President Packard called the meeting to order at 12:00 pm. He welcomed attendees and announced that the annual meeting will be held on Wednesday, June 19 at 11:30 pm at the offices of SSFM International. The guest speaker will be International Vice President Zaki Mustafa. He also noted that members should have already received their ballots for Chapter elections and should receive their District ballots on June 10. He provided some campaign literature for two National Vice-President candidates. He noted that Cathy Leong is running for District Secretary/Treasurer. Then, he introduced the speaker, Kaleo Manuel with the Department of Hawaiian Homelands (DHHL).
Mr. Manuel said that DHHL has a small planning staff of five individuals, and presented information on the history of the department, which goes back to the Hawaiian Home Commission Act of 1920. The goal of the department is to revitalize the native Hawaiian population, which was decimated following the European discovery of the islands in 1778. DHHL is essentially a homesteading program, which was granted 200,000 acres of land on six of the eight major islands. However, the land is often remote and difficult to access.
Mr. Manuel presented information on DHHL’s planning system, which includes:
- The General Plan, which has a 20-year planning horizon and is updated every 10 years;
- Strategic Program Plans, which translate the General Plan into specific action plans, and have a three to six year timeframe
- Island Plans, which establish the land-use goals and objectives on each island, identify islandwide needs, opportunities, priorities, and DHHL land-use designations; they have a ten year planning horizon
- Regional plans, which cover developed areas, identify data, issues, and potential projects, and are updated every two to five years
- Development plans, which cover undeveloped areas, timing and phasing for delivering the optimum number of homestead lots, market and demand, social considerations, and environmental analysis
He noted that no cost of infrastructure is passed on to the beneficiaries, which must be of at least 50% native Hawaiian blood and be at least 18 years old. He then presented some examples of transportation issues that DHHL deals with, such as emergency egress, access, connectivity, and complete streets implementation.
Following his presentation, Mr. Manuel took several questions from the audience.
The meeting adjourned at 12:55 pm.
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