adjustments right now. Those are the next two lines there... Puu Road improvements we
have a consultant on board who is essentially evaluating that road for road safety issues in
needing guardrails, site distance, other aspects and we reviewed the draft report and
awaiting there next version of the report after our comments.
Mr. Dill: Okay and I have already spoken about Puapae
Bridge so we can look at the Rice Street crossing improvements. The Rice Street crossing
improvements...this project we're looking in to do some sort of complete street efforts on
Rice Street in the vicinity of the Lihu`e Town Core Plan, it will mesh with our projects of
the Eiwa Street Mall and the Hardy Street improvements. Honestly, we've been waiting for
Michael to become involved since bringing his complete streets know how to the table on
this project so will be scoping this out and planning this, this year in the Engineering
Division. The next line is the speed from traffic problem and this is basically a pot of funds
we use and we have to build a speed hump in the neighborhood so that is available for us to
use for that purposes. The twin reservoirs as you know the County is a co-owner one of I
think 8 owners of the twin reservoirs project. We have agreed together that the goal here is
to decommission this reservoir, decommissioning of the reservoir will have downstream
flooding impacts and the County has secured information be contracted with the core of
engineers who provided with analysis of the downstream flooding impacts. That resulted in
the need to update the existing FEMA maps, and so we want to take the information
provided by the coronal, update the FEMA maps and proceed with the decommissioning of
the reservoir. This line item you see here is for the portion related specifically for the
updating of the FEMA maps for the twin reservoirs decommissioning. The Pa'a Road
Drainage study, there's concerns (inaudible) road is this road on Rice Street right across
from here that goes down the hill to the valley, there's concerns about flooding down there
and working with Grove Farm Museum because they own the Railway right of way that is
the embankment down there. They will be doing some construction improvements to
address storm drainage issues so we are partnering with them on the project and we will
provide a plan that will help show a Colbert storm drain running from Wa'a Road over to
where they're going to be doing some improvements connecting to those improvements to
alleviate flooding problems there. So that is going to be another project engineering division
will be doing the design in-house.
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Mr. Moule: I will cover Alana Bridge is the pedestrian
walkway replacement and we talked about this briefly yesterday, it is that little bridge for
pedestrians walkway next to the road bridge at Knudsen Park near Koloa Town. That one
we're finalizing at that is another project that is being designed in-house and we're
finalizing that design. I have seen the plans from that last week and we are trying to work
with parks to at least connect the Mauka end of the bridge with a sidewalk connecting to
the walkway in front of the park. That is something we're trying to add there and we are in
conversation with parks about that because that was something that was overlooked earlier
but we're trying to work that out as well. In connecting the other end of the bridge to Koloa
Town is much more much harder thing to do and we're not planning on making any plans
right now just to get the bridge in place now and that would be a later project.
Mr. Dill: Okay the next project I actually touched on this
morning because the projects been completed in closing out the funding and you'll see when
we come back with the May submittal that these funds $112,000 are going to be used for
the Owai Road guardrail project. The Salt Pond waste water improvements as you are
aware we have had some concerns about the waste water system, the septic system down at
the Salt Pond Beach Park. We are right now in the process I believe of signing the contract
with the consultant in order to take a look at different options for addressing the waste
water issues and they will be doing the final design as well. The actual design contract is in
the neighborhood of$100,000 so if we can get that done soon enough we will be able to use
funds remaining from this balance for the construction purposes to implement the proposal
that they designed. The helicopter hanger pad... if I may I would like to come back to that
one please. I need to get up to speed on that one. But if we can we can go ahead with
questions now Councilmember Rapozo?
Mr. Rapozo: If we can start on the top of the list
page 3, `Aliomanu Road and work on the projects one by one and let's just try to get through
this. Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: You say we have to go one by one?
Mr. Rapozo: I mean not one by one but let us start on page 3
and let's just go down the list so we're not going back and forth if that is possible. I marked
mine so I think... `Aliomanu Road? Okay.
Ms. Yukimura: On Aliomanu Road does the road that we are
improving support any DHHL homes?
Mr. Dill: I do not believe so, it is the road that is right
along the water and the DHHL Property is Mauka. It is hard to be Makai being along the
water. It is Mauka from there to the highway. So I do not think it provides any access to
DHHL land. There is a very small encroachment to their property that we need to get.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. That is all I have on the project.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. "Aliomanu Road? Anini Bridge? Auto
Shop Improvements? Biannual bridge inspections? Complete Streets Koloa-Po`ipu?
Mr. Bynum: That is 100% CFD?
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Mr. Moule: The money shown here is CFD funds yes.
Mr. Bynum: The next one down Complete Streets, Kawaihau
I want to ask about.
Mr. Rapozo: Go ahead.
Mr. Bynum: This is a changing approach in terms of putting
it on the STIP. This is primarily around the intersection. Is there conceptual design at this
point or that is what you have awarded?
Mr. Moule: There is not a conceptual design...well, there is a
very conceptual design.
Mr. Bynum: We will talk about that later, but this going with
this project to STIP is new to me in this. I am curious about the time. This is a project that
I am very, very interested in and, in fact I think I helped to put funding in to begin this
project a few years ago.
Ms. Yukimura: You did.
Mr. Bynum: So I just want to get a sense of where it is going
and what the timeframe is?
Mr. Tabata: You are right and we are finding that the
improvements...the permanent improvements that we are looking to implement from the
initial community charrette that we had, we feel that we need to be able to leverage the
funds that have been put aside for us by putting the project on the STIP. So that question
we can do the permit improvements and harden it, versus just do it with paint. So we have
it in phases, the initial quick-fix safety improvements and then the midterm and longer
term.
Mr. Bynum: I can follow-up separately with more details.
Unfortunately I was ill when you had the charrette and I kind of lost track of it. That all
makes sense to me, Lyle. STIP is something that we have to wait in line for. Is this five
years out?
Mr. Tabata: Right that is why we are trying to get on the
STIP now and we need to have our matching funds to get on the STIP appropriated ahead
of time.
Mr. Bynum: Understood. But we do not know how long it
would take for this come up in queue, right? Do you have a guesstimate? This is not next
year? This is several years out, you think?
Mr. Dill: We are planning the next four-year cycle which
starts with the Federal Fiscal Years, 15, 16, 17, and 18 and we are planning for that cycle
and that has not been finalized, but that is the proposal we are making to Federal DOT.
And Federal Highways.
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Mr. Bynum: We will follow-up with the STIP. I used to meet
with you every month and I am not the Chair there anymore. So I just want to get up to
speed. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. I have questions about Koloa-Po`ipu
Complete Streets, but I want to finish Kawaihau first, if that is okay?
Mr. Rapozo: Kawaihau is after? The Kawaihau Complete
Streets. It is after Koloa-Po`ipu.
Ms. Yukimura: Since we are there already to finish up there and
go back. Just a suggestion for this format, one thing that is missing is actually a project
description. It is sort of assumes we know what it is about and maybe a few words in the
project column might help later on or next round. Because even for the public that is
viewing this, it would be helpful to kind of understand what the project is about. As I
understand it and I am asking to make sure, it is that project right outside of Kapa'a
Elementary School by St. Catherine's, where there are five streets coming out, right? I do
want to acknowledge Councilmember Bynum, who has been a bulldog on this issue, trying
to get its potential realized. So conceptually, it is to put in safe walkway for kids coming
down from Kawaihau to the school and accommodate for that sort of place where cars can
come out from all angles?
Mr.Moule: I will give you a brief summary and fill you in a
little bit. It includes improvements on several streets in that area. It includes
improvements on Kawaihau Road, Mahelona Road and Halo Road, sidewalk improvements
on most of those. It also includes the intersections of all three of those roads at the top of
the hill at the five way intersection. The proposal is sort of a peanut about, round about
double circles in a sense and that's what's shown...
Ms. Yukimura: Did you say a peanut round about?
Mr. Moule: Yes peanut round about is what it is being called
by one of the consultants and it's what it looks like in the drawings and that's what controls
the traffic there and slows the traffic helping the pedestrians moving through the area,
students, kids, everyone, high schools students, elementary school students and residents
in the area move through the area. It also includes walkways in different locations along
each of those three roads.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay well thank you for the description. I have
to compliment you Michael on your pronunciation of Hawaiian Roads, Hawaiian names for
roads; you have really caught on quickly. I think it's an exciting project that will bring a lot
of benefits and most of all safe routes to school. I think that's...and right now you've
awarded the conceptual design contract. It's not going to cost $162,000 right?
Mr. Moule: The $162,000 is for the final design.
Ms. Yukimura: The final what?
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Mr. Moule: The final design which we proposed to be in the
federal fiscal year 2015 STIP for planning and design and I think we're looking hopeful to
go for 2016 for construction in the federal STIP. So that's what we're proposing but it's not
final yet but that's in our current discussion.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay well it's very admirable that you folks have
thought ahead on the time table and on fitting the STIP schedule and I look forward to
seeing it completed.
Mr. Bynum: Yeah I want to go a little further with this
because it is exciting and I have a couple of questions as well. In just for context the County
put in pedestrian element years ago during the Kusaka Administration and it changed the
character in the neighborhood, just having this little strip of asphalt and people got to know
each other more. I heard right away that with this intersection I can't send my kids to
school because the path is fine but right here by Saint Catherine's from here to there is
scary and we heard that from parents and so it's a key intersection right next to the biggest
schools we have on the Island, in the highest population center. So I think conceptually,
initially the idea was hey lets deal with this intersection and I remember getting all the
roads wit of Kawaihau and it varies from 50 to 65 feet here, 40 feet here, but it's like lets
deal with this intersection and stub out just a few feet of what will be the complete street in
the future with the pedestrian elements and the bike lanes because that's sufficient with.
So is that still a concept that's going to stub out those extra ways that will logically lead to
extending the complete streets further?
Mr. Moule: Our goal at this point is to do more than that
with this project that we've created in the STIP. Because one ultimately and we don't know
for sure because we're in the very preliminary stages of cost estimating so we don't have a
good feel yet we have a general planning level idea perhaps but once we get further into the
conceptual design we can report back on that. Of course the actual final design or a better
feel of what can be built for that amount of money.
Mr. Bynum: Right and I just want to say that the vision was
here's where we demonstrate what could go further up and down Kawaihau and connect to
the multi-use path which is tantalizingly close in terms of... so that could lead to other
STIP projects is my question?
Mr. Moule: It could.
Mr. Bynum: Because it's kind of like I thought okay we have a
fifty-feet of what might be Kawaihau, with bike lanes and the community can vision what
will this neighborhood be like and the safety improvements on Kawaiahau, It's a very fast
roadway above the speed limit and I encourage you to look at our history of backing road
and the efforts the county put in there in Hanalei and I've had that questions ever since
well what about Kawaihau? That road serves twenty-thirty homes, this road serves
thousands of homes so what are you going to do about the safety and speed here? To me the
answer long term is complete streets, yes?
Mr. Moule: Yes and so again the goal is to start the round
about Mahelona and down Kawaihau and try to get down towards where the path steps out
to right now, down (inaudible) down to the first intersection (inaudible) and sort of as far up
•
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Kawaihau as we can get with an improved facility since there already is a walkway up
mentioned earlier.
