HomeMy WebLinkAbout05/01/2019 Special Council minutes (C-2019-94, C-2019-95, Res 2019-33) SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING
MAY 1, 2019
The Special Council Meeting of the Council of the County of Kaua`i was called
to order by Council Chair Arryl Kaneshiro at the Council Chambers, 4396 Rice Street,
Suite 201, Lihu`e, Kauai, on Wednesday, May 1, 2019 at 9:48 a.m., after which the
following Members answered the call of the roll:
Honorable Mason K. Chock
Honorable Felicia Cowden
Honorable Luke A. Evslin
Honorable Ross Kagawa (not present at 12:08 p.m.)
Honorable Arryl Kaneshiro
Excused: Honorable Arthur Brun
Honorable KipuKai Kuali`i
APPROVAL OF AGENDA.
Councilmember Kagawa moved for approval of the agenda, as circulated,
seconded by Councilmember Cowden.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there any discussion from the members?
Councilmember Chock.
Councilmember Chock: I understand this is a Special Council
Meeting, but are there "timing" issues on the agenda? Is that why we need to move
on it today?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: If you are looking at the two (2) items, yes, we
did get a rush order on Resolution No. 2019-33 from the Department of Public Works,
and then as far as the audits go, we want to get it out and procured in this fiscal
period, so time was a factor in it.
Councilmember Chock: Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there anyone in the audience wishing to
testify on the agenda?
There being no objections, the rules were suspended to take public testimony.
There being no one present to provide testimony, the meeting was called back
to order, and proceeded as follows:
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 2 MAY 1, 2019
The motion for approval of the agenda, as circulated, was then put, and carried
by a vote of 5:0:2 (Councilmembers Brun and Kuali`i were excused).
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Motion carried. If people want to testify on the
Resolution, I would like them to testify on it at the actual Resolution. I want to get
the audits out, because I know we have some people in the audience here for the
audits and then we can just concentrate on the Resolution after that. Can we go to
the Consent Calendar, please?
CONSENT CALENDAR:
C 2019-94 Communication (04/24/2019) from the Deputy County Engineer,
transmitting for Council consideration, a Resolution Authorizing Speed Cushions On
A Portion Of Weke Road And Amending Section 4 Of Resolution No. 2008-21, Hanalei
District, County Of Kaua`i: Councilmember Chock moved to receive C 2019-94 for
the record, seconded by Councilmember Kagawa.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there anyone in the public wishing to testify
on the Consent Calendar?
There being no objections, the rules were suspended to take public testimony.
There being no one present to provide testimony, the meeting was called back
to order, and proceeded as follows:
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there any discussion from the members?
The motion to receive C 2019-94 for the record was then put, and carried by a
vote of 5:0:2 (Councilmembers Brun and Kuali`i were excused).
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Motion carried. Next item.
COMMUNICATION:
C 2019-95 Communication (04/25/2019) from Council Chair Kaneshiro,
transmitting for Council consideration to conduct Performance Audits on the
following:
• Kaua`i Fire Department: Managerial Issues;
• Department of Public Works — Roads Division: Operational Readiness
& Implementation of the General Excise Tax (GET) Surcharge;
• Disaster Related Funding: Procurement and Award; and
• Department of Public Works — Solid Waste Division: Operational and
Managerial Issues.
Councilmember Kagawa moved to approve C 2019-95, seconded by
Councilmember Chock.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 3 MAY 1, 2019
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I will give a brief overview on the audit and the
audit process. It has been the privy on the Administration side and the Mayor has
mentioned many times about him wanting to proactively pursue audits. On the Council
end, we have always had an audit budget and it has been our privy to actually go out
and do some audits. I think this was the result of that. We received some information
from the Administration on what they wanted to see audited, the Council has a whole
spoke about things we wanted to see audited, and we came up with this list of four (4)
items to audit. I believe the process is, if we approve it here, then we go out for
procurement, we will see what the pricing is, what our budget is, and then we will make
a decision. If we have the money and want to go ahead with four (4) audits, we will go
ahead with four (4) audits, if we do not have the money for it, then we will decide what
our top priority is. Do we have any questions from the members? Councilmember
Chock.
Councilmember Chock: Just in light of the "shared interests" between
the Administration and the Council on some of these items, has there been any
discussion with the Administration about how it is going to be run? Is it going to be
completely separate from their approach? I am just curious as to if there is an overlap
or not.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I think there is an overlap because in the
information they sent us, I believe three (3)of these were things that the Administration
was interesting in auditing also. But as far as the audit process goes, we are going to
be running the process, we are going to be procuring, we are going to be finding the
auditors, and then the auditors will be on their own asking the Administration the
questions based on the scope.
Councilmember Chock: Are we to expect the Administration to run
their separate internal audit on these items concurrently?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I do not think they are going to be running a
separate internal audit. I think they are going to be basing their decisions on the audit
that is going to come out of this. Councilmember Kagawa.
Councilmember Kagawa: I would hope that the Administration would
see this going and would not do another audit on their own on the same thing. I
guarantee that would draw criticism.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes, and...
Councilmember Kagawa: It is no secret that for me the top priority would
be the Fire Department and the spiking. There is already evidence to prove from the
Employees' Retirement System (ERS) that spiking has occurred and I have an example
I want to show to the members and the public of the evidence that I speak. I am not
talking about accusations; I am talking about actual evidence as provided by another
agency, ERS. I will show you some of that information and will tell you why that is my
number 1. Like you said, if the Administration agrees with the other three (3),
no-brainer, we should get those done. It is mutually agreed upon. This is what the ERS
has come up with. The row you want to look at is the "Non-Base Pay." It is the second
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 4 MAY 1, 2019
to the last column to the right. In the spiking years, this employee in 2016 to 2017, he
got seventy-two thousand eight hundred twenty-four dollars ($72,824)in Non-Base Pay.
That was his last year of his employment. The year before that, he received fifty-one
thousand four hundred thirty-four dollars ($51,434). The year before that, the first of
his high-three year, he got fifty-six thousand eighty-four dollars ($56,084). This is the
evidence I spoke of, if you go to the next box, it shows his previous years. If you look at
Non-Base Pay, the fourth year before he retired, sixteen thousand dollars ($16,000); if
you look at the year before that, nineteen thousand dollars ($19,000); if you look at the
year before that,thirty-one thousand dollars ($31,000), so I mean, if that is not evidence,
I do not know what is. Okay, let us go to the next employee. Something is wrong.
Something is really wrong. Again, this comes from ERS and not me. They sent us a big,
fat two point whatever million dollar bill to the Fire Department, which they somehow
found in their budget, which they told me in the previous year that there is no fat. What
does "no fat" mean? There is no excess. But they found two point whatever million to
pay for their mistake. That angers me. This is another employee. Fifty-eight thousand
seven hundred twelve dollars ($58,712) on the last year of his employment. The year
before that, forty-four thousand three hundred forty-nine dollars ($44,349); the year
before that, fifty-four thousand one hundred thirty-one dollars ($54,131). Look at the
fourth year...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: It is only partial year.
Councilmember Kagawa: Okay, so if you look at the year before that,
though, the fourth year, fifteen thousand dollars ($15,000); the year before that, eight
thousand dollars ($8,000); the year before that, twenty-nine thousand dollars ($29,000).
Hit me with a sledgehammer, I do not know what is going on. Okay, thank you, I am
done.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Are there any further questions from the
members? Again, this was a collaborative process and I do not think it happened before
where we actually got input from the Administration on what things they wanted to be
audited. We looked at that, we came up with our own list, and decided on items that we
wanted to move forward on. Three (3) of these items are items that we had in common
with the Administration. I will take public testimony. Is there anyone in the audience
wishing to testify on this?
There being no objections, the rules were suspended to take public testimony.
There being no one present to provide testimony, the meeting was called back
to order, and proceeded as follows:
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there any final discussion? Scott, is the
Mayor on his way? Councilmember Kagawa.
Councilmember Kagawa: My final discussion to this is that I think the
audit on the Fire Department, at least, needs to tell us; what went wrong, who did
wrong, and what we can do from here. I think that to some point some fraud has been
committed. I look to you, County Attorney, can we get some money back? I am very
concerned about the arrogance that was committed because I was hard on them for
•
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 5 MAY 1, 2019
six (6) years and this still happened. That is total arrogance when that happens.
There is no respect to the taxpayers, zero. It is very frustrating.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I believe what is going to come out of the audit
is they are going to identify processes that need to be in place to prevent it from
happening in the future. I know that Kilipaki Vaughan has given us a lot of ideas in
the budget meetings on how he plans to try and address it, but ultimately the audit
will be a good tool to use as far as trying to curb types of activities like spiking and
really give us a better handle on how to control overtime, control rank-for-rank, and
things like that. I think the four (4) things that we are auditing makes perfect sense.
We have the Fire Department with the spiking and overtime, which we saw two
million four hundred thousand dollar ($2,400,000) bill come in just recently. The
Department of Public Works, Road Division, as we have General Excise Tax (GET)
money coming in, it only makes sense for us to audit the Department, make sure that
we are ready and able to spend the money that is going to be coming in, in an efficient
and effective way. It is a lot more money than we had in the past and I think it is up
to us to make sure that we are ready, prepared, and we spend it wisely and we spend
it on roads, bridges, and work that needs to get done, and have a good priority on it.
As far as the Disaster Related Funding: Procurement and Award, again, this is
something we heard before. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
has taken money back from counties. I know when we were at the National
Association of Counties (NACo), I believe when Florida and Louisiana had flooding,
FEMA actually took money back when counties did not follow the proper procedures,
and that is the last thing we want to happen. It is just making sure that as we are
spending this money and going through the process, we have dotted all our "i's" and
crossed all our"t's" on it. As far as the Department of Public Works goes, it is a heavily
subsidized Department, our Solid Waste Division. The revenue does not come close
to meeting the expenses and it is just a matter of looking at how we improve the
process, what we can do, and is there any waste that is occurring along the way. I
think this is a good start and the last audits we did was the Kaua`i Humane Society
Audit, maybe a couple years ago, and prior to that, I do not know I think all the audits
were prior to me; over five (5) or six (6) years ago. I think it is a welcome sight. Is
there any more discussion from the members? Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: I just want to say because I had gotten some
inquiry, this challenge on these has come over the years to not only this Council, but
even more specifically to Councils prior. This is not just a fresh request or complaint.
I had someone ask about that and this is cumulative. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes, a lot of the information that we got from
the audits, we see people at Costco, they tell us things, it comes from all over the
place. The Administration recognizes some things that they wanted to look into. On
our side, we hear things just being out in the community and that is where it comes
from. With that, I do have a note that the Mayor wants to come over and make a
quick statement on the audits. I am going to take our ten-minute caption break right
now and then when we come back, hopefully the Mayor will be here, he can do his
final statement on the audits, we will vote, and we will move on to our final item.
