properly published mr chair notice of this public hearing on the proposed budget bills as listed on today's agenda was published on the main nineteenth and may twenty second issues in the mali news respectively thank you very much members the purpose of this public hearing is to receive public testimony on the proposed budget bills listed on today's public hearing agenda and before we proceed with the agenda please request that everyone silence their cell phones and mr clark let's proceed mr chair proceeding with presentation of public testimony we've established limited telephone interactive communication  honna to provide testimony from our district offices individuals who wish to offer testimony from honolulu nine and morlock i should now sign up with the district office staff individuals who wish to offer testimony in the council chamber please sign up at the desk located on the eighth floor lobby just outside the chamber door testimony at all locations is limited to the item listed on today's agenda pursuant to the rules of the council each testifiers allowed to testify for up to three minutes with one minute to conclude if requested and when testifying please state your name and the name of any organization you represent the pano office please identify yourself and introduce your first test chamber and the first person to testify in the chamber is jim smith to be followed by robert jocelyn there three minutes for the public hearing on each item or just one item being a public hearing well if you would technically we have not seen it in the rules  here on this budget operating budget has just incredible amount of stuff but i would ask you first of all to stay real be true to our see whatever and it's here in the budget and it's an example would be moving the budget program the idea of a budget program first of all it's ludicrous but moving the budget program to the mayor's office where charter is very specific that the apartment of planning management the part of management ok supervises the budget they prepare the budget if you look at that section that one point three five it tells you to refer to the office of mayor and it says that the managing director has the duty ok to supervise the budget and you are given a budget requests that it be moved to the office in there that's not our let me just mention another one which is this detail number one two three eight which is this country water expansion capital font the problem is dysfunction the problem is a director or department that's not doing the job not a lack of money so please don't do those funds thank you i'd like to no right now in haiku you have a forty four lot subdivision being developed right in haiku tom by west ok you've got this water shortage stuff you're working on and you're you're going to hit us that and then ok and then you have these no capital improvements specific to that there's no connection between what you're building and the treatment plant you're building key h forest things you're spending twenty million dollars on just those two things ideas ok and then you're going to set up a fund to do capital for upcountry water list on the water list itself isn't solved by money it's solved by limiting demand so you're not even being placed in the right place ok you're just being floated by this executive branch it's dysfunctional because they changed from operating budget capital program to budget program and capital program in one thousand nine hundred three and it's been helter skelter ever since because there's no such thing as a budget program ok or are a program budget that hides responsibility it eliminates responsibility from the person who is inept and that's why you have that it's a fraud and you are being played and it doesn't stop even though you know it it doesn't stop your react to it as if it's serious but please as our capital improvement budget is considered put it into a concept of what's happening in real time thank you very much that was on that particular item the other the last thing that i would like to testify on is this  there's loans all these loans with twenty thousand dollars and twenty million dollars for this and this will just pay three hundred thousand dollars about the people that you don't see the people who are real that the mayor doesn't see because he's so creative he's got these imaginations things going on but you know we have a forty million dollar d and it doesn't get smaller so i appreciate you being here and stay strong and stay real don't bite every time the hook is dangled in front of you thank you very much good morning mr chairman you know many members of the council my name is robert joslin and i'm the vice chairman for the board of water supply and have been for the last few years but i'm here to speak to one item on the budget and that has to do with our billing system there is a million dollars grasses a line item or reduced i'm sorry reduced down to two hundred fifty thousand and that has to do with  feeding the agreement that we have with sitting in county honolulu i have been asked to speak for the border water supply your board of water supply for this issue we would like to see the million dollar line item put back in to get our own c i s system in which is our own customer information and building system we don't have one right now and we see a problem on the horizon if we stay on the same path that we have with the mess up that i would call that happened in honolulu i have a letter that signed by me that should be amongst members but i'd like to go a little off script sitting county is proposing a ten year agreement that will escalate to a million dollars a year if we stay with them now the system that was in place isn't is under performing won't perform to the our size the oracle system that has all the bells and whistles that went on into the honolulu system that we tagged ourselves with is doesn't fit us and isn't going to work and it's going to get expenses every year goes by taking the hundred dollars or taken a million dollars out of the budget mess of the world well it