Mr. Bynum: Right.
Mr. Moule: That's the general concept at this point but we
don't know for sure because we have to figure out funding.
Mr. Bynum: Well it is the kind of funding that will logically
lead to extensions.
Mr. Moule: Yes, absolutely.
Mr. Bynum: So it's a wonderful effort that we're engaged in
and it is news to me that it was going to go to STIP road and we had originally conceptually
thought we might have fund it in house or other ways and this is logical so thank you very
much.
Mr. Moule: You're welcome.
Mr. Rapozo: Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: I would like to go to the Koloa-Po`ipu Project. I
just want to get an idea of what these improvements are? I'm sorry I think we had a council
meeting when you were having your charette process and I don't know what the result is, if
you could help us?
Mr. Moule: Yes I'm somewhat familiar having worked on
this in the past but I will let Lee Steinmetz talk about this.
Mr. Steinmetz: Good morning, Lee Steinmetz transportation
planner with the Planning Department and also with Public Works kind of. Anyway the
Po`ipu-Road project extends from Koloa Road in KOloa down to the roundabout and on
Po`ipu Road in Po`ipu from the roundabout to the Grand Hyatt. As you mentioned we had a
community design shred to really take a look at this and there will be different sections in
different parts of the road, but basically through Koloa town we will be looking at sidewalks
near the town and both sides of the road and possibly as we get further down, perhaps on
just one side of the road and bike lanes also continuously through on Po`ipu road. In the
more what I call the resort section we are looking at continuous broad sidewalks on both
sides of the street, generously landscaped shoulders and a median that will serve to calm
traffic and also create more character in the sense of identity. The older long range plans
called for four lanes up the Po`ipu road through the resort district but through the charette
and working more on traffic and looking at the circulation plan that was done earlier. We
are proposing that it remain a two lane which gives us a lot of extra room to do some really
nice treatments. Also to handle the increase traffic we're proposing roundabouts at two
locations, one at the eastern bypass and the other at Kiahuna Plantation Drive
intersection. So that would be a way to...
Mr. Bynum: I'm sorry did you just say those two
intersections?
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Mr. Steinmetz: Yes the intersection of Poipu Road with the
eastern bypass and with Kiahuna Plantation Drive right by the shopping center. That will
allow us to increase capacity of the roadway and slow down traffic and it will meet all of
goals without having to widen to four lanes. So that's generally the scope.
Ms. Yukimura: So basically we're going to have sidewalks from
Koloa town to the Hyatt?
Mr. Steinmetz: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: And bike lanes?
Mr. Steinmetz: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: And two roundabouts at Kiahuna and at the
eastern bypass so the bypass closest to the Hyatt?The opening of that bypass?
Mr. Steinmetz: Yes and the other intersections there are
intersection improvements, improving crosswalks and making other improvements but not
necessarily having roundabouts.
Ms. Yukimura: That is going to be such an improvement to the
resort area. This past Saturday when we were at the Farm Based Code Workshop, I saw
people literally walking and the street between the eastern bypass outlet and the Hyatt.
They were literally walking in the Street and very, very dangerous and so we've also talked
about parking problems but that's wonderful thank you for the description.
Mr. Steinmetz: You're welcome.
Ms. Yukimura: And...I think I got enough of a description of the
Waikomo Road. I have been on the walk to school events and know what kinds of
improvements are needed there so it sounds very, very good thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you Mr. Rapozo.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you Mr. Chair. Anymore complete streets?
If not Driver's License counter... Who's Kimo? Oh eh Kimo how you? Nice to meet you
Kimo. Is that $40,000 going to be enough I know that Mr. Barreira talked about the ADA
issue that popped up. Is that $40,000 going to be sufficient? No? Yeah you would need to
come up and Larry you can just relay and that's fine. I'm just very thankful that it's moving
forward.
Mr. Suga: So $40,000 will cover a good portion and we were
working with Brian Inouye, Public Works Maintenance to utilize some of their internal
maintenance funds to fund the difference of the balance.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: Can we get a definition of a good portion? Some
kind of a measuring cup for that or?
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Mr. Suga: Excuse me I believe it was 75 for the total
project.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay, moving on to the Hanapepe Bridge. I'm
not sure Mr. Chair they are moving forward on the vehicular portion and coming back later
for the pedestrian. Larry is that what I heard earlier?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay moving on down Hanapepe Bridge,
Hanapepe Road. For which one I'm sorry. Oh the Hanapepe Town?
Mr. Suga: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: Go ahead.
Mr. Suga: Yeah just...
Mr. Rapozo: JoAnn did you have?
Ms. Yukimura: I had the Hanapepe Road resurfacing.
Mr. Suga: Go ahead, go ahead.
Mr. Rapozo: No go ahead you are right before the...
Ms. Yukimura: I'm really excited that there's a complete streets
context to this Hanapepe Road resurfacing right that somebody mentioned that. So
Hanapepe Road is the road that goes from Kuhie Highway up to Hanapepe Heights?
Mr. Moule: No it's the one that connects right through town
by all the businesses right through town there.
Mr. Dill: It's towards the highway... Excuse me Michael.
It goes through the bridge so the old Hanapepe Bridge is Hanapepe Road then it goes back
to the highway.
Mr. Rapozo: The art night? Hanapepe art night?
Ms. Yukimura: It's in the old town.
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: That whole road that goes through the old town.
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay and you said that I think Michael said that
you're expanding it to a complete streets concept?
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Mr. Tabata: So we reprogrammed this project originally from
resurfacing it to include complete streets elements and the focus for the complete street
elements and the focus for the complete streets elements will be done in phases and the
initial phase is Highway 50, Kaumuali`i Highway to the 100 year old bridge. And Phase 2
will take from the bridge continue all the way back to tie in back to Highway 50, Kaumuali`i
Highway.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Tabata: That would be phase 2.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay excellent.
Mr. Tabata: And part of it doing a survey of the rights of way
within the town as you know is very zigzag through the center of town.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Tabata: And Michael already has been coming as a
consultant and we would do Friday night and he would come for all the projects and I forced
him to come with me one night and he has a good idea of what we're looking at.
Ms. Yukimura: Nothing like a site visit.
Mr. Tabata: We have a good consultant.
Ms. Yukimura: Well you know that in the Hanapepe-`Eleele
area development plan which I helped to get pass as the planning committee chair long,
long ago. I think they talked about the realigning of the rights of way and so do they speak
of that in the Hanapepe Historic, there was a plan subsequent to the area plan which
talked about how to preserve the historic town and I think that was the spencer line weber
study.
Mr. Tabata: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: It says the same thing so that you're actually
moving to make it happen is fabulous so I'm glad to hear that. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Mr. Chock.
Vice Chair Chock: Thank you Chair.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh but you should re-name it.
Mr. Tabata: Yeah we...
Ms. Yukimura: Sorry.
Mr. Tabata: It's a STIP Project so on the STIP its listed as is
but the description includes complete streets on that.
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Ms. Yukimura: Okay great, thank you. I'm sorry Mason.
Vice Chair Chock: No problem I just had a question about the
parking lot improvements. Is that for more spaces and if so how many?
Mr. Tabata: It's not to add more spaces but it's to utilize the
space available to safely park vehicles at an overhead light for security at the entrance and
inside the parking lot and to resurface it. Currently it's just a gravel parking lot so we're
going to install pavement, asphalt pavement and the lights inside the parking lot and one
at the entrance and KIUC is helping us with that.
Vice Chair Chock: Okay.
Mr. Tabata: No we... twenty-one spaces.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay its eleven o clock and we need to take a ten
minute caption break so we will do that at this time, and we will resume...
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 11:16 a.m.
There being no objections, the Committee was called back to order at 11:26 a.m.
Mr. Rapozo: I will call the meeting back to order. Mr. Chair?
Chair Furfaro: This is really for the Finance people so I just
wanted to make sure that I have a heads-up here for a second. Great job on laying out the
spreadsheet but I want to make sure that we are all in understanding these changes in
brackets are moneys that are being defunded from that particular project...I just want to
make sure that we all understand that. It is not as easy to track all of these to the various
Special Trust Funds but I want to make sure that when I am looking at something there is
three hundred and eighty thousand dollars ($380,000) swing at a project like Engineering
and Parks with the Salt Pond Improvements, the proposed year 2015 CIP is coming in now
at five hundred and twenty thousand dollars ($520,000) for example. And then when we
have projects that are getting dumped up for example we have the Anini Bridge
Improvements where it was previously identified at five hundred thousand dollars
($500,000), the change is a plus a hundred fifty thousand dollars ($150,000) and the new
project release in year 2015 is now the six hundred fifty thousand dollars ($650,000). So,
you got to watch the brackets and the pluses but at the same time be very careful and I just
want to hear it from you folks, be very careful that there are certain regulations on Trust
Fund moneys, there are certain regulations on Bond moneys and at the end of the day it all
comes back and balances to this piece. Larry, I want you to look at this. To the Finance
Director, it all comes back and balances here. This is a monumental task to try and identify
what Trust Fund money has savings in, what Trust Fund money was then transferred to,
and in particular I just wanted to reconfirm how I am reading this piece. At the end of the
day, it does balance to be CIP Trust Fund and Bond accounts that are here. It is an
excellent job. Very, very well done but it does leave some audit trails for all of us to look at.
The brackets are defunded projects or reductions and then the highlighted yellow reflects
all the really new projects that we are going to see in 2015. I just wanted to summarize
that. I also understand that Mr. Dill needs to leave early this afternoon and if we finish this
Engineering part and when we come back from lunch, you would like to do Sewer first?
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Mr. Dill: Chair, what I would like to do is try to get
through our current schedule all the way through Solid Waste if I could before lunch and
then do Wastewater right after lunch then if it is possible.
Chair Furfaro: But you want to be here for Wastewater?
Mr. Dill: No. Ed Tschupp and the Deputy can take care of
Wastewater without my presence.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. So, if we can get through all of that before
12:30 then Ed Tschupp and Donald will be available for Wastewater?
Mr. Dill: Absolutely, yes. Thank you, I appreciate that.
Chair Furfaro: I do not have a problem with that. I think Mr.
Rapozo will be running the afternoon budget. Third, I want to make sure we know that Mr.
Hooser has left today's meeting because he is going to give testimony for us at the State
regarding Intergovernmental Relations Committee and he will not join us the rest of the
day. Thank you for giving me some housekeeping time. I know I had to step out, Mel, but
you got the meeting again.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Mr. Chair. We left off with
Hanapepe Town parking lot improvements. We went down the list. Kamalu Bridge,
Kamalu Road, Kanaele Road, Kapahi Bridge, Kapaia Bridge...Councilmember Yukimura?
Ms. Yukimura: Are we working with the community to get the
rights-of-way?
Mr. Dill: Yes, absolutely, with the Kapaia Swinging
Bridge Foundation, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, good. Is there any timetable for when we
hope to secure that access? Can you come up and speak?
WYNNE USHIGOME, Civil Engineer: Good morning. So, basically we are
securing the access through the various landowners, one being Grove Farm and the other
being property owners on the Lakini Road entrance.