There being no objections, the Council recessed at 10:04 a.m.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 6 MAY 1, 2019
The meeting was called back to order at 10:17 a.m., and proceeded as follows:
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Welcome back. I will suspend the rules; the
Mayor is here. Right now, we are still on the audits.
There being no objections, the rules were suspended.
DEREK S.K. KAWAKAMI, Mayor: Good morning, Council. Council
Chair, thank you so much for the opportunity to speak on these audits. My name is
Derek Kawakami, Mayor of the County of Kaua`i, for the record. I want to say first
and foremost, thank you for allowing this to happen. I do know being a former
Councilmember that it is extremely hard to do audits when you have an
administration that is resistant to it because it automatically becomes "the council
wants to go on a witch-hunt, the council wants to micromanage." In this case, I would
like the people of Kaua`i and Ni`ihau to know that this is a joint venture to make sure
that we are giving a good service and that we are building the very best organization
that we possibly can. We cannot do it on our side of the fence solely and so we are
going to need your assistance. Therefore, I really want to thank you for allocating
some money and appropriations to get these audits done. I want to also mention that
for our Administration on our side of the street, do not be afraid of this audit. It is
going to be inconvenient because you are going to have outside people that are going
to be engaged in our operation. This is by no means a way for us to identify "bad"
people. This is just to identify where we are strong and tell us where we are weak, so
we can improve on those weaknesses, take a look at any opportunities and threats,
this is a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) analysis. For a new Mayor, a new
organization, and administration, this is key for us to be able to improve on our
operation. This is what we want to do, so I want to thank you.
There are four (4) audits that you folks are asking for. We can support all of
them. Quite frankly, we sent over a list of six (6) audits that, in my opinion, were
potentially more scathing, they were in my opinion. We were asking for an audit on
salary spiking and there are some overlay. You folks are asking for an audit on the
Kaua`i Fire Department (KFD) and let us be upfront, the issue with KFD is the
concerns with pensions and spiking; let us call it for what it is. We were taking a look
at a broader scope across the entire County because it is not just KFD. We are seeing
this type of ways where we can improve across all departments, but if this is the wish
of the Council, we can agree; we can start from there.
We asked for a parks and buildings maintenance audit, because we had a
number of complaints on parks and buildings. It may not be included on this
go-around, but like I said, perhaps every single year, together we can work on a list
of where we want to improve. Even though not all six (6) of our audits are included
on this list, hopefully we can get to them on our next budget cycle because we really
want to take a deep dive into some of these things, such as hiring practices, as well.
Here is another common denominator that we have. We definitely want to audit the
Department of Public Works, Roads Division to see if we have the mechanism in place
and the policies and procedures to spend this GET surcharge that we are going to be
getting. We made a commitment to our constituents that we are going to spend this
money to address the condition of our roads and we are going to be held accountable
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 7 MAY 1, 2019
and this audit is going reveal what we have in place, if it is sufficient or if there are
areas we need to work on. Also, Disaster Related Funding: Procurement and
Award—with the recent floods in April and Hurricane Lane, it was madness and
there was a rush to recover. We were under the impression that we were going to get
audited anyway, either through FEMA or through the State because they threw a
whole bunch of resources our way. We were assuming that we are going to get
audited, so being that you folks want to do an audit as well, the more the merrier. We
want to make sure that we are operationally sound when it comes to this type of
disaster recovery because it is going to happen again. At some point in time, we are
going to be hit with another disaster and so if we made mistakes along the way, let
us learn those mistakes, we are human. Last but not least, Solid Waste. It is not
secret that we want to improve on our operations in the Solid Waste Division, and so
for these four (4), we think you folks did a great job and we eagerly await. You can
count on our cooperation with these audits. Our department heads will be ordered to
cooperate fully, to not put up any resistance, and that is why it is very important for
me to tell our one thousand two hundred (1,200) or so associates out there to not be
afraid of this process, this is by no means a way for us to go on a witch-hunt, but these
are necessary to any big organization. Any big organization, this is a key tool. Finally,
we are going to be embarking on new grounds by fully cooperating with each other
and you can count on our support and our full cooperation as we go through this
process. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Thank you. Councilmember Kagawa.
Councilmember Kagawa: Thank you for your cooperation and I think it
makes it so much easier for us that you are working together with us on this.
Regarding the Disaster Related Funding from FEMA, does FEMA already do an
audit? They may initially award, but do they not...I know that federal government is
pretty strict with guidelines. They may give you it, but then after that, they may bill
you back if they find that you did not go (inaudible). I am thinking, why would we
audit knowing that we could be shooting our own self in the foot? What purpose...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: That one actually came from the Council.
Councilmember Kagawa: Oh.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: That was actually one from the Council.
Councilmember Kagawa: Oh, okay. Whose idea was that? I am just
kidding. Okay, you do not need to answer that because it is ours.
Mayor Kawakami: Thank you.
Councilmember Kagawa: Do you have the same concern?
Mayor Kawakami: We are concerned about redundancy. We do
know that we are limited on the amount of resources, but we do not know at this
point. At the State-level, we were under the assumption that because the State had
appropriated twenty-five million dollars ($25,000,000), that is no drop in the bucket,
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 8 MAY 1, 2019
that at some point, they were going to take a look through our books to make sure
that if they could call back anything, because they are under extreme pressure to
balance their budget as well right now. We were under the impression that any
opportunity to claw back any money that they gave to us through error or mistakes,
that they were going to do it; we were under the gun and under the impression
from the very beginning that they were going to go through our operation with the
fine-tooth comb to make sure all of our "i's" were dotted and all of our "t's" were
crossed. As far as FEMA, they have an extensive policy and procedure in place, but
like I said, for me this is new ground and so it is just going to make us stronger if we
audit the Disaster Related Funding, but yes, we were concerned at first at some
redundancy, but after we thought about it, it is going to be necessary because like I
said, it is not a matter of if, but it is just when we are going to get hit by another
disaster. We want to make sure that the next time we are prepared and our chance
of making any type of human error is less than that. We really think this is going to
help us.
Councilmember Kagawa: Okay. Yes, redundancy is a concern. I want to
make my concern noted that I think that the state and federal government conducts
audits in itself called "internal audits" on grants that they give. That may be already
being performed. Part of the Fire Department audit, I did not want to just say
"spiking" because I wanted it to be "managerial issues," because I want the audit to
look at overtime and vacation. Let me just play a scenario. If someone takes vacation
or sick leave, someone has to cover you on overtime. I am wondering if you work it
out where someone covers you then theoretically by...you are legally allowed and a
"sick" can be a sore throat, it can be something you do not want to spread to other
men that if you have a lot of this going on where you are sick or have vacation.
Basically, when you are supposed to work, you are sick or on vacation and when you
do work, you are working on overtime because you are covering someone who is the
same. Is that going on? That is what I want the audit to check. Then, what do the
auditors recommend as a solution because I know we have mandates where we can
operate with as low as three (3) people, but are we choosing to go with five (5) all the
time? That may be a solution. For instance, you put pressure on the people that,
"Hey, every time you take vacation or sick leave, does not mean someone is
automatically going to work for you." The crew there will suffer because of your
absence. As a team, they will say, "We need to reduce the amount and if our throat
is a little bit sore, we are still going to show up for work because we do not want to
short-hand the other people." That is where I am looking for solutions. How can you
cut down a little bit and then that way, you leave less leeway for indirect or direct
spiking?
Mayor Kawakami: Sure. Thank you for that. Like I said before,
it is an issue statewide. The state departments have been wrestling with overtime
and increased pension cost with the Department of Public Safety. It is well-known, it
has been well-documented that in the Department of Public Safety, you will see a
spiking in overtime that coincides with the Super Bowl and what we are trying to say
is that this is certainly not just a concern for one particular department, but from our
side, I wanted to get a good grasp countywide as to see where we can manage better
because you made an interesting point about it is "legal." What is legal and what is
right often times are two (2) different things. Legal is a baseline of what we are
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 9 MAY 1, 2019
allowed and not allowed to do, but doing the right thing adds a different layer of
integrity and we want to make sure that we are doing the right things and not just
the legal things. But this is a good start, Vice Chair. This is a good start and like I
said, further down the road, we appreciate the Council's ability to drill down and get
focused because we gave you folks a broad overview of what we would like to see and
based on what we sent out, you folks were able to drill down on what you priorities
are. So, you can count on our full cooperation as we go through that process.
Councilmember Kagawa: Thank you. I just want to note for the record
that I did not get this type of support from the previous Mayor. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: I want to thank you and we are really
appreciative that we are working together. From my understanding when we were
looking at a narrower look to begin with...the key thing is theirs to begin with. We
thought we would go for the low-hanging fruit and so we would be looking where we
would likely to find the bigger numbers and make sure our process is good because
we will either have to be contracting someone and we are still in the process of looking
for an auditor, so these will probably be contracts. We were not in any way not
respecting the breath of what you were suggesting, we are just going more narrow. If
I remember correctly on the Disaster Related Funding, one of the thoughts was as if
we looked at it, we would be more prepared in dealing with when other lenders or the
grantors were giving it. So, that was a part of it that it is working with you and not
against you.
Mayor Kawakami: Absolutely. We take this as in no way, shape,
or form as anything other than we are all trying to improve our organization; our
people deserve it.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I can definitely assure you that we took all of
your six (6) into consideration, but we thought we should prioritize and maybe not
put six (6) audits on in one fiscal period. It will take time away from your offices and
your workers, so we thought let us do four (4) and let us also see how much money we
have in our budget, what these audits come out to, and then next year we will have a
better idea of the audit's average may be x amount of dollars, so we can do so much.
How does it go on the workload for your Administration? We do not just want to fully
bombard all of them and then they are just concentrating on an audit when they have
all this other work to do, so those were the considerations and we are definitely going
to keep your other considerations in our pocket for next year when we have a
discussion again. The whole plan was to try and get something done in this fiscal
period and we will look at it again next fiscal period, there may be new audit items,
new big ticket items that we may want to look at, and again, the plan is to work
collaboratively with you, just keep moving, and try to get our process better to
improve the County.
Mayor Kawakami: Our Department Heads are probably under
their breath saying, "The Council was nicer to us than our own Mayor," because like
I said, our list is pretty potentially scathing, but I want to say this is not about
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 10 MAY 1, 2019
scathing. I am going to remind our people this is not out there to expose anyone or to
take anyone's job away. Look, we all have to develop. As we move forward, it is a
constant evolution of how we can be better servants to the public and this is all that
it is. It is an outside view into our organization that is going to make really good
recommendations. Some of them, I am sure we are going to be able to implement,
some of them might be more challenging and more time consuming, but we are
looking for low-hanging fruit and then the long-term improvement plan for all of us.