Ms. Yukimura: When do you expect that to be accomplished?
Ms. Ushigome: Again, there were some existing easements
however when we tried to look for the title search, the metes and bounds or the map, we
noticed that a couple of the easements may have not been recorded. Again, I think the plan
is basically to do the survey in-house and create the necessary easements on both ends of
the bridge.
Ms. Yukimura: Create easements in our favor?
Ms. Ushigome: Yes.
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Ms. Yukimura: In favor to the County?
Ms. Ushigome: Yes, because there were a couple of easements
that I did locate however the County was not named as grantee or it was not in favor of the
County of Kaua`i.
Ms. Yukimura: So, it is not going to serve our purpose or need.
Ms. Ushigome: Yes. So we would have to create the necessary
easement documents to identify the County as having the right to use those access ways.
Ms. Yukimura: So, we would get from the landowners, Grove
Farm and various property owners in that areas on both ends of the bridge, a public
easement?
Ms. Ushigome: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: In favor of the County of Kaua`i. The plan is to
have pedestrian access from behind the Kapaia Church, across the bridge and then up
toward the Catholic Church. Is that right?
Ms. Ushigome: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Do you have any idea how long that will take?
Ms. Ushigome: Not at this time. I do not think we planned out a
time schedule as of yet. I think we just recognized that we did not have the necessary
easements based on our research with the Real Property Division.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, so you are working with the County
Attorney's?
Ms. Ushigome: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, and then we have proposed for this FY
that same amount that is in the budget now, two hundred thirty-one thousand four
hundred and three dollars ($231,403). What do we think we are going to accomplish over
this coming FY?
Mr. Moule: I do not know that we can answer that question
for you at this point with the challenges when you are dealing with property issues, it is
really hard to estimate how long it will take to get the easements in place.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Moule: We would like to get that bridge replaced as soon
as we can but we just do not know for sure. We want to keep the funds in here so we can.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
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Ms. Ushigome: Just to clarify, because we are identifying the
funding from the Bond 2015, I guess we have been made aware that we need public access
and public use before we can spend those Bond funds.
Ms. Yukimura: You need what?
Ms. Ushigome: Public access and public use.
Mr. Moule: The reason we need to get this public easement
for access is that we cannot spend Bond funds on this project unless there is public access.
Ms. Yukimura: To me that is a given. That is the whole reason
we want this project...well not the whole reason but one of the main reason that we want
this project.
Chair Furfaro: But that is the first time we ever heard it laid
out in that detail to us in three year. Thank you for sharing that with us. I feel
enlightened now.
Ms. Ushigome: Again, we need to get through the access. The
first phase, basically just the bridge piers and phase two was basically the restoration of the
decking and the other support systems. Again, prior to funding the bridge piers, we need to
be able to get the public access.
Ms. Yukimura: I understand. It is a necessary prerequisite to
us doing any kind of construction?
Mr. Moule: Exactly.
Ms. Yukimura: But when we get the legal easement then we will
be able to put in the foundation?
Ms. Ushigome: The piers. We are going to restore the piers.
Ms. Yukimura: Right and we have enough money based on our
estimates to do that, right?
Ms. Ushigome: I believe the estimates was a hundred and fifty
thousand ($150,000) for the piers along but not the decking.
Ms. Yukimura: I am going to think real positive that we will get
the easement and be able to put in the piers by the end of this FY.
Ms. Ushigome: And again I think verbally both Kapaia and
Grove Farm have verbally committed to working with the County on the easements.
Ms. Yukimura: That is good news but it is getting that signature
on that document that is key. Alright, very good. Thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: I would like to summarize what you just told us
in writing to this Council.
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Ms. Ushigome: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: It is quite obviously the timing would need to be
explained to people who are friends of this access and like I said this is the first we have
actually heard that the right-of-way is a piece of priority of the actual repair of the
walkway. Please give it to us in writing.
Ms. Ushigome: Okay.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you very much for your report.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore on Kapaia? If not, Keapana? Is that
the swing bridge, Keapana?
Mr. Dill: I believe so.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay and that is done. Kokee Road is complete.
Koloa Lighted Crosswalk is complete. Koloa Safety Improvements, Lae Road Safety
Improvements which is in progress, correct? And then Lihu`e Bypass Feasibility Study,
County match. Niumalu Bridge. Mr. Chock and then Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Chock: I am so happy to hear that we are looking at this
bridge because it is pretty obvious that it is in poor condition. I had some inquires from the
community. Would you be able to also share a timeframe in terms of the next phase which
is the design process or in terms of how long it is going to take to get this done.
(inaudible)
Mr. Rapozo: Within a year and it will be an Acrow bridge.
Mr. Chock: What is that?
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, Glenn Mickens will be happy.
Mr. Rapozo: A prefabricated bridge. So, Acrow is the brand
but it was a prefab...that was my question "are we going to use a prefab," so thank you very
much. It makes sense for Niumalu and saves a lot of money.
Mr. Chock: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Within a year I heard.
Mr. Moule: Which of course the prefab...that is why we can
do it fairly quickly as well.
Mr. Bynum: The Lihu`e Bypass Feasibility Study...
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, let us finish up Niumalu.
Mr. Bynum: I am sorry.
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Mr. Rapozo: Then we will go back to the Feasibility. Go
ahead, Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: The six hundred fifty thousand dollars
($650,000) should cover the whole project?
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: So the Acrow bridge is faster and probably
cheaper then construction from scratch so that is why you can say within a year? That is
really excellent. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: My understanding of Acrow bridge is sometimes
they are cost savings and sometimes they are not depending on what the footings...how
much of the expense goes into the footings and underneath the bridge...are you doing an
analysis now of both to decide which way to go?
Mr. Dill: That is correct, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: May I ask one more question on Niumalu?
Mr. Bynum: Sure.
Ms. Yukimura: The issues of corrosion and rusting, is that okay
with respect to an Acrow? Is it going to last long? Do we have to reinforce to spraying it
with something? It is right next to the ocean and so it is vulnerable to that kind of
corrosion. I live two miles from the ocean and we have a problem.
Mr. Dill: It is a steel bridge and it will require more
maintenance from us so that will be part of our Roads Division to make sure they maintain
it appropriately. With the appropriate maintenance, they will have a lifespan, not
significantly different than what a concrete bridge would be.
Ms. Yukimura: Is there any kind of pretreatment that you can do
at the time of construction?
Mr. Dill: Yes, we are looking at those types of things.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, very good. Thank you.
Mr. Bynum: So, just remind me of what the Lihu`e Bypass
Feasibility Study...we funded...
Mr. Rapozo: Hold on, Chair wanted to talk.
Mr. Bynum: Oh, I am sorry.
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Chair Furfaro: How wide is this bridge and how many lanes
does it provide?
Mr. Dill: I believe the proposed bridge is for a two lane
bridge.
Mr. Moule: Currently there is a single lane bridge now and I
heard and agree in a sense that it does provide a nice gateway feature to the community.
The challenge with bridges is that they do last fifty (50) to seventy (70) years. It is not
usually a good idea to narrow on a bridge.
Chair Furfaro: Someone early commented that something of this
style would make Mr. Mickens happy and this is a two part question...he wants the two
lane.
Mr. Moule: He wants the two lane, okay.
Chair Furfaro: But most of the historical people want a single
land but what we are looking for with this money is two lanes?
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you for the clarification on that.
Ms. Yukimura: I have a follow-up.
Mr. Rapozo: I know what it is going to be.
Mr. Bynum: I have one too.
Ms. Yukimura: When you go from one lane to two lanes you lose
the traffic calming aspect of the one lane bridge, so can you modify, add or
something...anything to retain the traffic calming aspect of the bridge?
Mr. Moule: We can look into that issue. In that particular
location because of the fact that it is close to an intersection, people are slowing down to
turn anyway, so traffic calming is maybe not as important as other places. I do not think
our plans would include widening the road for hundreds of feet on either side so there is
still going to be some narrow roadway near the bridge. It is a pretty narrow road to begin
with so I think it has the traffic calming effect. I do understand the gateway in traffic
calming aspect in that particular location and gateway into that neighborhood and I
respect that, it is an important aspect but it is very challenging...when you are adding a
bridge who will last for so long, you really do want to go right around that.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: This is not a historic bridge, right?
Mr. Moule: Well...
Mr. Bynum: I am sorry. Forget I asked that question.
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Mr. Rapozo: It will be when the people see this televised.
Mr. Bynum: Forget I asked that question.
Ms. Yukimura: Let us move on.
Mr. Bynum: I do have one question about Niumalu though,
that seems like a good approach for that bridge, I agree. Is Niumalu a collector road?
Mr. Moule: No it is not.
Mr. Bynum: Sure looks like a collector road to me. It was our
first every speed hump in Niumalu and so there is a big history of speed hump...anyway.
But it is still currently not a collector?
Mr. Moule: Correct.
Mr. Bynum: Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Chair.
Chair Furfaro: So, you can see why I asked the question because
there are a lot of concerns here about calming devices but more importantly before this
project gets started, is there plans to do community outreach in Niumalu?
Mr. Moule: I do not think we got that far down the road yet
but we certainly can include that.
Chair Furfaro: Could you put a note there that it might be
appropriate.
Mr. Dill: We will look into that. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: That was the question I thought JoAnn was
going to ask and that was the question that I was going to ask because I think by tomorrow
we are all going to be hearing about Niumalu. I think I agree with the long-term because
the bridge is going to last, and JoAnn for your information although it is treated steel, these
bridges do very well over salt water throughout the world. I look at Wainiha twin bridges,
that is a acrow bridge and it is holding up very well. I do want to ask that we let the
community know because I think...and not so much that they are coming across to make
that turn up to Ulumalu Road, it is going to the end of...because there are homes at the end
as well and the canoe club is down there. I think it is coming across not intending to turn
but to go straight to the end might encourage some speeding down there. I want to see that
bridge fixed but I want to also make sure that the community is aware because it is not a
very big community. That bridge with the bypass road, I use it a lot because I almost
always use the back road, I do never go up Rice and Kaumuali`i, I always take the back
road when I drive to the west side and coming back only because of the traffic. I think it is
well used but I think the community may have some concerns with two (2) lanes. If it does
go to one (1) lane, if for some reason one (1) lane is sufficient that cuts the costs
dramatically.
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Mr. Moule: It is not going to cut it in half.
Mr. Rapozo: No, not in half but I think you would save...
Mr. Moule: It is hard to say exactly twenty percent (20%),
thirty percent (30%) perhaps reduction if I were to guess —educated guess at this point.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore? Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: Of the move away from cookie cutter decisions
about bridges, the context sensitive design, right? And the context here is different here in
Niumalu then it is in these other places. I do not believe one (1) or two (2) is the right
answer all the time, right? It is context sensitive. Is that correct?
Mr. Moule: This is true in general with road projects, yes.
Mr. Bynum: I think the Chair's excellent question and to
encourage to do community outreach because that is a really small community in terms of
the number of residents but the road through there has a big impact. Thank you for the
work. Are we done with Niumalu?
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, JoAnn wants to keep moving, so, yes.
Mr. Bynum: JoAnn wants to keep moving?
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, JoAnn wants to keep moving.
Mr. Bynum: This is a really quick question, it says this Lihu`e
bypass feasibility we awarded, so the funds were in there last year. Can you tell me what
that award was? This is the remaining funds because we awarded those funds when? Can
you remind me what they were?
Mr. Dill: I believe it was a hundred thousand dollars
($100,000) was the original appropriation, is that right? Okay, so, ninety thousand dollars
($90,000). I stand corrected.
Mr. Bynum: And SSFM that is the whole scope-of-work for
SSFM?
Mr. Dill: That is correct.
Mr. Bynum: If you know, are they involved in the Lihu`e
Development Plan? I know it is the same firm...
Mr. Moule: It is the same firm. Some of the leading leaders
that are working on it, sort of the management staff or... will be the same but different
people working on it.
Mr. Bynum: Okay, thank you.
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Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Councilmember Yukimura.
Ms. Yukimura: So the County match is ninety thousand dollars
($90,000) so that is ten percent (10%) or twenty percent (20%)?
Mr. Dill: Twenty percent (20%).
Ms. Yukimura: So the total contract is how much?
Chair Furfaro: Four hundred fifty thousand dollars ($450,000).
Ms. Yukimura: Four hundred fifty thousand dollars ($450,000)
and what is the end product?
Mr. Moule: It is a feasibility study that in a fair amount of
detail at the traffic issues and how the traffic...includes the traffic analysis, how traffic will
shift, change with respect to having this new road in that location, as well as sort of a cost
estimate of what it would cost and more detail to construct it and ideas as to how
intersections might be needed to treated in different ways depending on the traffic volumes
and that sort of thing. I do not have the actual scope-of-work in front of me so I cannot give
you the exact information.
Ms. Yukimura: But it will not include any environmental
assessment of sorts because that would be the next phase?
Mr. Moule: I believe that is correct. There is no
environmental work.
Mr. Dill: There is some environmental work to identify
environmental issues.
(Inaudible)
Chair Furfaro: You cannot talk from the back of the room.
Please come up.
Mr. Moule: As far as environmental, it does not do the actual
environmental studies but it identifies the purpose and need for environmental issues on
the project.
Chair Furfaro: And that was Kimo in the back that gave you
that answer?
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you, Kimo but we cannot hear you from
there.
Ms. Yukimura: And so the different alignments, I presume will
be suggested and at the end of the feasibility study, number 1 it will be decided whether or
not to proceed on some form on a bypass and if so, what alignment?
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Mr. Moule: That is correct. There will be recommendations
on how the alignments could work, what makes more sense based on existing cane hauls
roads that are there and could be followed, what connections makes sense to existing roads
and how would we connect back into town. No decision...it would not recommend...a
decision would not be made of course by the study. It would just be, here is the possibilities
and here is what needs to be done, if that is going to happen, what needs to be done to make
it happen.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: I do not want to belabor this because we
discussed this at length last year and just the context, I did not support this project going
forward but I did not win and it is going forward and that is fine. That is the way things go
however this may be the right time to ask this and the Chair will tell me if it is not because
in that context of that discussion last year there were a lot of discussion about Pouli Road
and the need that if we are really looking at some alternative bypass that are going to make
a difference that that was an important project. I believe Councilmemher Nakamura and I
started to follow-up on that unfortunately she is no longer on the Council for that.
Ms. Yukimura: Is Pouli Road...
Mr. Bynum: Why is there nothing in here about Pouli Road
and where is Pouli Road? What happened since last year, to put that back on the radar
screen?
Ms. Yukimura: These are two (2) different regions. This is
Lihu`e bypass.
Mr. Bynum: I said somebody will tell me if I cannot ask this
now and the reason why I am asking is because this is where we had the discussion last
year about Pouli Road and if it needs a separate thing on the agenda in the future, I will
defer to the Chair's judgment.
Mr. Dill: I would request a separate agenda item. We do
not have a proposal in the CIP for Pouli Road this year.
Mr. Bynum: Bummer.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Chair.
Chair Furfaro: We will put it on a soon agenda for an update on
the two (2) bypass out of Kapa`a.
Ms. Yukimura: Chair, it is a possible call-back, is it not?
Mr. Rapozo: Not if it is not in the budget. Pouli Road is not in
the budget.
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Ms. Yukimura: But what if it is a potential budget item? What if
some of us want to put it in?
Mr. Rapozo: If you want to ask him more questions of it, I
mean he just said that it is not on the budget.
Ms. Yukimura: I know that it is not on the budget but why could
we not learn about it and see so that we may want to put it in. To me it is a potential but
we are going to be putting things in that are not in the budget right now.,.by that nature it
is in the budget item.
Chair Furfaro: I will just remind everybody the rules, you can
put something back in if you find the money for it. That is where it starts.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes but first we need to know how much it is
going to cost.
Chair Furfaro: Let me finish. I will try and put this on a
discussion item very soon, Larry, very soon.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: Let us move on Mr. Rapozo.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you. Northern leg Koloa bypass road,
again, that is on hold right Larry, you said?
Mr. Dill: Yes the money is in here to complete the
acquisition of the property.
Mr. Rapozo: Opaekaa Bridge replacement. Piikoi Interior
Renovation, I just had a question, you talked about the potential uses. Did we agree or
decide what we are going to use that building—the old Big Save?
Mr. Dill: Yes, it will be used primarily for storage space
requirements. You may recall a few years ago we had two million dollars ($2,000,000)
identified in the budget to acquire outside storage, Big Save came along with almost the
amount necessary to accommodate that need as identified in the previous plan. So, it would
be primarily for storage but also other office space. We are looking for a small amount of
Kaua`i Made retail to support local folks and looking into moving the Transportation
Agency over there. As part of our presentation that we will be making on April 9 about the
Eiwa Street. Doug talked about moving the transit location over the Eiwa from Hardy. We
want to make a close location for the Transportation Office. It is part of the transit mall
and that is generally speaking of how we are going to use the space.
Mr. Rapozo: So the meat processing plan is out?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
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Mr. Rapozo: Okay. That is good. Okay...Puhi Road
construction. Puu Road Improvements. Puuopae Bridget. Stop me if you guys have a
question. Rice Street Crossing Improvements. Speed Hump/Traffic Calming Program.
Mr. Bynum: I have one on Rice Street.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay, Rice Street.
Mr. Bynum: The Lihu`e Business Association is really
interested in branding and I just wanted to know the status. There was some discussion
with State Highways about concrete stamping in some of these premiers and are we still
pursuing that?
Mr. Dill: There were some discussions but it was not about
concrete stamping. It was regarding doing a unique crosswalk design to, as you are saying,
to identify the community. We were moving in that direction until we got a ruling from
Federal Highways that those sorts of things were frowned upon and were not allowed.
Apparently they are distracted to drivers in their opinion.
Mr. Bynum: I am sorry, what is distracted?
Mr. Dill: A unique crosswalk design.
Mr. Bynum: That is absurd. I will pursue that at the State
level. There is all kinds of...I have seen thousands of different crosswalk designs across the
Country in the last five (5) years that have character and so you are saying you cannot use
bricks, you cannot put those bricks in a pattern?
Mr. Dill: No. What they were looking for was a quilt
design.
Mr. Bynum: Well we did this at Lydgate Park. There is a
crosswalk at Lydgate Park with a concrete...
Mr. Dill: Was it across a Federal Aid road?
Mr. Bynum: No.
Mr. Dill: So that might be the difference.
Mr. Moule: Let me address this.
Mr. Bynum: I do not want to belabor this again, I want to
move on, I will discuss this...
Mr. Moule: Talk to me offline. I know a lot about this.
Mr. Bynum: I will discuss this offline. Thank you.
Ms. Yukimura: Is a possible result coming out of this process
actual wider sidewalks for Rice Street?
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Mr. Moule: I think right now we are trying to look at staying
within curb to curb and then restriping to get bike lanes but the sidewalks would be much
more significance expense and there is not a lot of width out there. If it goes that way we
will have to budget for a lot more funding then we are anticipating right now. We are
mainly talking about restriping and a few other changes in crosswalks changes.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, at some point we will have to look at
undergrounding the utilities too.
Mr. Rapozo: Speed hump?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. Right now our ordinance only allows speed
humps and not a whole lot of other traffic calming. I was wondering whether the
Administration is going to develop legislation that allows for other kinds of...I mean the
diversity from speed humps to speed tables or whatever or even more elaborate
roundabouts or mini roundabouts, I do not know all the terminology. So, one whether you
are planning to have legislation or maybe it is included in your living streets things or else I
would like to work on some amendments to the code but in corporation with the
Administration to develop that because right now our ordinance is very limited in traffic
calming options.
Mr. Dill: That is something that Michael has on his list of
things to do. So, we will be looking at that.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, great.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore speed humps? If not, Twin Reservoirs.
Waa Road Drainage Study.
Ms. Yukimura: Twin Reservoirs.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Go ahead.
Ms. Yukimura: The County is co-owner with DLNR, who is the
other owner?
Mr. Dill: Private owners.
Ms. Yukimura: How many?
Mr. Dill: I believe there are eight (8) total.
Ms. Yukimura: And we are saying that decommissioning which
means what? Removing the reservoir?
Mr. Dill: Yes. It will be actually cutting a notch in the
dam which is a County owned road that is not in service. So, we own the road.
Ms. Yukimura: So it is the draining of the dam?
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Mr. Dill: Correct. It is modifying the dam so we will not
hold back water anymore or get it below the regulatory threshold.
Ms. Yukimura: Which then may have some downstream funding
impacts, is that what I heard?
Mr. Dill: That is correct. We hire the United States of
Army Corp of Engineers and they did a downstream study because we did not want to
decommission and have a downstream funding problem.
Ms. Yukimura: Good.
Mr. Dill: So they are looking at it and mapped out the
(inaudible) downstream and determined that the impacts will be not that significant but
would require an update of the existing FEMA maps. Actually they found out that...since
they are doing it with a lot more modernly available information. The old maps are...the
existing condition needs to be updated regardless of the decommissioning.
Ms. Yukimura: What happens to that dam land?
Mr. Dill: The dam land?
Ms. Yukimura: It is just open space?
Mr. Dill: We will keep the dam land.
Ms. Yukimura: But it is just going to be this...but I have not
made it up there but people say that it is a huge landmark or whatever. What about
liability? What about potential park?
Mr. Dill: The County only owns the roadway and so that is
our reason for this participation. The private landowners have their own plans for their
properties.
Ms. Yukimura: I see. We only own the roadway?
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: How disappointing.
Mr. Dill: Unfortunately it is very significant with the dam
but part of my thinking is once we complete the decommissioning, we might want to convey
that roadway to an adjacent property owner. I am not sure there would be any reason for
the County to want to continue to own it.
Ms. Yukimura: Because it is not used for regular traffic.
Mr. Dill: Correct. It is not used for any traffic.
Ms. Yukimura: It is used mainly as a wall of the dam?
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Mr. Dill: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: I see. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore questions on the reservoir? If not, Waa
Road. Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: It is the next one.
Mr. Rapozo: Wailana Bridge?
Mr. Bynum: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: Go ahead.