Like I said, the Council has a tremendous tool as far as having the ability to form
that audit committee, our Finance Director has the ability to work with you folks as
well, and yes, I am excited because this is something new. I am a little bit nervous,
too. I would be lying to say that I am sitting up here saying that we are not going to
find anything, because we will, but that is the purpose of it. I do have some butterflies
in my stomach as to what we are going to find and then, how am I going to fix this
thing? Some things are hard to fix in this County. Often times, the right decision is
not popular, but in this case, I think this is a great first step and we came here to just
say thank you to everyone for making this to the top priority as well.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Thank you, Mayor. Is there any final
discussion from the members? Are there any further questions for the Mayor?
Councilmember Kagawa.
Councilmember Kagawa: I think Maui County Councilmember Mike
White did an audit on Maui's Fire Department and he said that the audit brought out
some issues, but he said that the Administration and under Mayor Arakawa, no steps
were taken to correct. I do not know if it is just continuing, so I am wondering because
the Fire Commission oversees KFD. Is there any chance...because I talked to a
member of the Fire Commission and he asked, "Why are you saying these things; are
there problems," and I responded, "Yes, I can show you the reports." Basically, they
have no clue that they had that two point whatever million dollar bill that they paid
out of the Fire budget and I was just wondering if we want them to get a little bit
more involved in trying to help as a volunteer body to help? To me, to help provide
cover to the chief when he makes some new moves to try to correct or do you think it
is their role to just give out certificates or whatever?
Mayor Kawakami: No. I think the precedent has been set very
clear. During the last Administration, you folks may recall there was a little
disagreement as to who had jurisdiction over the police chief and it became very clear
that the commission's role is to oversee the performance, the hiring, the retention,
and the disciplinary action of the police chief. Therefore, we are reading that per
Charter the same relationship holds true with commission appointed departments.
Our Fire Commission has been extremely engaged with the performance of the Fire
Chief and then the hiring of the new Fire Chief as well. This is going to be another
tool for them to see and they can further analyze the performance of the new Fire
Chief coming in based on some of what is going to be identified and then them setting
benchmarks to see how some of these issues can be addressed as well. So, yes, we are
expecting them to do their job and they have been.
Councilmember Kagawa: I totally agree. As far as their performance as
long as I have been on the Council, their performance on the job is outstanding. I have
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 11 MAY 1, 2019
no qualms about that. What I have is spending more than they should; that is
basically it. Are they spending more than they should? That question has not been
answered for me and those reports do not make their case look good either, that I just
showed earlier on the ERS bill that they gave them. Yes, hopefully we can get the
Fire Commission a little bit more involved because like I said, I find it kind of
dumfounding that when the Commissioner told me he did not know anything of what
I was talking about. Thank you.
Councilmember Evslin: Thank you for coming today. This process has
been great. I think it is great to see your willingness and I think we have worked well
collaboratively in trying to determine the range of these audits. I hope the
department heads are going to be receptive to this. One thing that I have been a little
bit surprised and I guess as a new Councilmember especially as we go through budget
is how little performance matrix we have to gauge how well each department is doing.
For instance, what condition our roads are in based on some objective measure or
average response time for the Fire Department and things like that, that we can
gauge performance year-to-year and really base their budgeting off that. Whether it
is through a county auditor or whether it is through internal metrics, I just hope that
we can move in that position of more sort of...I think the data is all there, it is just
compiling it and communicating it.
Mayor Kawakami: Councilmember, we look forward to working
with you. I am an operations man coming from a grocery business and so we do set
tangible benchmarks. Say for example, the amount of time to process permits, how
long does it take for someone to address a customer at the counter? One of the pet
peeves that I have is when, as a customer, I am at the counter and then there is an
associate that is busy and they failed to just say, "Hey, Councilmember, I will be with
you, let me wrap up this phone call." It is little things and we are returning this to a
customer service oriented type of organization, so yes, you bring up a good point, we
should have tangible benchmarks. We are going to include that, we look forward to
working with the Council, because you hear it, too. You are the voice of the people,
this is the people's council, so people come to you with priorities and we expect you
folks to give,us that input and see where we can collaborate as well. As far as the
comment on, "We are hoping that department heads are going to cooperate." it is a
direct order. Therefore, any non-cooperation would be insubordination and then we
will just go through the disciplinary action as well. We are telling our department
heads that this is not optional, this is mandatory to cooperate because if we resist, it
is going to be more expensive. We are wasting people's time. We have a job to do, too.
This is going to slow the process down though, people need to realize that whenever
you have an audit, it is going to slow things down a bit, just by the nature that you
are going to have someone asking our staff for information and people are going to
have to drop what they are doing. Therefore, there is going to be somewhat a potential
for disruption in service, a slowdown in service, but in the end, that minor
inconvenience should have a better product at the end of the day. We will cooperate;
it is not an option; it is mandatory.
Councilmember Evslin: I appreciate that. I meant in more of, "I hope
everyone can see it as a good thing." In my own business, we have to do internal
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 12 MAY 1, 2019
financial audits all the time for insurance and it is a pain to do it, but it is always
good in the end because you reveal things you did not know.
Mayor Kawakami: Yes, let us be honest about it, people are not
going to like it. Everyone wants something new, but everyone hates change. This is
definitely going to be a change, so not everyone will be saying that this is great, but
it is what it is. We are running a business.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Chock.
Councilmember Chock: I guess I will add my comments in now since
the Mayor is here. I want to thank you also for being here and for your comments in
relation to how we can collaborate together. I am very pleased with the list that not
only the Council has come up with, but seeing the alignment with what your Office
has submitted and so I am looking forward to that collaboration. I think the idea of
continuous improvement is really what we are all talking about and having that type
of spirit within the county government is really important to instill, so I think we are
taking the first step in that direction with this type of approach to how we are looking
introspectively. I would only add that I think when we looked and talked about these,
certainly our, for instance as we talked about the Disaster Related Funding for the
flood and so forth, certainly financial in nature, but even more so an aspect of
performance is key here. For instance, how can we better manage funding because
we know it is so limited when it comes in? There are so many lessons from the April
floods that we know how we might be able to spread the funding more even locally to
ensure that we can get the work done that is necessary at the frontend. I am looking
at those improvements. I think the process improvement takes time and that without
us actually creating the space for process improvement to occur, it will not occur. The
audits are an excuse for me to try and do that, but culturally speaking, I think that
if we can instill that it comes from within, eventually everyone no matter at what
level, department head all the way down to the lay-worker are looking for
opportunities to improve—it will be a much better organization. Thank you.
Mayor Kawakami: You watch, it is going to identify some really
good workers. Audits always do that. One of the best things out of every audit, they
will come out and say, "Man, this person is...we should take a notebook from
whatever they are doing," and I am really excited about that component of it.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Are there any further questions for the
Mayor? If not, thank you. Is there any final discussion from the members?
Councilmember Kagawa.
The meeting was called back to order, and proceeded as follows:
Councilmember Kagawa: I just want to clarify my comment about the
previous Mayor. What I meant was that I have been hounding him in the past about
some of the problems that I have seen regarding the budgeting, regarding Fire and
Police, and I think for me not only in this meeting here, but I had meetings with our
Mayor. He has the same attitude as me, which is we are equal opportunity
employment and we need to be the leader in how employees are treated. If one person
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 13 MAY 1, 2019
gets to get the benefit of the spike, all county employees should all have that same
ability and if not, then no one should get it. Reasonable overtime is great and fine,
but deliberate spiking and those types of practices, this Mayor and myself, we fall in
the same line. We have to eliminate the nonsense and I think we would all be at a
happier place. We have to be the leader. This County has to be the leader in showing
that we treat everyone equally, fairly, and if you break the rules on that, then there
will be consequences because we need to be the leader. We cannot allow nonsense
going on without us doing something about it. It took seven (7) years on this Council
and if my big mouth saves this County one million dollars ($1,000,000) in the end a
year, then I did my job and it was definitely worth my pay. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there anyone else? Councilmember
Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: I want to say that I am thankful that we are
going to be working together. Even when we are looking at the budget, I think this
audit will help in a number of ways in setting a baseline, too. I am excited about our
potential improvement with our six million dollars ($6,000,000) worth of software
upgrades, having Human Resources (HR) be able to be much more effective. I think
we are going to be having the opportunity to eliminate the number of the challenges,
so between a strong look and then some plans behind it to improve and the audible
help, we would be able to identify some challenges. I feel very enthusiastic about our
team and people, and people can shift and change if we need to. I am appreciative of
what is happening.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Evslin.
Councilmember Evslin: I am optimistic that this is going to result in
some good things. I think there is that famous study where they started measuring
performance or looking at how light impacted performance in a factory. Whether if
they increased the brightness of the light and then performance improved, but then
they realized when they decreased the brightness of the light, performance still
improved. It had nothing to do with the light, it was just the fact of measuring
performance and I think that this is going to only help when we are looking at
processes and people know that they are being paid attention to, the performance will
improve. But I also think that it has to be continual, right. We need continual
performance metrics and we need continual audits of this sort, so I am kind of
optimistic.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there anyone else?
The motion to approve C 2019-95 was then put, and carried by a vote of 5:0:2
(Councilmembers Brun and Kuali`i were excused).
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Motion carried. Next item, please.
RESOLUTION:
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 14 MAY 1, 2019
Resolution No. 2019-33–RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING SPEED CUSHIONS
ON A PORTION OF WEKE ROAD AND AMENDING SECTION 4 OF
RESOLUTION NO. 2008-21, HANALEI DISTRICT, COUNTY OF KAUAI:
Councilmember Kagawa moved for adoption of Resolution No. 2019-33, seconded by
Councilmember Cowden.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Administration, do you have a presentation or
a map on this? We will get a brief description on it and then we will take public
testimony after that. I will suspend the rules.
There being no objections, the rules were suspended.