Mr. Bynum: Thanks for the initiative on this one. I think I
heard earlier that you are going to have a pedestrian connection to Anne Knudsen but on
the other side going towards Koloa; that is not possible at this time?
Mr. Moule: Yes, based on the current budget. Even the
connection to Knudsen Park, we are still trying to figure out whether funding is going to be
enough for that.
Mr. Bynum: I am interested in how you maneuvered the ADA
issues there and whether the pedestrian bridge that you rebuild will be ADA compliant
even though it may not have connections.
Mr. Moule: Right. We need to make sure that the bridge
itself and any connecting walkways are ADA compliant. Obviously on the high side of the
bridge, there would not be a walkway connecting the short or near term and when there is
no walkway, there is no ADA requirement. So, we would only have to make the ramp
coming off the bridge compliant.
Mr. Bynum: But going towards the part.
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: There would be an ADA compliant walkway?
Mr. Moule: Yes. I looked at it on Saturday.
Mr. Bynum: If the developer should redevelop, we would pick
it up then, I assume?
Mr. Moule: That is correct. There is potential for
development on the other side of the road which we heard about so we will look at that
when that time comes but right now there is no firm plans to build a sidewalk into Koloa
Town.
Mr. Bynum: Right but what we will be replacing will connect
to ADA appropriate in the long run?
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Mr. Moule: Yes. We need to make sure that what we build
now is compliant to...
Mr. Bynum: Well we are required to do that so that means
the width of this bridge is going to be wider than the existing.
Mr. Moule: Yes. I think we are going to eight feet knowing
that the long-term might be not just...
Mr. Bynum: I would strongly encourage that eight foot be to
the minimum when possible to allow the potential for shared use path in the future should
it be determined that appropriately.
Mr. Moule: That is our thoughts as well. The eight foot
minimum so it could be a shared use path if that happens because again bridges last a long
time. We do not want to do another bridge.
Mr. Bynum: Right and there is no current plans to do
anything like that, it is just me...but you are preparing...
Mr. Moule: Yes but we want to keep it open.
Mr. Bynum: Great. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore questions on Wailana Bridge?
Wailapa/Kilauea Stream Project. Salt Pond Wastwater Improvements, the only thing I
notice right off the bat is there is a huge reduction and is that going to cover the project?
Mr. Dill: The budget for the project will be contingent
upon the selective design at the end. Our design contract is about just under a hundred
thousand dollars ($100,000) so we are just in the process of finalizing. So that will leave
four hundred and twenty thousand ($420,000), I guess I will say that we are optimistic
that we will cover it but we do not know a hundred percent (100%) yet.
Ms. Yukimura: What is IWS?
Mr. Dill: Individual Wastewater System. So a typical IWS
is a cesspool or septic system but it could also mean a small treatment plant.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Helicopter Hanger Pad.
Ms. Yukimura: Where is this going to be?
Mr. Dill: This is of course to house the Fire Department
helicopter. It is on airport property. We have been working with them on this. A question
that recently arisen from the Department of Transportation is they have a concern about a
temporary structure on their properties so before we move forward, they want to be able to
see and approve the design on a permanent structure on the property. That has pushed our
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design cost up a little bit because whereas we are proposing to design temporary now we
have to do the temporary and permanent design for this structure.
Ms. Yukimura: What is the estimated cost?
Mr. Dill: The design cost...we are just working on
finalizing with the consultant but it looks like it will be in the neighbor of two hundred and
eighty thousand dollars ($280,000) just for the design process since we have to have a
permanent structure design now. I do not believe we have a cost estimate for the structures
yet.
Ms. Yukimura: Using a rule of thumb of what design, design cost
is usually what ten percent (10%) of construction?
Mr. Dill: That is including permit and fees and
nevertheless, yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
Mr. Dill: I think the plan is to erect the temporary
structure and the permanent structure will be some time in the future.
Ms. Yukimura: Well I do not know if anticipated this when we
approved the helicopter. Okay, thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: So this is just for the pad?
Mr. Dill: No, this is for the pad and the temporary
structure that we are shooting for.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Any other questions? Mr. Chair.
Chair Furfaro: Have we found out from a standpoint of I
thought we were pursuing something for space with the State and we were going to be able
to trade out some services and so forth.
Mr. Dill: Actually, I am not aware of that. Maybe the Fire
Department was...
Chair Furfaro: Can somebody from the Administration speak on
that?
Mr. Moule: I understand that the Fire Department is in
negotiations about some land issues which is one of the reasons why and that is maybe why
the contract execution may be delayed a little bit. I am not familiar with what those are.
We just know that they are trying to work some things out — the Fire Department. I am
sorry I could not find any more information. I do not think any of us know those details.
Mr. Rapozo: Maybe we can...
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Chair Furfaro; We can put that on the agenda. I am putting
Pouli Road on the agenda for April 16 and I will think about having the Fire Department
come talk to us about...
Mr. Rapozo: Yes. We probably got to get more information on
that. So the State has basically given us the land—the Airports Division?
Mr. Dill: I believe we are leasing the land.
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: So we are paying for the land and we pay for our
building and we got to start charging the State for the rescues at the State trails and parks.
Mr. Bynum: I like that.
Chair Furfaro: We were not aware of what was being pursued
here for this kind of cost. We will put this on the agenda.
Mr. Rapozo: Does anyone know what the lease is?
Mr. Moule: The cost of it?
Mr. Rapozo: Just the cost of the lease.
Mr. Bynum: Is it in the Fire budget.
Mr. Rapozo: Do you have it there, Scott? Okay. We can have
that discussion in the Committee Meeting.
Chair Furfaro: We will have that discussion in Committee. I
have something in my files on it too.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Anymore questions on Engineering? Last
chance. If not, thank you very much.
Mr. Dill: Thank you. May I ask for a change in the
schedule? Can we go to Solid Waste at this time?
Chair Furfaro: Actually I said that we were going to do that at
your request because you were going to be needing to leave this afternoon.
Mr. Dill: Our normal schedule we were going to Roads and
then Solid Waste but if we can do Solid Waste first, I would appreciate that.
Chair Furfaro: I think that is what I said. We will accommodate
you.
Mr. Rapozo: Solid Waste. You have thirty (30) minutes before
our lunch break.
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Chair Furfaro: I will have Pouli Road on the Committee Meeting
for April 16.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Okay, Larry, we will just
go with the same format. Just go right through your... you do not have that many on here
but it is significant. You can go down your list and then we will open it up for questions
when you are done.
TROY TANIGAWA, Environmental Services Management Engineer: The first
project we have listed here for Solid Waste is the Kekaha Landfill gas collection and control
system. It is a new project and what this project will do is to fund design and construction
document preparation for complete gas collection and control or capture system for the
landfill both phase 1 and phase 2. Any questions?
Mr. Rapozo: No, just go right through and we will do the
questions at the end.
Mr. Tanigawa: Okay. Kekaha Landfill Lateral Expansion — Cell
II. I think most of us are familiar with the location of the area for the cell 2 lateral
expansion. The current status is we are currently on hold with that project as we have
secured our landfill capacity for a number of years to further operations with the vertical
expansion. The appropriation that we have here is to complete the leachate system
modification project projected to be completed by the end of this calendar year 2014.
Kekaha Landfill Lateral Extension. This project is basically complete. Kekaha Landfill
Vertical Expansion. We secured the permit. We issued the permit on March 7, 2014. This
project is basically complete. Kekaha Landfill Phase 2 closure. We have consultants that
are helping us determine design requirements and we will be executing a scope-of-work to
have these consultants prepare design contract specifications for partial closure of the
phase 2 landfill and lateral cell 1 area. Material Recovery Facility. We currently have a
contract with a consultant to prepare conceptual design that includes preparation of
environmental assessment for the project. NTP was issued October 21, 2013. Remaining
funds will be used for the final design. New Landfill and Resource Recovery Park. We have
our consultant continuing work on the environmental impact statement (EIS). EIS
completion anticipated for July... I guess we are going to make a correction on the date. So,
that will be probably part of the discussion. NPDES Compliance. We have statements of
qualifications that have been evaluated. We are nearing the end of the procurement process
for that project. That is it.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Chair.
Chair Furfaro: The recovery park acquisition plans and design,
we have six hundred and seventy-three thousand dollars ($673,000) earmarked as the
carryover balance but we are changing that order by four hundred and twenty thousand
dollars ($420,000). What are we expect to accomplish for two hundred and fifty-three
thousand dollars ($253,000)?
Mr. Dill: Chair in the spirit of trying to move forward and
fund only projects that we feel that will need the funding in the next twelve (12) to eighteen
(18) months, we reduced this amount. I think I shared with each of the Councilmembers in
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the past that at the landfill one recent issue that has come up was that we will need to be
conducting a wildlife hazardous estimate and wildlife hazard mitigation plan. So the
purpose of these funds is to conduct a wildlife hazardous assessment.
Ms. Yukimura: Which one are you talking about?
Mr. Dill: That is the New Landfill Resource Recovery Park
Development and Acquisition.
Chair Furfaro: Okay well I am just thinking forward because
this is bond money.
Mr. Dill: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: May I just ask you, we are going to speak to the
Bond Counsel on the 9th and I really worry how many deviations we are going to be making
here on money that we borrowed for certain purposes, have you guys...any preliminary
understanding with changing almost a half a million dollars?
Mr. Dill: We are aware of that issue as our Director of
Finance is but I will have to defer to him on responding.
Chair Furfaro: I do not need you up, Steve, we are going to move
on. I just want to put the red flag up there because I think the call we are on is the 9th,
right?
STEVEN A. HUNT, Director of Finance: There are two (2) issues, the Bond
Counsel which is Brian Hirai and McCorriston firm is not involved in this. This is the
credit rating agency that determines our credit rating.
Chair Furfaro: I understand that but what I am saying is that
we are going to be looking at our old plan.
Mr. Hunt: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: And they are going to say something major as
this swing on the landfill...
Mr. Hunt: Not an issue at all.
Chair Furfaro: Not an issue?
Mr. Hunt: Yes. The issues that we do have are when we do
not have site control and you attempt to spend bond moneys on sites that you do not
control. Part of the reason for some of these defunding are we do not have site control on
some of the projects.
Chair Furfaro: Now I am satisfied.
Mr. Rapozo: Any other questions? Councilmember Yukimura.
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Ms. Yukimura: Are we on the new landfill or any place? Okay, I
want to start at the beginning. The Kekaha Landfill gas collection and control system, I just
want to really express my pleasure that we are actually moving toward something. This
thing has been referred for twenty (20) years and nothing has happened and to tie it into
the supply of fuel for our County vehicles including the bus is really important, as you
know, in our multi-modal land transportation plan. It was pointed out that fuel costs is
thirty percent (30%) of the transportation budget and if the fuel costs were to double, that
would be sixty percent (60%) of our operations budget and so we could not operate like that.
So looking for one of the initiatives in the plan was that we would look for a local and
renewable source of fuel. I hope this will work out and I am glad that it is moving ahead.
Mr. Rapozo: We do have that coming up for a discussion - the
methane collection. We talked about that in the open session.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Chock: Do we have an approximate cost for the system?
I know this is a construction document that we are looking at.
Mr. Tanigawa: The early estimates are going to be about four
point eight (4.8) million.
Ms. Yukimura: How much?
Mr. Tanigawa: Four point eight (4.8) million.
Mr. Rapozo: To capture the methane and convert it?
Mr. Tanigawa: No, it is just the capture system.
Mr. Rapozo: Just to capture.
Ms. Yukimura: Wow.
Chair Furfaro: Not to burn a lot of time on this and I think you
mentioned that earlier, we already advised Economic Development to be prepared to talk
about this on their time on Friday. Okay.
Mr. Rapozo: Okay. Thank you.
Ms. Yukimura: The lateral landfill expansions cell 2 is on hold
until we use up the vertical expansion, is that right?
Mr. Tanigawa: No. That project is just on hold temporarily. We
are looking at...we are considering different thing having some discussions with a
consultant on the best way to move forward. Once we determine what are the appropriate
things to do then we will have another contract amendment that would have to be executed
and funded to complete the design. Basically what we saw when we went through a
review of our permit application that included the current design there were issues that
came up that we felt with the given time and we have that time now with the vertical
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expansion. Within several months we can come up with solutions to better deal with those
issues.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay because we were looking at an estimated
budget of nine million dollars ($9,000,000) to accomplish the lateral expansion, right?
Mr. Tanigawa: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: And because the vertical expansion is so
economical as I recall, that is what we are doing first?
Mr. Tanigawa: That was done because the vertical expansion
could be completed within the time that we had the window we had remaining given the
remaining landfill capacity at that time.
Ms. Yukimura: And it was much cheaper right? It was like three
hundred thousand dollars ($300,000) or something?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. So by going with the vertical expansion
we have gained at least five (5) years?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: Although if we do diversion real well we might
have even longer?
Mr. Tanigawa: We might get a little more but given the
programs that we have and the ones that are implementable within a reasonable timeframe
during this five (5) year period we will not have enough...we will not gain enough capacity
or save enough capacity to bridge...
Ms. Yukimura: Right to not need something else. Okay, now are
the issues that have come up with the lateral expansion related to the lining?
Mr. Tanigawa: There are several issues. It is complex. It
involves areas over the existing unlined phase 1 landfill, the side slopes, it involved the
ground water considerations, so you know...
Ms. Yukimura: And the problem we think we are having with
our lining, right?
Mr. Tanigawa: No.
Ms. Yukimura: No?
Mr. Tanigawa: No.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. So if we cannot do lateral expansion, we
might really be in trouble?
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Mr. Tanigawa: We would be in trouble if we could not but based
on our discussions with our Engineers, we feel that it is something that is definitely
obtainable. It will just take time to determine which would be the best options for the
County.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Well we have five (5) years to figure it out
and set it up so we are ready to do lateral expansion in five (5) years.
Mr. Tanigawa: Likelihood it would be before five (5) years. We
will be back here probably for FY 2016.
Mr. Dill: We have five (5) years assuming five (5) years of
vertical expansion lifespan, we have five (5) years to result problems, design it, permit it,
and construct it.
Ms. Yukimura: To be ready to receive waste in five (5) years so
that we are not stuck.
Mr. Dill: Correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright, thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Any further questions for Solid Waste?
Ms. Yukimura: New Landfill and Resource Recovery Park
Development/Acquisition, so this ACOM consultant contract is the one for one point eight
(1.8) million? Is that right?
Mr. Tanigawa: That cost has gone up.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, so...
Chair Furfaro: I am sorry I did not hear your answer.
Mr. Tanigawa: That was the original contract cost.
Ms. Yukimura: What is the present?
Chair Furfaro: What is it now?
Mr. Tanigawa: It since increased to two point two (2.2).
Ms. Yukimura: For what reason?
Mr. Tanigawa: We have had several contract amendments. The
latest...I do not have the sequence of what we added but the latest additions were traffic
studies, expanded scope-of-work for traffic studies for archeological impact assessment,
additions to the special studies to contribute to the EIS.
Ms. Yukimura: Is the roads stuff not tied to the Lihu`e Bypass?
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Mr. Tanigawa: Portions of the routes that we looked at tie into
the bypass.
Ms. Yukimura: Well I hope we are not double paying.
Mr. Dill: No they are not looking at the Lihu`e Bypass as
access to the landfill for this study.
Ms. Yukimura: But is the Lihu`e Bypass not part...going to
encompass whatever is...
Mr. Dill: The Lihu`e bypass if and when is built would be a
reasonable alternate to provide some access to the landfill but at this point we do not know
if the landfill will come first or after it or if the bypass will happen at all. So, the bypass
study is happening on its own merits as a requirement or need to provide a bypass for
transportation in and around Lihu`e. It is certainly considering the landfill as a possible
additional traffic generating but it is a separate issue.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes and I saw that they are proposing urban
growth boundaries in the Lihu`e bypass is outside of the urban growth boundary though
putting the roads out there is going to fuel pressures for growth out there. So, back to this
ACOM contract, can you please provide us all the addendums and the amounts for each?
Mr. Tanigawa: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: And let us not forget...did we not pay half a
million dollars...how much for Special Counsel, was it fifty or five hundred?
Mr. Dill: We will defer that one to the Attorney, I am not
sure what the cost was.
Ms. Yukimura: Staff can we just...we just saw that recently
but...
Chair Furfaro: We just saw that on the reconciliation on an
Executive Session response to me.
Ms. Yukimura: So I just want to know because that is part of the
costs of this Solid Waste project.
Mr. Tanigawa: So should I anticipate a communication coming
over requesting that?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Chair Furfaro: We will take care of that legal question, you can
anticipate the other question.
Ms. Yukimura: Right, the legal question we will take care of but
we want to get the addendum information from you - all the addendums to the one point
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eight (1.8) and the reason for it. Thank you. And you said to have some discussion
anticipated EIS completion not July 2015?
Mr. Tanigawa: That date has been revised to December 2016
anticipated to consider the period of time required...that we anticipate to be required to
complete the wildlife hazard assessment and mitigation plan.
Ms. Yukimura: So that is like a year and a half later that we are
setting back the timetable for the construction of the new landfill?
Mr. Tanigawa: Approximately it takes about twenty (20) to
twenty-four (24) months.
Chair Furfaro: Her comment was that it pushes it back a year
and you are saying that it is twenty (20) to twenty-four (24) months?
Mr. Tanigawa: It will be longer than a year, likely longer than a
year and a half.
Chair Furfaro: It is more than twenty (20) months?
Mr. Tanigawa: That is an estimate right now. We are going to
be getting better information soon on that.
Ms. Yukimura: So, now what is our timetable for needing when
we are going to open the landfill?
Mr. Tanigawa: That timeline is stretched out to...I am trying to
recall, I believe it is going to be stretched out to about 2023 —2024 timeline.
Ms. Yukimura: 2023 — 2024 which right now is nine (9) year to
ten (10) years more? And we have five (5) years from vertical? We are in another crunch.
Mr. Dill: We have always been in a crunch.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay, well we better get that MRF up and get
the diversion so that if we reach zero waste we will have a century to open the new landfill.
Mr. Rapozo: I got the solution but we will not go there right
now. Anymore questions?
Chair Furfaro: Larry, I want to make sure that you understand
and Troy, I want you to know all the adjustments that we are making and the money that
we are spending right now, we are intended to take us out of such a crunch. Okay. Do you
want to revise your statement?
Mr. Dill: No. The lateral expansion, the cell 2, we estimate
it will provide us an additional five (5) years. So, five (5) years of the vertical, five (5) years
to the lateral that will give us ten (10) and then hopefully any increase in waste diversion
will give us a little more buffer to extend that time.
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Chair Furfaro: Could you put that in writing for me please?
Mr. Dill: Certainly.
Chair Furfaro: On a separate response to my question, what is
this whole evaluation of these adjustments and amendments that we are making to the
landfill how do they play out in the critical path? How do I get three (3) years here, five (5)
years here? I would like to see that in writing. Thank you.
Ms. Yukimura: I have a question on NPDES compliance. This is
not for the landfill, this is for transfer stations, I know you talked about it before but can
you refresh my memory? Any leaching or runoff from our transfer stations need an NPDES
permit, is that what it is?
Mr. Tanigawa: Any type of discharge off property will require
you to do secure an NPDES permit.
Ms. Yukimura: So we are working on procurement for bid to
address the Department of Health issues at all transfers stations. So we are going to get a
consultant to help us project the improvements that we need or identify the improvements
that we need to make at our transfer stations.
Mr. Tanigawa: It will help us assess all of our four (4) transfers
stations and help determine best management practices. Any type of improvements that
need to be installed they will help and design and prepare specifications so we can go out to
bid and have construction done. They will also provide construction estimates for us which
we will come back to present to the Council.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Good I am glad that there is this
attention on our transfer stations because they are critical County facilities and I feel like
they have been under the radar but we will need to address it. I know Lyle has been
addressing them but we need to take care of about it. Tim, you just said that Kapa'a has
been much improved - the transfer station?
Mr. Bynum: Tremendously.
Ms. Yukimura: Good. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you. Anymore questions for Solid Waste?
If not, thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: I do have a question. Can I have Keith come up?
KEITH SUGA: Yes, sir.
Chair Furfaro: As the amendments are added to the landfill and
the recovery park and so forth, how are you keeping track on the growth of those projects
without actually having a CIP item that is earmarked for the whole amount? How do you
keep track of that?
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Mr. Suga: I have a similar worksheet that looks kind of
like this but on that particular worksheet I have a column that has encumbered funds and
that is how I keep track of all the amendments and change orders for the various projects.
Chair Furfaro: Okay. That answers my question. Thank you.
Mr. Chock: This actually refers to an earlier comment from
Councilmember Yukimura on the project description is that possible to have this available
to the community as well as an update of these items? Is it already happening?
Mr. Suga: Yes. We do have project descriptions, I just do
not have it on this sheet that is in front of you but it can be certainly incorporated into it.
Mr. Chock: I think it would be great if the community to see
what is happening.
Ms. Yukimura: Councilmember Chock comes with new eyes so
something that we have been dealing with over and over again is not clear to him so that is
where I think even abbreviated project description would help. Actually I was going to ask
for the Chair anticipated, what would really help me is a column that says encumbered.
Mr. Suga: Sure.
Ms. Yukimura: The ones that you already have because that
gives us sort of the context for the specific current things, it gives us some of the history in
terms of, you say it has been encumbered but how much money has been spent for design.
Mr. Suga: Understood. Can do.
Ms. Yukimura: But this is really great so thanks very much it is
like day and night in terms of CIP review for us.
Mr. Suga: Thank you.
Chair Furfaro: I do want to say that I am going to send over
after talking with Scott, we are going to send over a communication to the Fire
Department. They are on next week Tuesday and we need more information from them
about this helicopter facility hanger and we will ask them in advance of their meeting, so
that will not be on one of the questions coming over. If everybody is okay with that we will
actually put it in advance in the Fire Department's question. Larry, you are not going to be
with us this afternoon but your trusty Deputy will be here, so our plan is to do Wastewater
in the afternoon.
Mr. Dill: We actually switch Roads so Roads will be done
in the afternoon as well.