MICHAEL MOULE, Chief of the Engineering Division: Good morning,
Chair and members of the Council. My name is Michael Moule, Chief of the
Engineering Division, Public Works, for the record. Just briefly to talk about what
this Resolution is intended to do. As stated in the Resolution and in the memorandum
that we sent in response to Councilmember Cowden's request about this issue, there
is an existing resolution that specified the use of speed tables on Weke Road. A bit of
other history—there is a County ordinance that allows speed humps, which I will
describe briefly. They are twelve (12) to fourteen (14) feet long, three (3) inches high
on residential streets, but they are not allowed on collector roads, per the County
ordinance. I was not here when the ordinance passed, but that was most likely due
to national guidance and recommendations that say that for collector roads where
you have higher volumes of traffic and you have emergency responders, fire trucks
and others and potentially buses on some collector roads, you typically would not
want to have a speed hump that affects these larger vehicles. It makes them slow
down very much, especially fire equipment and the jostling it has for the trucks, and
that is why speed humps are not typically allowed on collector roads, I believe in the
County ordinance. The decision was made in 2008, the old resolution, to install speed
tables, which are typically longer than speed humps. They are typically twenty (20)
to twenty-two (22) feet long and have a flattop on the top, so there is a ramp and then
a flattop. They have less effect on all vehicles, actually, because everyone goes a little
faster over the speed table than they would over a hump, but has less effect on fire
trucks and other emergency responders as well. They are more acceptable on collector
roads, which Weke Road is a collector road. The resolution that we proposed, I am not
going to read the entire thing, but essentially it is modifying one section of the 2008
Resolution to authorize the Department of Public Works to install either speed tables
or speed cushions. The reason why we did it that way as opposed to just going straight
to speed cushions is because right now, we a project due to repairs on Weke Road
from the flood of last year. We have the need to replace one of those old speed tables
that was in the area and was damaged. We are resurfacing that area and we plan to
put one speed cushion in there now. We do want to replace the other rubber speed
tables in the future, but are not doing that right away. After consulting with the
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 15 MAY 1, 2019
County Attorney, as we always do on resolutions, they suggested writing this
language giving us the authority to do either one.
Just to briefly go through sort of why we are recommending the option for speed
cushions. First, I will start by saying the rubber speed tables that are out there, as
far as it is physically made out of rubber is a problem, and we do not intend to install
any future devices on this road where it is sandy like this that are made out of rubber
or temporary that can be bolted onto the pavement. Whether we replace the rubber
speed tables with speed tables or speed cushions, we intend to install them where the
road is concrete pavement, and the new portion is being reconstructed now, or an
asphalt pavement surface. We could simply replace the rubber speed tables with
asphalt speed tables under the existing resolution, but we are recommending speed
cushions for a couple reasons. One, they are even better than speed tables for
emergency response. Let me go ahead and show the difference here. I will keep
talking while he is putting the slide up. My apologies for not letting your staff know
that we are going to be projecting this.
This is from the memorandum that we sent to you all in response to
Councilmember Cowden's request. This shows the typical speed hump profile,
fourteen (14) feet long, it could be shorter, twelve (12) feet and three (3) inches high.
Speed table, a much longer—twenty-two (22) feet total with a typically about a six (6)
foot ramp and a ten (10) foot flat part in the middle. Because it is longer and flatter,
it affects all traffic less, including the larger vehicles. This is a picture of a speed
cushion. I do not have the profile, but I can give you that data, specifically though.
The idea behind a speed cushion, the major way that it is different from a speed hump
or speed table is that it has a cut down the middle. It is split, essentially, so the span
between the wheels of a fire truck, the horizontal distance on a fire truck between the
wheels, when they drive over the middle of this, their wheels are largely span this, so
they do not have to slow down very much. Their outside wheels will roughly be outside
of the speed cushion and the inside wheels will touch the edges of it—they do not have
to slow down very much. But because most passenger vehicles are narrower than
that, they have to slow down. The other really important thing to note and I am not
showing it here, but the length of the speed cushion is more like twelve (12) feet, so
it is a shorter device in length with a more abrupt ramp than a typical speed hump.
If you had this same device all the way across, it would be the slowest of all—probably
too slow. The reason that you need to do that is because of the way it was designed,
even a passenger car is going to have...if they travel down the middle of it, will have
wheels potentially on the sloped portion and not on the very top of the hump of the
cushion because it is mounted in all directions, right. If a driver says, "I do not want
to drive straddling it down the middle, I am going to drop two (2) wheels on the right
side," where that gap is, you see the picture, or two (2) wheels on the left side and
cross the center line or drive the wheels down the centerline, I am going to try to drive
only one wheel going over the top. Because it is shorter in length along the road and
a more abrupt up-and-down, even with one wheel over that speed cushion, it slows
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 16 MAY 1, 2019
them down a lot more than it would if there was nothing there. National research on
speed cushions...there is one major study that was done by the Federal Highway
Administration or posted on their website, at least, that compared speed humps. It
had what I would call speed tables or what was defined in that study is twenty-two
(22) foot speed humps, that is more like a speed table profile and speed cushions. It
found that the actual travel speeds over the speed cushions were much closer to the
speed humps for the average vehicles, the total population of vehicles traveling over
those devices. The travel speeds over the twenty-two (22) foot speed hump in that
study, what I would call a speed table, were much higher than that. We actually feel
that this not only is better for emergency vehicles, but would actually result in a
slower overall speed profile than a traditional twenty-two (22) foot asphalt speed
table. That is the reason we are recommending it. We think it is the best of both
worlds and will solve the speeding problem better than a speed table while still
making it the easiest for fire trucks, the primary emergency response vehicles or
ambulances to travel over the device and get down the road to Black Pot Beach Park
or other destination they need to respond to on Weke Road.
That is the summary of where we are. We have talked to some residents that
have concerns about speed cushions and if there are questions after they have made
their comments, I will be glad to try to answer them. I do not know that we will all
necessarily agree on this, but I have been doing traffic calming work for over twenty
(20) years and speed cushions have this one benefit that other traffic calming
measures do not. I did also want to say that one challenge is lifted trucks, which we
do have a lot of here on Kaua`i, I will say that. They will not be slowed down as much
because they have the wider wheelbase, but I think for the overall population of
vehicles even here on Kaua`i, we are better off with final travel speeds slower speed
profile with a speed cushion like this than a speed table, even though there are some
concerns with pickup trucks. I should also mention that there is a concern that drivers
could drop wheels into the centerline, right or left, and get one wheel off, but again,
they still have to slowdown. If they did go to the centerline and there is a problem
with that, we can simply add a "flexpost" in the centerline, like we have elsewhere.
We have flexpost in the center of the road on Po`ipu Road in Koloa Town at Koloa
Elementary School, for that very purpose; traffic calming purposes. Those were added
about six (6) or seven (7) years ago. That would help traffic even more but it would
make it physically impossible if someone was to actually hit the post to drop their
wheels all the way onto the yellow line. But again, with this laid down appropriately,
if the person wanted to drive their wheels on one-side or the other, they can go on
either side and successfully get their wheels down the right side, but they still have
to slow down because their left wheel is going over the highest part of the speed
cushion, in that case. That is it.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Chock.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 17 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Chock: I have a couple questions. What I am hearing
is that one of the reasons for moving it on this is for emergency vehicles and I hear
that the fire truck can go over it without being affected.
Mr. Moule: Not as much.
Councilmember Chock: That will be less for an ambulance or for
instance the lifeguard association's truck that pulls a trailer that pulls the jet ski
wave runner, correct?
Mr. Moule: Yes. The more narrow the span between the
tires, the more they are affected by this, but they are affected by any device; speed
table or speed cushion.
Councilmember Chock: So, putting a flexpost in the middle as you
suggested, would that eliminate that? Would it still offer the same benefit to the
emergency vehicle or not?
Mr. Moule: Yes, because the goal with the emergency
vehicles is to travel down the center of the lane. They do not need to drop their tires
into the yellow line area. The fastest way to travel in an emergency vehicle is to drive
down the center where you are mostly straddling the cushion itself, if that makes
sense.
Councilmember Chock: Okay.
Mr. Moule: And that post would either make the road feel
narrow, but they can still physically get their vehicle through without hitting the
post.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: When you consider that post down the
center...when I see this road and I am on it pretty regularly when there is an event,
party, a canoe race, anything—there are cars parked in both directions on either side.
So, to consider that somehow someone is going to straddle the right side does not
seem reasonable or to be expected. It would have to be a very, very low volume day
when you over on the right, but most of the time, that road is crowded. You also have
to visualize bicyclists, people walking with their body boards, pushing double
strollers, and this is an area that is not always that easy to get two (2) cars down. I
think it is pretty natural for people to put their left wheel on the front of the low
clearance car, so it is definitely going to be my inclination so it brings people to almost
head-on and I know as people are frustrated along Weke Road with all the heavy
traffic, even where we do not have the speed cushions, you have to pull over to the
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 18 MAY 1, 2019
right into someone's driveway as the truck is coming. It is almost like a shared-lane
road, especially with big vehicles. The idea of putting a flexpost in the center there, I
cannot even see how you begin to consider that because unless people can run them
over and they are going to flip back up because people need to get down the road.
Mr. Moule: Putting a flexpost is something that, honestly,
we do not recommend that we do in the initial short-term if we find people moving
more left at the speed cushion than otherwise. You are saying that they are moving
left anyway because of the parked cars, which is true. If they move more left on the
speed cushion and we find that to be a safety issue than yes, we could put a post, but
I think in the short-term we would not suggest putting a post.
Councilmember Cowden: I am glad that you have Kilipaki up here
because I see these letters that are included in the information that we got from the
Kaua`i Police Department (KPD), KFD, and the Emergency Medical Technician
(EMT) that are pretty happy with the speed tables, that is what I am seeing what I
am reading from the past. Are you saying that in looking forward, it is going to be
different?
Mr. Moule: I do not think I have seen all those letters, so
I could not answer that question.
Councilmember Cowden: Okay. Can I ask a question to Kilipaki?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: You can ask your question.
Councilmember Cowden: Acting Fire Chief Vaughan, if there were
these speed tables, I am sure you have gone over them; do you find them problematic
in being able to arrive for a water rescue? I cannot remember a fire that we might
have had down that road, but I know there are definitely safety vehicles that go down;
do those speed tables significantly hinder you from being effective at your job?
KILIPAKI K. F. VAUGHAN, Deputy Fire Chief: Good morning, aloha
Council Chair, Vice Chair, and Councilmembers. Kilipaki Vaughan, Deputy Fire
Chief, Kauai Fire Department. In regards to this particular Resolution and the
discussion regarding tables versus speed cushions, over the years, these tables were
originally here for probably about nine (9) years or so. They have actually slowed
down traffic and also for us by the time Weke Road, we are not in a rush, because we
are almost at the end. We are trying to get down to the pavilion. So for us, the impact
on apparatus would probably be a little bit greater with the tables; with the cushions,
we can straddle the entire cushion and not reduce our speed, but speed is not an issue
for us. We want to get their safe. We are there to help people and if we get into an
accident on the way, it does not behoove us in that manner. We are fine with either
way. There is an evolution; there is a change. We do know that tables have been there
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 19 MAY 1, 2019
and we have been conditioned to that and the community has been conditioned to
that. We are for any traffic calming device that is appropriate and designed well.