Ms. Yukimura: Oh, I was going to ask about that.
Chair Furfaro: But the main switch we did was Solid Waste and
Wastewater, right?
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Mr. Dill: Yes. Thank you very much.
Chair Furfaro: Thank you, Mr. Rapozo.
Ms. Yukimura: Larry since you are not going to be here as the
Head of all of this, I do want to thank you. It has been much easier CIP review thus far
because of all the good work that you all have done and the format of all the information.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Dill: I appreciate that. I got to credit to where credit
is due Keith is a major part in this whole process.
Mr. Rapozo: Well it is 12:30 and we will be back at 1:30.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 12:28 p.m.
There being no objections, the Committee was called back to order at 1:35 p.m., and
proceeded as follows:
Mr. Rapozo: The format is if you can go through an overview
of all the projects and then we will open up for questions immediately following that.
EDWARD TSCHUPP: Okay thank you, for the record Edward Tschupp,
Chief Wastewater Management Division. We have several projects in various stages of
completion within the Wastewater Division CIP taking them in the order that they are
presented in Keith's spreadsheet. The first one is Coco Palms pump station odor controls.
We are very close to finishing that. There is one more phase of work that is included which
we are going to be going out separately to bid for but the main odor control unit was fired
up about a week to a week and a half ago and I don't know whether anybody has driven by
Coco Palms and noticed a non odor but hopefully that is the case. The remaining work to
be done is to put in a back up carbon unit to that odor control unit and we met with
purchasing on the procurement strategy for that and we will be formatting the carbon unit
installation as a separate bid item. The main unit is in place and up and running at
present.
Second item on the list a package of improvements that we are doing at `Ele`ele
Wastewater Treatment Plant the primary funding here is the State revolving loan funds
and that was bid earlier this fiscal year and awarded and contracted is executed. The
contractor has been doing their various submittal things. There are a lot of equipment
components to that project. The notice to proceed for actual hard construction has been
issued for May 5th
The next three on the list which are Facilities Reserved, island wide scada and
island wide scada are basically one project. They have been allocated to the island wide
scada project although there are actually two contracts; the design engineer has executed
and returned to the County the contract amendment for their services during construction.
The construction contractor which is Glenn Global, an intergrader out of California that
does these kinds of specialty scada systems. They have signed and returned to the County
the contract so it is a waiting county processing so that process should be going pretty
quickly. We are actually looking at notice to proceed date of probably the end of this month
or the beginning of May. So I feel like that has been a long complex process to get to
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procurement and get through procurement and I am very happy to announce that all
contracts are on the verge of being signed by the county.
Flipping over to the next page the next project is a Kahn Highway/Hanamd'ulu
Bridge sewer main replacement and manhole rehabilitation project. This was actually
something that came up through some observations of some deterioration of the sewer pipe
on the bridge the DOT highway bridge in Hanama`ulu. We operationally worked with DOT
highways to have some repair clamps placed on the areas where the pipeline had some
pukas and there still a considerable amount of work that needs to be done here it has been
a staffing issue for the division to actually move that forward beyond the immediate need to
place the repair clamps. We are seeking continuation of the funding so that is something
we can tackle into the next year.
The next project is ... and this allocation is actually design work for further
improvements at Wailua Wastewater Plant. We are currently under construction on about
fifty percent complete with the project that kicked off earlier this fiscal year. There is
another batch construction...this is actually sort of a residual design allocation in the event
that we need to ... the seventeen thousand roughly eighteen thousand dollars sitting in this
account is funds that we anticipate we might need some additional contract change order
for design work.
The new project for this upcoming year is Wailua's Own mixing study is the title
that is used here requesting allocation of five hundred thousand dollars. That is absolutely
one hundred percent driven by our new NPDES permit which was issued it became
effective November 1, 2013. It has in there two fundamental requirements. One of the
things the new permit did was establish ammonia, nitrogen, limitations on our effluent on
what we discharge to the ocean. Those limits are three point five micro grams per liter
which is that is in a part per billion range. I personally don't feel that is achievable and I
also don't agree the health department established that limit properly. So we actually filed
a contested case hearing with the hearing officer with the health department who is the
issuer of the permit but in the mean while we have a permit that we have compliance
schedule is a ten year compliance schedule. Year one is within the first year task one
secure funding to evaluate alternatives to comply with the effluent limits. So that is the
principal area that we need to demonstrate to the health department that even if we don't
agree with the permit we are following it.
The other task that is a new item in the health department permit, the NPDS
permit is that within a three year period and the first mile stone is actually due May 1,
2014 is submit a work plan for another study called a zone of mixing delusion analysis
study. So that is more of a consultant kind of study at this point. The combination of those
two permit requirements we are estimating that we need to allocate the five hundred
thousand dollars that is requested.
Permit compliance work. The final item is the County match for the Waimea R1
distribution system improvement. That contract has been executed and notice to proceed is
in about a week, so we will be sitting down with a consultant.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: I didn't think I had any questions but I forgotten
about this item so just a couple questions. I want to know more about and we have time
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today. I this the only wastewater plant that has discharge so it is the only one affected by
these new regulations?
Mr. Tschupp: Wailua is the only County owned wastewater
plant that has an ocean out fall. The others are either reuse or injection wells as back up.
Mr. Bynum: Go ahead.
Mr. Tschupp: Yes. The answer is yes Wailua is the only one
that is subject to these new set of requirements.
Mr. Bynum: So we have a major reuse project are to water at
the golf course. I don't want this now, but I want to know the history of how much water ...
how that diversion...because that diverts from the out fall right. The more water reuse we
use the less there needs to be discharged, is that correct?
Mr. Tschupp: Yes, and in fact the health department has told
us they think staffs opinion is that we should get to a place where discontinue use of the
ocean out fall and only function as a reuse facility.
Mr. Bynum: Isn't that our goal there in Wailua? I thought
that was our goal.
Mr. Tschupp: It has never been stated as a goal to my
knowledge. The key thing here is that when it rains a lot nobody needs irrigation water.
You got to be able to run the wastewater plant and that is when our flows are the highest so
you got to be able to do something with the water when there are no customers for reuse.
Now that can show up as a surface water impoundment and it will be about a ten million
gallon reservoir so that is one of the options that would be an alternative to an ocean out
fall.
Mr. Bynum: And I think we have space for that in Wailua,
but I don't want to go into detail today and I am just very interested in following up on this
in the future. That's all. I thought our goal was and I think it is but I do want to do some
follow up about how our reuse how that county system is work? Is it working now? Is
parks excepting a large amount of water for the golf course and is (inaudible) all of that.
Mr. Tschupp: Yes. In fact over the last several years we are
discharging to the ocean only approximately every other day I mean on average we show up
with about a hundred and eighty days of ocean discharge some of that is for purposes of
keeping the out fall keeping some flow going to the out fall so it doesn't sand over. Some of
that is to enable us to do the required month...weekly monitoring that we have to do so we
will switch over to the out fall for a day which ends up being two days as far as it's a
twenty-four hour period but it laps over two days.
Mr. Bynum: Again I don't want to delay...we discussed this at
length several years ago you and I and I just want to get an update. We can do that later
thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Councilmember Yukimura.
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Ms. Yukimura: What is the estimate to complete the estimated
cost of completing the zone of mixing study is it five hundred thousand?
Mr. Tschupp: We have included these two as one budget item.
Ms. Yukimura: These two meaning...
Mr. Tschupp: Meaning both the secure funding to evaluate the
alternatives. One of the permit conditions and the other is a zoning of mixing. So there is
two separate permit requirements that are being funded from the same account. The zone
of mixing delusion analysis I have had some discussions with consultants and they have
indicated purely as that part we be looking at a quarter of a million fifty-fifty on the two
components.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. But we could if we did say our goal is to
retire the out fall. We could spend this half a million dollars if we could be sure that we
could accomplish it. If our out fall has only a short life of ten years then we should better
spend the money to figure out how to remove the out fall right?
Mr. Tschupp: That certainly is a I can see the logic there what
we are looking at is a permit requirement saying do this.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes, and that is responsible that you are starting
to move on it. So this limits on ammonium nitrogen to three point five (3.5) micrograms? Is
ammonium nitrate a liquid substance or a gas?
Mr. Tschupp: That would be liquid.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright.
Mr. Tschupp: In this case it would be ammonium nitrogen.
Ms. Yukimura: It is micrograms per, what is the unit?
Mr. Tschupp: Micrograms per liter.
Ms. Yukimura: Just off the top of my head it seems quite
unreasonable so I think it is a good idea that you filed a contest case although I do not know
how much will that costs.
Mr. Tschupp: I do not either.
Ms. Yukimura: I mean do you not have to bring in expert
witnesses or something?
Mr. Tschupp: Yes, I can see where and I have requested the
County Attorney's Office to assist us and I think it would be prudent for us to engage
Special Counsel. I have had discussions with the County Attorney about that and I believe
that there are some specialty consultant client services that are appropriate also.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay.
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Mr. Tschupp: Expert in this type of item...
Ms. Yukimura: And then you said on the average we are
discharging every other day that is we are doing quite a bit of reuse.
Mr. Tschupp: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: But this is R-2 water, if we could go to R-1 level,
the water would be even more valuable?
Mr. Tschupp: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: And places like Aloha Beach Hotel, you would
have to have a distribution system but you could actually have reuse...
Mr. Tschupp: Expansion of the reuse system is certainly one of
the objectives, I think there are a lot of support for, it has been stated as an objective of the
Department of Public Works. Wailua is particularly challenging to try to get to R-1 because
of the amount of property that we have. We only have a limited amount of property and the
plant geometry is configured the way it is and so trying to wedge in a piece of equipment is
a challenge to try to get the proper assembly of things to get to R-1.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright. So, part of the problem is storm waters.
You said that when it rains hard, we have a lot of outflow.
Mr. Tschupp: We do have more outflow when it rains harder.
That is generically referred to as inflow and infiltration (I&I) - infiltration basically.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Tschupp: There is some I&I that we see in the system so
when it rains really hard we do have higher flows. We do not have too much I&I, we have
not seen that much variation from really wet weather to really dry weather. The key point
is that is when the Golf Course does not need irrigation water.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright, I got it. So the thing is and that is good
news that we do not have a lot of I&I because if we did it would mean that our pipes are
aging and from a lot of leakage from outside of the pipes into the pipes when the water
table is high. Our pipes are in high water table in Kapa`a.
Mr. Tschupp: Wailua does have some areas where the pipes
are below the water table.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Because there is this whole issue of aging
pipes and how you are dealing with them but I will not go there right now. That is just a
lot of money. I am looking at this Public Works CIP breakdown, right, and sewers are the
second largest use, right, in this chart? This orange — Wastewater. The green is
Engineering and that is...anyway...and when you look at what percentage of the
population is serves, it is a pretty small percentage. What is the percentage of our
households that are sewer?
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Mr. Tschupp: We have about sixty-five hundred (6,500)
customers so that is...
Ms. Yukimura: Out of thirty thousand — we have about thirty
thousand (30,000) households, so what is it?
Mr. Tschupp: Sixty-five hundred (6,500), That includes
commercial.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Well even if you assume that they are all
residential thirty thousand (30,000) that is about one/fifth, right?