Councilmember Cowden: Why I felt that this was particularly
important is not just relative to Hanalei, but I heard requests like this on Moi Road
in Hanapepe where people are coming down really quickly and then on Kilauea Road
where I live, there is enough potholes that we have plenty traffic calming devices
right now, but particularly some of the seniors—I will not name any of them, but we
have people who lived there most of their lives. They are older and have trouble
walking across the road, so they have even asked, "How come we cannot have they
have in Hanalei?" Even just this past weekend, I got asked that very, very firmly by
a kupuna who is going to demand that we ask that. I understand collector roads is a
longer question, but it is not just Weke Road that has this challenge and I think when
you ask people to kind of come to the center, you are more likely to have a head-on or
clips of rearview mirrors, and I am wondering if it is more of a problem than a help
with coming to the center. Have you thought about it relative to other roads because
I am letting you know that it is an issue coming up?
Mr. Moule: We have and we do get request for speed
humps on collector roads on a regular basis and we say that we cannot put them in
because we will not do speed humps on collector roads. I think there is potential on
other collector roads and that is an important consideration. It does not necessarily
affect what you all decide to do on Weke Road, I mean you certainly can decide to
leave speed tables on Weke Road and when we get a future possible action to add
speed tables on Kilauea Road, Hanamd'ulu Road, or somewhere else where we know
we had complaints in the past. We could ask the question about going speed cushions
or otherwise, in that case. I strongly believe that the best choice for the balance
between slowing vehicles down and making it better for emergency responders faster,
potentially, and less jostling to the equipment and for the firemen and firewomen on
the vehicles, that the speed cushion is the better choice for that. As far as people
moving toward the center, there is a research study shown that the most common one
did not even study a design that only had two (2) speed cushions, the study was with
three (3)—and going over the middle one, I assume, or somehow going over something
that way. Therefore, I do not know how much of an issue that would be in this case,
so that is part of the reason why I was thinking we did not need to say, "Put a post in
that." The research I have seen does not show a significant...there is no research
that I have seen that shows that probably moving to the center when there are two
(2) cushions as a oppose to three (3) across a wider street. Our roads are narrow,
twenty (20) feet. These are most often done on streets that are more like thirty (30)
feet or more and they put three (3) in and that may be why people are going down the
center.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Kagawa.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 20 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Kagawa: I have been here for seven (7) years and have
been the Public Works Committee Chair for a while now. We have been through
several with Larry and yourself personal requests installing speed bumps where
people are aggravated at people speeding and nothing is being done—some are even
by schools. I think been denied one hundred percent (100%) of the speed humps
because if you put a speed bump by every request, it will just keep building. Everyone
wants people to slow down right by their house, especially when they have a lot of
cars and have to back up on the road. Mike is back there from KPD and what has
been helpful is that I have had KPD help with that and they have caught speeders.
That really helps. But then once they catch a few, then they slow down, and they do
not monitor that area again and I get the request back for the speed bumps—it is like
a hamster wheel that keeps going around and around. Can you explain the speed
cushion? Does it go up three (3) inches and to what about? You do not show the side
view. -
Mr. Moule: I can probably get that on the screen, if you
like.
Councilmember Kagawa: Just a rough measurement. I know that
Hanalei one has been there forever, it is great and it slows traffic down in that
community. I can see why residents would want to keep it the same way. It keeps
traffic going pretty slow.
Mr. Moule: The design of the speed...
Councilmember Kagawa: I am just wondering if the speed cushion is
going to keep it that way and you can tell me as an engineer that it is going to
probably keep it about the same, then I will feel a little bit more comfortable. But if
it is severely different from that one that was there, then I can see why they are
concerns—they may have cars going five (5) miles per hour (MPH) to fifteen (15) MPH
than they used to.
Mr. Moule: I will describe what the profile of the speed
cushion and the design we have chosen for the initial one to be installed on Weke
Road. It has a total length along the linear part of the road, sort of in line with the
stripes.
Councilmember Kagawa: The black area?
Mr. Moule: Yes, the length of the black area there, from
here to here is about twelve (12) feet with a three (3) foot ramp, a six (6) foot flattop
and then a three (3) foot ramp. It is a more abrupt ramp than either a speed hump
or speed cushion.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 21 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Kagawa: How high?
Mr. Moule: Three (3) inches. All of them are three (3)
inches high. We proposed a three (3) inch height for any of the ones that we would
use.
Councilmember Kagawa: It is just like a triangle, but with a really...
Mr. Moule: Let me just go back...
Councilmember Kagawa: Is it like a triangle rather than a round hump?
Mr. Moule: Just take this bottom.
Councilmember Kagawa: Yes, and just connect the straight line to the
flat.
Mr. Moule: Essentially to think of it this way, three (3)
feet here, six (6) feet here, and three (3) feet here. That is the profile that is the one
we have, which is, twelve (12) feet total—three (3) foot parabolic ramp, rounded ramp,
then six (6) feet flat, and then three (3) feet down. A more abrupt profile than either
the speed table or the speed hump. Again, if you get only one wheel on it, you are
slowed down more than if it were a flatter device with just one wheel. Does that make
sense? Because it is a more abrupt bump.
Councilmember Kagawa: You are explaining it perfectly, but if we had
a picture between those two (2), that would be great.
Mr. Moule: Hold on a second, we can get a picture up
really quickly.
Councilmember Kagawa: I think the best way is to drive over one, but...
Mr. Moule: I will send a picture to your staff.
Councilmember Kagawa: Because we all drove over that speed table,
right? We drove over that speed table many times, it is just we know how different
that was from any other speed bump. Those speed tables were like embedded, we
know what it feels like, and we know how slow you have to go. On the lower picture,
the rounded one, you can kind of fly over that. If it is real gradual like that, you can
go a lot faster than the speed table because it does not have that angle where you hit
the part where it changes the slope. I am just trying to picture how that will feel in
a car.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 22 MAY 1, 2019
Mr. Moule: The reason why I did not put it in the response
to Councilmember Cowden is that the drawing of that was really cluttered and you
will see it when I bring it up; it is not as clear as the others. I should have put it in
there even though it was cluttered to make it more clear, but I just sent it to Scott
and it will be up there in a minute.
Councilmember Kagawa: I will ask you another question while we wait
for that. Is KPD good with the new design?
MICHAEL M. CONTRADES, Deputy Chief of Police: I have testimony.
Councilmember Kagawa: Can we hear from KPD? Do you want to finish
these folks first?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: No. Mike is part of the Administration, so he
can come up and state whether he is for or against, but I do know he has testimony.
Councilmember Kagawa: Kilipaki did not really have an opinion. He
said that both ways are okay. I just wanted to hear from KPD because sometimes
they need to get in there real fast, there are a lot of people down there; good and bad.
I know when you get the bad folks, you need to fly it in there.
Mr. Contrades: For the record, Michael Contrades, KPD. I do
have testimony, so I am assuming that comes after.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes, you can provide your testimony after, but
you can answer Councilmember Kagawa's question now.
Councilmember Kagawa: Are you for or against the speed change?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: He is asking an overall question on how it
affects public safety.
Mr. Contrades: For us the main thing is being able to calm
down the speeds, but as far as the officers responding, we have no issues with the
speed tables. I am not an expert on the speed cushion aspect of it, I can only speak
to what I have seen with the speed tables and the speed tables work. As far as the
officers responding, the speed tables have been fine for us. We want to get to a place
quickly, but we also want them to get there safely just like the Fire Department.
Councilmember Kagawa: It is kind of unusual as you know we have
two (2) public safety sectors saying either way.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 23 MAY 1, 2019
Mr. Contrades: My main concern is that whatever is there
continues to do what the speed tables have done, which is calm the traffic down and
negate the need for us to be there for speed enforcement all the time.
Councilmember Kagawa: Okay. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: I have a question for Deputy Chief of Police
Contrades. When there is the opening in the middle, do you think that encourages
traffic safety issues? The natural inclination, I watch it at Foodland or anywhere
where there is a speed bump, almost anyone is going to have their left tire off that,
unless they have a baby seat in the back, then they are going to have the right tire
off. People are going to drive comfortably and put less impact and so it causes people
to either go this side or go to this side. You have seen that area on Weke Road gets
congested pretty regularly, correct?
Mr. Contrades: Again, I am not as familiar with the speed
cushions. I am not an expert in that particular area, but just listening to what I have
heard thus far, I do have a concern with cars being pushed or moving towards the
middle of the roadway. I would like to see us avoiding any head-on collisions and
vehicles that are trying to go off to the right, of course, could be problematic as well.
Councilmember Cowden: Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Are there any further questions for Mike? Do
you have a question for Kilipaki? Councilmember Evslin.
Councilmember Evslin: When it comes to response time, there is a
quote in the information that we received from Chief Westerman saying that a speed
table reduces response time by nine point one (9.1) seconds per one. As someone who
has been saved by a responder from the ocean, I know that every second is important.
Is there any estimate that you folks have or maybe Mr. Moule has of the actual
response time savings, if we did switch?
Mr. Vaughan: For the record, Kilipaki Vaughan, Deputy
Fire Chief. My position is that we arrive safe. If we do not arrive safely, we are not
doing our job. Really, that is the gist of it from our standpoint. It could be a speed
bump, a speed hump, a speed cushion, tire spikes, whatever it is, if it slows people
down, it is important. We want to make sure that we arrive safely. For us, there has
been some discussion about drifting into the middle of the lane, with our big red
trucks and our lights, we have to have that on, so people tend to migrate towards to
the edges and get out of our way, so it is not an issue for us. Again, Weke Road is
probably a quarter mile long to the pavilion where we would be responding to, and
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 24 MAY 1, 2019
every second does count, but if we fail to get there in that one or two (2) seconds that
we sacrifice, then we are not doing our job.
Councilmember Evslin: Okay.
Mr. Vaughan: I have not done an analysis on this. I know
that over the years the speed tables that have been there have eventually—one has
gone out, two has gone out, and a few remainders. They continue to work for us.
Again, we know not to try and speed down there because we know it is congested, it
is a popular place, especially Black Pot, and Hanalei towards the pier. Even if we
have to launch our boat in the river, it is another issue, but we try to make sure we
do it safely.
Councilmember Evslin: What about the potential concern of jostling
equipment?
Mr. Vaughan: The apparatus' are obviously high ticket
items and we want to make sure we maintain their operation. It would be a different
thing if we were running over these types of cushions, tables, or whatever it may be
and injuring the apparatus and now we are out of commission. That really does not
serve our purpose, again, that is another reason why we want to slow down and take
it really cautiously, get over the hump, and do it efficiently and effectively to arrive
safely. It does not put our firefighters at risk as well.