Mr. Tschupp: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: So 1/5 of our island is taking up thirty-one
percent (31%) of our CIP.
Mr. Tschupp: Note that a lot of this allocation, Keith was just
pointing out to me, is one project. Also note that several of our other projects like the
`Ele`ele Project is not really shown in this because it is SRF funded.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Tschupp: So we do have unique situation of having a
separate dedicated source of funds.
Ms. Yukimura: Right and that is so good. The State was very
smart in setting of that. That is the Sewer Revolving Fund, right?
Mr. Tschupp: State Revolving Fund.
Ms. Yukimura: But it is earmarked for Wastewater, right?
Mr. Tschupp: Right.
Ms. Yukimura: Alright. May I go to `Ele`ele?
Mr. Rapozo: Sure.
Ms. Yukimura: We had a couple of spills related to the `Ele`ele
McDonalds but that is not aging infrastructure? Do we have that fixed?
Mr. Tschupp: That particular situation that you are alluding to
that is actually part of the collection system and at that intersection we got the unfortunate
circumstance of a shallow manhole that sits pretty low and so there is not very much space
in the manhole. During really heavy rains, it is right next to the drainage line of the storm
drain and the manhole can overflow and that is what has happened. We looked at possibly
reconstructing that manhole but we have not as of yet done so.
Ms. Yukimura: Turned it into a project.
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Mr. Tschupp: That is correct.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. And it is not related to this `Ele`ele
improvements?
Mr. Tschupp: No. That is at the plant.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rapozo; Anymore questions for Wastewater?
Ms. Yukimura: Mahn Highway Hanama`ulu Bridge sewer main
replacement and manhole, is that the main bridge that goes up to Hanama`ulu? The
Kapaia Bridge?
Mr. Tschupp: If you are on Kuhi`o Bridge and you drop down in
the valley and you are coming up towards Hanama`ulu, there is a bridge there.
Ms. Yukimura: The main bridge?
Mr. Tschupp: It is the main bridge. It is a two (2) lane State
Highways bridge.
Ms. Yukimura: Right.
Mr. Tschupp: It is rather old.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Tschupp: And DOT is looking at started the design process
for replacing the bridge in its entirety so we do not really want to go out and put a brand
new pipe on a bridge that they are going to tear down.
Ms. Yukimura: So our sewer pipe is suspended on that bridge?
Mr. Tschupp: That is correct.
Ms. Yukimura: And it has been leaking?
Mr. Tschupp: Well it had some pukas and it was observed by a
State Highways Inspectors and they called us up and said you got to fix this and we agreed.
So we got some prepare clamps that we put on them.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay but if the State changes or reconstruct the
bridge then that would be the time to really upgrade our pipe?
Mr. Tschupp: Most projects of that nature where the State is
coming in and doing bridge work, part of the package the State needs to address is making
sure that the utility companies are not damaged in their work. So the expectation is that
they would put in new sewer line on the new bridge the same size as what is already there.
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If we wanted to upsize it then they would consider that betterment and they would ask us
to pay.
Ms. Yukimura: Okay. We should get our dibs in on a good
pedestrian access on the bridge when they design it too but if they are following their
multimodal mandate, they will hopefully think about that. I am done.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore questions? Thank you very much.
Roads Division.
Mr. Renaud: I am going to start off on page 8 and I will go
briefly right through. Aliomanu temporary road repair construction — the only thing that
we do there is maintaining the sand bags that get eroded and whatnot and we just waiting
for Engineering on the contract. The next one, Hanapepe/Waimea levee — is ongoing with
the contractor. The grassing and irrigation is looking really great out there but it is not
completed on both levees but it is being done like I mentioned yesterday. At Waimea
Station (inaudible) the main town 5 gate has been replaced. Hanapepe...excuse me, that is
the same. FEMA projects — we have started `Anini and it is ongoing. That is about the
culverts. The next project is Haleilio Road—that is a CMU wall with large boulders that we
are going to replace that at the bridge. The next project — Haleko. This is right up the
street at the mill. This is about a hundred foot of CRM wall that we are going to keep the
embankment from eroding. Page 9, Hauaala Road this is an AC repair — that is all it is.
We completed the removal embankment, completed the embankment fill and the road, and
we just need to put the AC in. The next one is Kaehulua/Apopo which is repair of CMU and
replace AC. It is twenty-five thousand in nature. The next one is Kahuna Road that is a
very large one four hundred thousand, we loss all the pavement out there from the rain and
whatnot and we are going to replace that with a contractor. The next one is Kiowai which
is a small AC swell in the cul-de-sac that we are going to replace. In nature twenty
thousand. The next one is Ohiki Road and this is a head wall repair and AC work out in
Hanalei by the taro patch. The next one is resurfacing various collector road this is one that
Engineering is working on the design and working out and it is a two point one million
project collector roads and as soon as they get completed then we will manage the project.
Wailua emergency bypass improvements — we just do maintenance work there and
maintain potholes and vegetation control. That is it. Questions?
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you, Ed. We are on page 8. Any
questions?
Mr. Chock: `Aliomanu - you talked about the maintenance of
sandbags for the road until it gets — I know it was talked about earlier but when is that
proposed?
Mr. Tabata: We mentioned that we were working with
Department of Hawaiian Homelands.
Mr. Chock: Right.
Mr. Tabata: And an agreement to do work for them so that is
still in negotiation with Engineering.
•
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Mr. Chock: So this nineteen thousand dollars ($19,000) it is
just in terms of maintaining that.
Mr. Tabata: Yes, it is just for them to have some material to
refill sandbags and place. If you go there you will see that they are substantial size bags.
Mr. Chock: Expensive bags —two thousand sandbags?
Mr. Tabata: • Yes.
Mr. Chock: I understand.
Mr. Tabata: And we have a permit to harvest the sand from
the river mouth and then we place the sandbags in place.
Mr. Chock: Thank you.
Mr. Rapozo: Anymore questions?
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Rapozo: Go for it.
Ms. Yukimura: I was looking again at this breakdown and thank
you, Keith, for doing all this work because it does give us an overall view that is helpful. I
guess Engineering has a lot of projects that are...this pie chart shows forty-six percent
(46%) for Engineering projects but they are actually Roads and bridges and seawalls, a
whole mix, right?
Mr. Tabata: Yes.
Ms. Yukimura: So at some point certain of this work gets
allocated to buildings or sewers?
Mr. Tabata: Pretty much all of the...so when Larry and I
came in to Public Works, the Mayor asked us to look at having Public Works touch pretty
much every CIP project for the County. So, a lot of work flows through our Engineering
Division to do the planning and the development and as we mentioned earlier even tried to
do our own in-house designs moving forward. Hopefully that will save the County money
versus sending everything out to consultants.
Ms. Yukimura: I think it will.
Mr. Tabata: That is the strategies to have all of our projects
run through.
Ms. Yukimura: I am not disagreeing with that strategy, in fact, I
think it is fabulous that you have your Building in-house capacity to do in-house designs
and even when you cannot do in-house designs you are just going to have smarter project
managers to oversee a consultant when they do it because you have...you kind of need to
know how to do it if you are overseeing the doing of it.
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Mr. Suga: Just to expand a little bit further the forty-six
percent (46%) for this pie chart what I tried to do is allocate the moneys to the Divisions
that were managing the project. Like you mentioned, Engineering does touch a lot of the
road and bridges and that is comprised within the forty-six percent (46%).
Ms. Yukimura: Yes. So I mean if you were to not do a year
breakdown but instead a project by project breakdown based on categories, some of the
moneys here would move, right? For the picture of this year CIP this is it and I understand
that. Thank you. That is all I have.
Mr. Rapozo: Mr. Bynum.
Mr. Bynum: That says General Fund... I am sorry this is CIP
distribution.
Mr. Suga: Correct.
Mr. Bynum: But it does not include all of the projects so it
should be not looked as a workload pie chart, right, because like Wastewater has projects
that are on here and bikepath that are not on here...
Mr. Tabata: Right.
Mr. Bynum: So, I just want to make that point. This is how
the moneys are going but it should not be seen as a workload distribution chart, right?
Mr. Tabata: Right. Like you mentioned Doug in the Building
Division, does work for Parks in managing the bike project.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Right and you know just a short comment my
observation of watching the County system work in the last four (4) to five (5) years the
level of collaboration is just really inspiring. We are making so much better decisions. So,
the Mayor was right when he said you guys come in and you guys need to be the linchpin
right, and that is why we have Keith, right? That is the history of this, right?
Mr. Tabata: Yes.
Mr. Bynum: Thank you.
Mr. Chock: I have a follow-up.
Mr. Rapozo: Yes, please.
Mr. Chock: Is there an overlap per project in terms of looking
at the costs, since you are touching upon different departments? Per project like
Councilmember Yukimura says that we can look at in the future?
•
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Mr. Suga: Sure. Like a breakdown of road projects versus
bridge projects?
Mr. Chock: Yes, because they are all connected.
Mr. Suga: Sure.
Mr. Rapozo: It is 2:10 p.m. but we are going to stay until 4:30
so...
Mr. Renaud: I got one more project and he bought this up
yesterday and this is about the steel plates on Waipouli Road. I talked to East Kaua`i
people and everything goes good, it supposed to go good, we will be completed the project in
December and not three (3) years.
Ms. Yukimura: I am sorry.
Mr. Renaud: This is the project where someone complained
about steel plates on Waipouli Road for seven (7) years or something.
Ms. Yukimura: Yes.
Mr. Renaud: So, it is going through. The plans come out, I
have talked to Michael, the plans come out this Friday, and then Larry looks at it and
stamps it. It goes back to East Kaua`i, they take it to finalize the funding and then from
there construction or fabrication of the precast culverts will be taking place and then we
will go from there.
Ms. Yukimura: Terrific.
Mr. Rapozo: Thank you.
Mr. Chock: Remember to tell Larry tomorrow.
Mr. Rapozo: I am sure he will find out. He will know.
Ms. Yukimura: I just want to observe that we are finishing early
partly because the presentation has been so well organized and you folks have been so
prepared that it has not been like pulling teeth and it does not give us any excuse to rant
and rave.
Mr. Tabata: Thank you very much. But as Larry Dill pointed
out I want to restress that Keith Suga has been the primary driver of our CIP program
since he came onboard he has done the lion share of the work in pulling of the projects
together. So, credit to Keith.
Ms. Yukimura: Thank you, Keith. It is very evident of your
leadership but it is also very evident that there is a team that is working together here and
like Tim says it is very inspiring and the best outcome is that things are moving and people
are getting their services. From what I hear, like Doug Haigh said today, all the people
working on it feel better too. Thank you.
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Mr. Rapozo: Well what we did today and the Chair asked me
to run the meeting, I asked my staff to keep track of each Councilmembers time
because...just to see how much time each Councilmember had taken. JoAnn has sixty-eight
percent (68%) of the time.
Ms. Yukimura: Well, how about grading the quality of questions?
Mr. Rapozo: That is twelve percent (12%). If there are no
questions or comments, we are in recess.
There being no objections, the Committee recessed at 2:14 p.m.