Councilmember Evslin: What would you choose if you had to choose
between a cushion or a hump, from a response time perspective?
Mr. Vaughan: I am going to stand on the position that either
would work for us. I think there is an evolution that sometimes it comes with it
whether it is a roundabout somewhere else, people need to get used to it—it is a new
evolution. Speed tables, speed humps, speed cushions, spikes, or whatever it may be,
if it is effective and helps us along the way, we are for it.
Councilmember Evslin: I think you are probably more familiar with
the literature on response time and speed cushions; do you folks feel like from the
literature at least, that there would be a timing savings on response time?
Mr. Moule: Yes, I believe there would be over speed
cushions than speed tables. I think that as much of the factor as that is the jostling
in the equipment...things that I have observed fire trucks going over both and have
seen the difference. What I have seen is they can go over faster over the speed
cushions.
Councilmember Evslin: How many are they?
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 25 MAY 1, 2019
Mr. Moule: That is a good question. There were five (5)
speed tables; a couple have been removed because of the problems with the rubber
speed table and the sand that is under them. In the short-term, we plan to replace
one (1) with the speed cushion and I think that left me to the thought that I have
had...we have to put one (1) in now and we do not have plans to put the others in
until we have another paving project and we get those added to it, potentially.
Therefore, we can put one (1) in at the location where the emergency work has been
done, see how that works, see if we like it, and then honestly if we find that what the
Fire and Police are saying, "We do not like it as much as the speed tables," when we
go to put the others in, again as the Resolution is written would authorize us to do
either. We would say, "Let us go to speed tables." In addition, if you folks heard from
Fire or Police that the speed cushions are not working, you could say and redo a
resolution to say, "You are not authorized to do either, you are only authorized to do
speed tables." You can force us to do what we would probably also do if we heard
from Fire and Police that it was not a good idea. One nice thing, I guess in a way, the
silver lining of this whole flood and this replacement road that we are doing, we have
the ability to just test the one right now and do that through either passing this
Resolution as written or potentially if you are meeting next week as well, we could
come back with a resolution just to authorize us to do the one, if you are concerned
about that. But you always have the ability to pass another resolution in the future
anyway, so I think either way, you have the control.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: A really significant thing that we have not
brought out yet is the new design of Black Pot Beach Park. It looks like it is intending
to not allow the parking on the beach any longer, is that correct?
Mr. Moule: That is correct.
Councilmember Cowden: Over the years, I have made a real point to go
count the number of vehicles and on an average day when the beach is a decent size,
there are one hundred fifty (150) vehicles down there. I have counted over two
hundred (200) vehicles. Those vehicles typically are the only place that the residents
are able to park. Sometimes they can park in a few other places. People get up really
early in the morning while on vacation because they are coming from the east and
they fill the prime parking spaces that are available, that are the standard parking.
Even in the property that is now going to be the extension of the park, the Sheehan's
have often been very good at allowing parking there, so when we take away even one
hundred (100) parking spaces and that is a light estimate—except I think many of
the families that go down there to enjoy that area will no longer be able to enjoy that
park when we take that beach park parking away. So when we take off one hundred
(100) to one hundred fifty (150) pieces of spaces for our people, where are they going
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 26 MAY 1, 2019
to go? It will always be crowded down Weke Road. The new area is not enough. Even
if you made it twice the size, that is going to be filled with visitors, so where are we
going to put our cars? They are going to end up down that road, so when you are
saying it is easier on the emergency vehicles, it just does not resonate with me at all.
A big truck like the fire truck is going to have to straddle the center of the road when
it is packed on both sides, especially with people walking with their surfboards.
People are parking there right up against the fence line. The strollers, surfboards,
body boards, and everything like that is in the lane. It is definitely a multimodal
transportation lane. When we have taken where our local people can park away from
them, it is going to be even more problematic. We have reduced the parking space by
one hundred (100) to two hundred (200) cars already and so that fire truck is going
down the center and is hitting both sides of the speed cushion.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Either way, it will be hitting a speed cushion
or a speed bump or a speed table, right?
Mr. Moule: Yes, that is correct. I will say that in as much
as a fire truck is sort of forced to go down the center of the road, they would likely be
slowed down somewhat more than they would if they can straddle the speed cushion
completely. The way it is designed and I was about it show this, I finally got it up,
that the gap between the speed cushions is three (3) feet and so if a fire truck were to
have to move away from the center of the lane, toward the center of the road, they
would likely have to put one or both sets of wheels on the steeper part of the cushion
than otherwise. Therefore, that could potentially affect them. I do not have the data
about how many parking spaces would be available at Black Pot Beach Park, but I do
know we have been working with the Department of Parks & Recreation because our
projects have to coordinate, right? We are actually increasing the amount of parking
available at the end of Weke Road near the old boat ramp. We are having parking on
both sides of that, in addition to the park is going to be opening up during the day
parking in the field behind into the former Sheehan property, but I do not have the
numbers of all of that. But you point about different purposes...
Councilmember Cowden: They will be filled with visitors. That is what
happens. The rental cars is what will fill that space.
Mr. Moule: But that space was never available, are you
saying it was?
Councilmember Cowden: It does not matter.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I want to keep the discussion to the speed
bumps.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 27 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Cowden: It is to the speed tables because we are
presuming that Weke Road is going to be open on both sides where when you take
the parking away from the residents, they are the ones who are most likely to end up
on the road or some will end up on the road, but we are taking away our residential
parking with the Black Pot Beach Park. Therefore, to presume that we are not going
to have a very crowded Weke Road is inaccurate and that people are not going to be
walking down with their beach chairs and coolers. That is a crowded thoroughfare
with the way we redesigned the park and so it is just not reasonable to me. I think
the whole park redesign has not been well-thought out, I am going to be honest about
that. When we put these speed cushions in, it is a slap in the face. I am going to stop
asking so many questions because we have residents who can come and talk. I want
to hear what they have to say, but the residents who live right there fought very hard
for a number of years and really knocked themselves out to get what they got. When
we had Weke Road replaced to what was when nature has made it really evident that
it needed to change, when we have to have "as-is," why can we not have as-is the way
the community said they want it to be? I do not see that these solutions that are
being proposed are going to solve the problem that they are asking for. The fire trucks
are going to have a chance to straddle it because there are going to be cars right there.
I am finish with having to ask questions with this particular person.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: The speed tables or speed cushions are just
going to be in place...is it a new speed table or speed cushion. Is it going to go in place
of where one used to be or are we putting in more?
Councilmember Cowden: That is correct.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I am asking the Administration.
Councilmember Cowden: I am sorry.
Mr. Moule: That is correct. All of them would go where or
very close to within the margin of error of the Resolution map.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: So we are deciding on whether we are going to
replace it with a table or a cushion?
Mr. Moule: It is to authorize us to do either.
LYLE TABATA, Deputy County Engineer: Lyle Tabata, Deputy County
Engineer. I have been sitting here patiently. As Michael mentioned, you can choose
to strike the cushion and say, "Only a table," or vice versa, but I just want to remind
you that this is the only collector road that we have a device such as this. I am saying
that someone previously...I believe, made an error by allowing it in the first place. I
just want to remind you that. We are just trying to improve what is there. Secondly,
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 28 MAY 1, 2019
can we remind the public that the comments behind the speaker should be kept to
themselves? Further, I will be sending, as soon as we complete...I have been working
on this for years, a right-of-way ordinance that will prevent the intrusion of private
residences into the right-of-way. Right now, I do not have any regulatory means to
correct, fine people, or charge them for their private property intrusion into the
County's right-of-way. That is forthcoming and that should deal with the
encroachments of vehicles parked partly on the roadway. That should solve that
problem. To me, the solution is simple, you can choose to keep the tables and strike
the cushion from this Resolution or allow the either or as Michael is suggesting. It is
in your hands, but I just wanted to reiterate that having the devices there in the first
place, I believe was an error. It would never had happened under my watch. That is
why Councilmember Kagawa points out that no other collector road on this island
has a device such as this. 4
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Kagawa.
Councilmember Kagawa: Where are we at on the project? I had this
lady call from Hanalei and asked my about the project. She was worried about the
design and things. She was surprised that I called her back, maybe she thought I did
not care about Hanalei, but I do care about the whole island. I called you, Lyle, and
you called her, but basically the contractor was going to begin the next day already,
so we were kind of...and she knew that. She knew that it was late to make a request
to change the direction that we were going. Are we moving on this project already?
As we speak, are we paving?
Mr. Moule: The paving is largely completed.
Councilmember Kagawa: So we just have not installed...
Mr. Moule: We have not installed any speed cushions or
speed tables and we will not until we have your blessing to do so.
Councilmember Kagawa: Is the contractor ready to install the speed
cushions?
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Councilmember Kagawa: If we deviate from the speed cushion back to
the speed table, would that affect any funding, FEMA matching, et cetera? I want to
make sure we have all the cards on the table. If we are going down a road that is
going to cost us money, I want to make sure that when we vote we know that we are
deciding to possibly lose a little. I am not saying that it should change the vote. I am
just saying let us get all the cards on the table before we vote.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 29 MAY 1, 2019
Mr. Moule: It would require a change order to move
towards something besides a speed cushion and speed table. That is on me, honestly,
because in the rush to get these emergency jobs out, we bid this thing before we came
to you all and we should not have done that. That is on me, that is my fault. I will
take full responsibility for that. I do not like being here and doing this at this time,
but I do not think you should base your decision on that, honestly. It would be a
change order. Pouring a speed table is more expensive than pouring a speed cushion
because it is bigger, so there would be additional cost, but I would not recommend
you make a decision based on that. If this were a decision that we were making
internally, I would not make the decision based on the additional cost. If we feel the
speed table is the right solution, that is what it is. It is going to reflect what we can
do in the short-term, we have to work with the contractor on a change order, but I do
not think that is the reason you should choose to go with speed tables than speed
cushions.
Councilmember Kagawa: I hear what you just said, Lyle, but we had it
already. It is kind of grandfathered. When you are grandfathered, you feel obligated
to put it back because it has created a safer environment, so for me, I am struggling
with this. I am just glad that the result is, "When are they going to open the road;
when are they going to fix the park," and I am glad that we rushed on the resounding
voice I heard was, "How long more do we have to wait," and so we moved on it. It has
been a year, but we are there. We just have to decide on these tables. It is the
Council's decision; we have five (5) members. Can we explain how much votes we will
need? Because we are missing two (2) members, I want to make sure that we know...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Right now the Resolution is for either or.
Councilmember Kagawa: What do you mean?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: They could either put a cushion or a table.
Councilmember Kagawa: Is that what the Resolution is saying?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes.
Councilmember Kagawa: Okay.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Unless we want to change it to make it
specific, which I think we are going to have to come with a new resolution on...right
now, it leaves the option open for whatever they want to put in.
Councilmember Kagawa: Okay, we will hear from the public.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Evslin.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 30 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Evslin: Just for clarity, if the Resolution passes, you
folks have the option, Mr. Moule mentioned maybe just doing one cushion; the other
four (4) would be to put back the bolted rubber thing for the time being or you would
asphalt a table?
Mr. Moule: The residents in the area can correct me on
this, but my understanding is that there are currently still three (3) in place, the
rubber ones. You can ask them that question because I am not sure. I do not live
there and I did not go out to confirm myself. The one near the pavilion is gone, the
one that is in the work area is gone, and the other three (3), I believe, are still there.
With this project, we would do just the one and we would not put back rubber speed
tables—I am not recommending we do that from a Public Works point of view, just
from the maintenance challenge. If we put that on an asphalt table, it will be there
until we resurface the road, but if we put a rubber table, it is there for about the same
time we have had those last ones and the roads crew are constantly out there trying
to clean it out, not constantly, I should not say that, but they have complained to us
about the challenges of the rubber. The last thing I will say is that the idea of just
doing the one works well for us because I think there is this dearth of devices that
can be used on collector roads and we have had a lot of complaints about collector
roads. I think that the speed cushion on other collector roads can be very successful
as a way to manage emergency response while still providing a device that works as
compared to the speed humps that are not allowed. Installing just the one for now
and seeing how that works, looking at it, and studying it before we put the others in
using asphalt in the next year or so, is what I would prefer to do and move forward
with, with Council's permission. To answer Council Chair Kaneshiro's question, if
you folks just reject this Resolution entirely, it leaves us to do speed tables. You do
not have to change it to go back to speed tables, you can just reject it, and that is what
we have to do. That is the simple answer to the question on the logistics of this.
Councilmember Evslin: Thank you. I was under the impression that
they were all gone at the moment, so if they are there, they are there.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Are there any further questions for the
Administration? Councilmember Chock.
Councilmember Chock: What is the cost of each one?
Mr. Moule: I do not have an answer on that right now. I
can look to see what the cost...I think we had a lump sum bid on this, but I cannot
remember if the cushion was cost to that separately. I should get that answer for you
while the public testifies. The asphalt ones could be a different cost because we have
never done asphalt speed tables before. It would be cheaper than this concrete one.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 31 MAY 1, 2019
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I have a question on the maintenance. Do you
see the same type of...to me, it is two (2) rubber things on the road, is there going to
be a difference in maintenance between a cushion versus a table?
Mr. Moule: We are proposing concrete pavement on this
and not rubber. I do not know if I made that clear. Whatever we do in the future
whether it is speed tables or speed cushions, I am recommending that we go with
concrete or asphalt. Therefore, either concrete pavement, which is what the road is
being paved at as like as have on Puhi Road for this one, for the others it will go on
existing asphalt surface, we will be recommending that we put those in an asphalt
concrete. None of these would be rubber.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is the table that is there now a rubber speed
bump?
Mr. Moule: Yes.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: But the cushion that you are suggesting is
going to be concrete?
Mr. Moule: Concrete. Cushions or tables in the future
anywhere on this road, we are going to be recommending we go concrete or asphalt
for the maintenance benefits of that.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: No rubber drilled down speed bumps, okay,
got it. Are there further questions for the Administration? If not, thank you. We will
take public testimony.
Ms. Fountain-Tanigawa: The first registered speaker is Michael
Contrades, followed by Richard Parks.
Councilmember Kagawa: I want to let the Council know that I have a
12:00 p.m. meeting with the Mayor. If you need my vote, we have to recess for lunch
at 12:00 p.m.
Mr. Contrades: Good morning, Honorable Chair Kaneshiro,
Honorable Vice Chair Kagawa, and Honorable Members of the County Council. For
the record, Michael Contrades, Kaua`i Police Department. I am here today for the
purpose of public safety and to testify on the effectiveness of the speed tables on Weke
Road. The testimony I am providing is anecdotal, as I have not had an opportunity
to review statistics; however, I have a good understanding and knowledge of the Weke
Road area as I served as the Hanalei District Commander from 2007 to 2010. Prior
to the installation of the speed tables, KPD received many complaints of speeding on
Weke Road. Being the only road to Black Pot and Hanalei Pier, the roadway is well
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 32 MAY 1, 2019
used by both residents and visitors alike. After the installation of the speed tables,
the need for the police presence for the purpose of speed enforcement diminished
greatly. The speed tables became a twenty-four (24) hour a day, seven (7) days a
week tool to prevent speeding. During my time as the Hanalei District Commander,
I cannot recall complaints or requests for speed enforcement once the speed tables
were installed. KPD is in favor of speed calming devices because as you know with
our limited resources and personnel, it is challenging to be everywhere at every time.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Thank you. Next speaker.
Ms. Fountain-Tanigawa: Richard Parks.
RICHARD PARKS: Is it time now?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes.
Mr. Parks: I was not trying to be funny because I hear
that ringing. Am I the only one who hears that?
Councilmember Cowden: No, we hear it.
Councilmember Chock: It is the first of the month.
Councilmember Cowden: It is a test.
Mr. Parks: I have a couple of people that would like to say
something. I would like them to go first, if I could, because they have been here all
morning. I would like you to hear what they have to say and then I will follow-up
with a lot of information that is relevant to the subject.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is there anyone else in the audience wishing
to testify? Pasty.
PASTY SHEEHAN: Yes.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I will just give you the rules. You will have
three (3) minutes, the light will turn green when your time starts, when you have
thirty (30) seconds left, it will turn orange, and then when the three (3) minutes is
up, it will turn red. If you need more time, we are going to go through all the other
testifiers first and then you can come back and testify for another three (3) minutes.
Just state your name for the record.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 33 MAY 1, 2019
Ms. Sheehan: My name is Pasty Sheehan. I live on Weke
Road and have been a long time resident of Hanalei and Kaua`i. I live midway
between the pavilion and the pier, so I am in the midst of all the action that has
happened over the last twenty (20) years. I have been involved with and supporting
of the installation of the speed tables as a result of concerns from residents like me
and park users about all the speeding and racing to and from the quarter mile stretch
from the pavilion to the pier. Besides some dogs being killed and fences being taken
out and lots of rubber being laid, we as a group of residents wanted to know how to
slow everyone down and keep the safety of people walking because more people are
walking and more people are riding bikes. I am sure the visitor industry has
advertised Hanalei Bay and the pier as an iconic place to go. The process of testing
the speed tables in the process of doing this, we had a pilot program, we engaged the
stakeholders, the emergency responders, the police, and the residents, and all of that
was very successfully done. It took years, but the result was a Council resolution for
permanent installing of speed tables. The pilot program required a pilot speed table
that was made out of rubber, it was modular, and you screw it in. If one square broke,
you would take that square out. Therefore, maintenance was not that big a problem,
but what was missing in all of these speed table troubles that we gotten so far is that
there was no maintenance. In the last ten (10) years, there has been no maintenance
whatsoever, so the rubber speed tables have just disintegrated with the sand. It could
have easily been replaced, but nothing has happened for all these years. Of course,
you all know that nothing lasts and maintained, so I believe the issue of replacing the
speed tables with cushions would not come before you if the maintenance of the
permanent speed tables were installed. I know that Weke Road is unique in its
problems from the pier to the pavilion and perhaps we are a collector road or maybe
we are not. I think we are only going to be more intensified in the visitors and the
use of the road and we are going to have a state-of-the-art park opening at the end of
the road. To plan for the future, I think, all of Weke Road needs to be certainly
repaved, but the part of Weke Road from the pavilion to the pier, especially, because
of the traffic going down. What the speed tables did was also act as a crosswalk and
that was very important because people wonder around, so I just wanted to say that
you need to keep the speed tables because they have been tested and tried and they
are true, and not speed cushions because they have not been tested. Thank you very
much.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Thank you. Are there any clarifying
questions? If not, next speaker. Is there anyone else in the audience wishing to
testify?
JEFF SHARDEL: Hi there, Councilmembers. My name is Jeff
Shardel and I live on Weke Road in Hanalei. I think everything has pretty much been
said. One thing I did want to mention is, as you mentioned before Councilmember
Cowden, there will be more and more people going to Black Pot, as well as the people
parking at the pavilion, so what is happening is you tend to have a situation where
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 34 MAY 1, 2019
there is kind of an infill of cars that are parking along Weke Road. I do agree that
over time especially during the busy traffic season, you are going to have people who
are parking on the roads and then bikers, strollers, and whatnot. I do believe that if
we go to a speed cushion set up versus a speed table set up, when the emergency
responders are going down the road, I do think that both tires are going to be on the
speed cushions instead of just one on and one off. I do not think there will not be as
much of an opportunity to straddle the speed cushions, as they have been talking
about, because of the infill of parking there. Two, which was mentioned as well, the
whole issue about where the pavilion is—the speed table there is used as a crosswalk
for people who go from the pavilion to Pilikoa Street and the Hanalei Palms area. I
think if we go to a speed cushion, that use as a crosswalk goes away, which is a
concern that I have. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Thank you for your testimony. State your
name for the record. I mentioned earlier that we will take your testimony in six (6)
minutes in total, if you needed the six (6) minutes. We are not going to break it up
into three (3) and three (3).
Mr. Parks: Thank you. May I offer this to him so that he
can pass them out to you?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: The light will turn green when your time
starts, it will turn yellow when you have thirty (30) seconds left, and red when your
six (6) minutes are up.
Mr. Parks: My name is Richard Parks, resident of
Hanalei since 1968. I am the guilty one that got this started back around 1997 and
thereafter in the year 2000. It took me five (5) years along working with another
person to get the other Council to consider doing something about the problem.
Unfortunately, the police force has never had enough people and on this island, it will
probably never will have enough people to do what really has to be done in all the
different areas. Therefore, we needed something that would supplement police just
sitting with radars around the corner or whatever, because that was not available. I
was traveling in parts of South America and the Caribbean one time and went to the
island of Dominica. I was in the taxi and the taxi driver is driving my wife and I and
we hit this horrible bump and our heads hit the ceiling in the taxi. I said, "Excuse
me, sir, what did you just run over?" He said, "A sleeping policeman." I said, "What?"
He said, "A sleeping policeman." I was like, "Oh, my gosh, we are in trouble. We
were in a foreign country and we are going to jail." He said, "No," and he turned
around and said, "What we ran over is a speed hump," but it was more than a hump,
it was more like those things you run into in the Costco parking lot where the
automobile center is, where you go (thump). It is radical. Fortunately, those are not
allowed on any streets, they are only on private areas, so I learned a lesson—watching
at the end of my driveway, folks pulling boats down to Black Pot Beach Park, and if
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 35 MAY 1, 2019
there was a bump, you know how boats are on trailers, everything bounces, people in
pick-up trucks with family riding in the back of the pick-up truck, same thing. I
thought if we are going to do something, we need something that does not accelerate
or explode people or cars, and so I looked into flattop types of what at that time were
called "humps." They were flattop humps and the word or verbiage became speed
tables, tabletops with a slight incline, three point six (3.6) inches coming up, three
point six (3.6) inches coming down, and seven (7) feet across the top equals a fourteen
(14) foot span. Therefore, as you go up on your front tires, it is only a three (3) inch
rise, so you are up, you flatten out, you come to other end with your front tires, as
your front tires start to go down, your back tires have already come up, and then they
hit the flat. So they do not flip. Now, what they do not allow is exactly what I got
from all these different federal organizations: Institute of Transportation Engineers
(ITE), United States Department of Transportation (DOT), the Federal Highway
Administration (FHWA). That is where all my information comes from. That is the
research I have done over all these years and by the way to answer a question, it was
not nine (9) years. They have been in there thirteen (13) years, folks. We did a pilot
program here and Council Chair Kaneshiro, I have a question to ask you. Are you
the son of the other Kaneshiro that actually helped us set the twenty (20) miles per
hour speed limit on Weke Road?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Probably. If it was Darryl Kaneshiro at the
time, then yes.
Mr. Parks: Is that your father?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes.
Mr. Parks: If you see him, tell him from all the people
who live there, "Thank you." He is the one that said, "We need to lower the speed
limit to twenty (20) and coincide it with the speed tables," and he said that it should
work out pretty well. Tell him when you see him that it has worked out awesome.
How many of you had a chance to look at the paperwork that I had left for you? Okay.
This particular page says, "County officials advocated and supported speed table
implementation on Weke Road from 1997 to 2019." Here are the names of the people
that all went "yes." On that list, two (2) fire chiefs, two (2) police chiefs, a deputy chief
police, police commissioner, American Medical Response (AMR), the county attorney,
the county mayor, the engineers from Public Works, and then all of the
councilmembers that were available at the time. They all went to the speed tables,
but that was after in 2005 when we had a pilot program. The sand is seeping fast.
The program was to put a speed table right by the pavilion at Hanalei. Now, there is
a three-way intersection there. There is Pilikoa Street, which goes into Hanalei Palms
area and comes out, there is Hanalei pavilion right there to the left, and it is also an
entrance into the dirt parking lot. That is where a lot of people who live, rent, or go
in there to park in Hanalei Palms will cross that street. That was considered a raised
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 36 MAY 1, 2019
crosswalk, just like they have on O`ahu, Maui, and in major intersections. It is only
three (3) inches high, but because of where it is located and the striping you put on
it, it becomes a crosswalk. That really helped at that critical spot to stop and
eliminate a lot of fast driving right in front of the public park, which was a parking
area for the pavilion. It basically eliminated...because they come down the street,
woah, there is an implement in the street, I have to slow down and cover the break.
That is exactly how it has worked out all this time, however...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: If you can summarize. Your time is up.
Mr. Parks: Am I done?
Councilmember Cowden: It went red a while ago.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes, you six (6) minutes is done.
Mr. Parks: Am I allowed the same amount of time that
those fellows before me got?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Yes, everyone is allowed six (6) minutes total.
Mr. Parks: Are you telling me to go and sit?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I said if you can summarize real quickly, but
I cannot give you more time than other people. I need to be fair to everyone.
Mr. Parks: Did you get this sheet with the lifeguards on
it? Look at what the lifeguard said. I can read it to you, but if you got it in front of
you, which I planned on you doing, then everything is this way according to the
lifeguards who say—it was critical with the amount of speed that was going up and
down on Weke Road and the danger that was involved. Okay, question. How fast
can you get your little `okole from the pavilion down to Black Pot Beach Park? Well,
we can go four-wheel on the beach, if it not crowded or we can take our little trailers
and it is no problem at all. It is just a few seconds to get over this speed table. There
are five (5) of them or there were until a couple of them were removed without telling
anyone. By the way, seven point three (7.3) seconds is what it takes any fire truck to
go from the beginning of a speed table to off the other side. I respected what he said
here and by the way, my brother-in-law is a lifetime fireman, so I had to be careful
where I went with this, but this gentleman sitting over here who I never met...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Okay, you have to summarize. I think we
know where your stance is; you want to keep the tables. Are there any questions for
Mr. Parks?
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 37 MAY 1, 2019
Mr. Parks: Part of the problem is I have all those years of
information and some of it are sitting right here. It is this thick. What I did was...
Council Chair Kaneshiro: We got your information.
Mr. Parks: What I gave you was a condensed version
because I knew that you needed something short and quick.
Councilmember Cowden: It is to your best interest to let us vote before
Councilmember Kagawa has to walk out of this room. Councilmember Kagawa, you
have to leave, right?
Councilmember Kagawa: Yes.
Councilmember Cowden: I think that collectively, we have a pretty
strong understanding that you well-researched this, is that correct of where we are
at for our voting?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I do not know how the vote is going to turn
out, but I do not want to recess. I would like for us to get to a decision.
Councilmember Kagawa: Thumbs up or thumbs down, we can refer to
Committee, and have him as an expert and he can talk for an hour.
Mr. Parks: Before I leave this spot, am I coming back?
Council Chair Kaneshiro: No.
Councilmember Kagawa: If it dies and you want to put it back on the
agenda, we can come back.
Mr. Parks: Okay. I put my information up against your
engineer.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: And we received your information.
Councilmember Evslin.
Mr. Parks: I got the support from other engineers before
him saying "yes."
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Evslin.
Councilmember Evslin: Is there any way that if we do vote in favor of
the Resolution, that we get a commitment that they will just do one. I think the fear
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 38 MAY 1, 2019
is that they are going to replace them all with speed cushions, but if they test one out
while keeping the tables, I think it is more reasonable. I would be concerned about
voting in favor of the Resolution than having them replacing all five (5). Is it possible
to get a verbal commitment, if that was something that we wanted to do.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Mike and Lyle, can you both come back up?
Councilmember Kagawa: He said that because he heard the concerns
that he would try one (1) test it out...
Mr. Moule: We are only contracted to do one (1) right now.
We do not have a timeline when we would replace the others, the rubber speed tables
with either asphalt speed tables or asphalt speed cushions. Especially based on what
we heard today, we definitely would want to study this to see and make sure we talk
to fire and police, if we have one, before we do any work. We want to do the right
thing. We are not trying to push things on the public, we are just trying to find what
is best for everyone.
Councilmember Evslin: I also got some texts during this meeting of
concerns over canoe trailers bottoming out or having to straddle it and driving
through. They are willing to see how one go. If trailers end up bottoming out or the
community ends up hating it, or the public safety says it is terrible, then you folks
would go back and change that to a table?
Mr. Moule: Yes, we can certainly do that. There would be
cost of that, of course, but yes, we could do that.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: To change it to a table, would you just make
it longer?
Mr. Moule: It would be the full width of the road, except
for leaving a little gap at the edge, and it would be longer as far as down the length
of the road.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Chock.
Councilmember Chock: When do you need an answer by?
Mr. Moule: As far as our current project, we would need
an answer either this week or next week. It does not have to be today, but if we want
to do...it is far better for our project, if we have it by next week.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 39 MAY 1, 2019
Councilmember Chock: The concern I hear from the community is
that this is also being used as a crosswalk, have you been taking that into
consideration?
Mr. Moule: That was the one at Pilikoa, which I believe is
the one that is gone right now. I have heard that, I think that a better solution would
be to actually put a separate actual marked crosswalk with the proper lines on either
end, with a nearby speed table or speed cushion. Having a crosswalk there is
reasonable, it is just that it is not accessible either because it is all bumpy and it is
high.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Cowden.
Councilmember Cowden: I just want to say that I am a clear "no." I feel
that out of respect to the community and what has had a real proven track-record of
working, that we have not heard a good reason to do this. Fire and the police do not
need it. The canoes have gone over what is there for years with no problem. The
community has worked really hard. Had it not been called to my attention, it would
have simply been built. I am a very strong"no" to go with what we have had and that
is the existing resolution.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I have a quick question. If the Resolution gets
shot down, are you going to do an asphalt speed table versus a rubberized speed table?
Mr. Moule: For this one, it would be concrete to match the
surface of the pavement, but not rubber.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Okay. No rubber anymore. Are there further
questions? Are there further comments from the members? Do we know what we
want to do?
The meeting was called back to order, and proceeded as follows:
Councilmember Kagawa: If you are not sure, we can come back. I know
you hate to come back after you eat lunch, but I really have to leave.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: I think we should decide what we want to do
within the next five (5) minutes.
Councilmember Evslin: If it does not make an impact to their
scheduling, if we had one more week just to talk more to the community, I feel like
this is a bigger issue than I knew it was going to be. If we can come back next week
and make a decision...if that did not impact their construction schedule, then I would
be happy with that.
SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING 40 MAY 1, 2019
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Councilmember Chock.
Councilmember Chock: That is fine with me. What I would suggest is
that Mr. Parks meet with us two (2) at a time for a much longer meeting rather than
here, so that you can deliver the information. That would be my request. Thank you.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: The information can be E-mailed, you can
meet with Councilmembers...
(Councilmember Kagawa was noted as not present.)
Council Chair Kaneshiro: Is it the decision of the Council to defer?
Councilmember Cowden: I move to deny this.
Council Chair Kaneshiro: A deferral is going to overtake a vote on it.
What is the pleasure of the Council? The deferral would be to next week, May 8th.
We have four (4) votes left.
Councilmember Chock: If I vote on it now, I am voting "no." I will
support a deferral because I think it is proven that if other members want information
that they have the opportunity.
Councilmember Evslin moved to defer Resolution No. 2019-33 to the
May 8, 2019 Council Meeting, seconded by Councilmember Chock, and carried
by a vote of 4*:1:2 (*Pursuant to Rule No. 5(b) of the Rules of the Council of the
County of Kauai, Councilmember Kagawa was noted as silent (not present), but
shall be recorded as an affirmative for the motion; Councilmember Cowden
voting no; Councilmembers Brun and Kuali`i were excused).
Council Chair Kaneshiro: The deferral passes, because Councilmember
Kagawa is an "aye," right? The Resolution is deferred. Seeing no further business
and hearing no objections, this Special Council Meeting is adjourned.
ADJOURNMENT:
There being no further business, the Special Council Meeting adjourned at
12:13 p.m.
lb tfu ly submitted,
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JAD . . FOUNTAIN-TANIGAWA
County Clerk
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