just it asserts the ability for us to move forward on our own we will be forever married to that system in honolulu if we don't suit something about within this b cycle sitting county if they end it on us or we don't carry forward with the greater amounts every year goes on we're going to be stuck without a system so we don't have one now so we would need that in place because of the the curve that it takes you to get to our billing system that works for all of us in a county won't be up to speed because it doesn't exist or they could cut it while we don't have anything you know you have a bunch of people around here trying to write out bills and look and to get our billing system right so i asked that council and share reconsider that line item we'd like to move a million out of the twelve thirty six capital improvement reserve agreement that escalates every year for ten years to the million dollars so if we don't do it this year we're signing a ten year green an illness unless the verbiage gets put in that you can bail out of it at any time i don't think they're going to do thank you and the water water supply in honolulu has agreed to opt out at any time we want to opt belt so check your records it was stated here at the meeting that we would be allowed to opt out at any time we had a meeting here with the director from their department of water and he did state that any time he'd allow us to opt out he knows we're moving in that direction to get our own system thank you any further questions members written testimony that's reflected in miss testimony i would like to address the large disparity in taxation between time shares versus all other categories and my always real property tax revenue budget we asked the council to recognize the contributions that full service time shares make to the community for service time shares like the ocean reserve villas provide good stable jobs opportunities and sustainability and are no more of a burden on county infrastructure than any other resident or visitor the council can achieve this by creating a sub classification in the whole tone resort real property tax category under which full service timeshare properties may qualify with this solution money can maintain its existing higher real property tax rate for time shares that do not contribute to the local economy and at the same time acknowledge timeshare properties that are invested members i'm always community an economy for service time shows like the ocean resort villas provide owners with accommodations in amenities in a resort setting and are resort owner and guest amenities include a spa pools fitness centers in tennis courts front desk and valet attendance and services and a kids club program however the public also enjoys our full service restaurants banquet event functions and a market and general store more importantly we are absolutely committed to being excellent neighbors and community members for example over the past five years we have reduced our electric consumption by nineteen percent and water consumption by twenty percent we also provide over fifty percent of our own electric power on property which further reduces the amount on the maui electric grid our shuttle system which provides transportation for our owners from the resort to various locations including a hyena takes about three hundred thousand cars off the roads every year additionally we receive our food and beverage and supply deliveries on a daily basis from many members and vendors on all resort to is in activities use local businesses as well in fact almost one hundred percent of our business operational expenses come from operations based in hawaii furthermore our owners and associates volunteer for a variety of community organizations including the maori charity walk relay for life malema hanako why malema and the maui food bank as well as habitat for humanity make a wish foundation we also provide guidance support education and career path information to maui children and young adults despite the significant contributions we have been mischaracterized in unfairly penalize with the highest real property tax rates on maui and in the state of hawaii for years for that reason i take our suggestion and seriously consider creating a sub classification for full service timeshare properties hollow thank you it's a no brainer members any questions for the test fire so thank you for being here this morning   bus fare increase and the elimination of the discount bus passes for seniors and students according to an article that i pulled up on the internet by keith kessler of key hey had protested some time ago with regard to the increase in bus fares and evidently there is a law in place and i can quote launch just one is the federal subsidized stransky it provider must provide a discount to valid medical medicare holders not just seniors but all medicare recipients federal subsidized trance it providers may not charge more than half of the peak price peak figure for fixed rate route transfer during the off peak hours for seniors and people with disabilities and medicare card holders and then there was there was an article that was doing it it october twenty seventh two thousand and nine and in that article it basically states that the transit system the maui bus system has logged more than six thousand boardings per day and it says it's not uncommon for  smaller twenty five passenger buses to experience of overloading which means that the bus service itself has increased and later in the article it base basically states that in two thousand and nine  two buses were purchased by manufacturer side california and eighty percent of the finding was subsidized by federal funding and the remaining binded by the county of maui and then the mexico article that i wanted to basically refer to is an article that stated august fifteenth to twenty thirteen and i v news and basically it says that it had a thousand world will be will go to building ten shelters and so the reason why i'm bringing this year attention is someone like me who is a senior citizen on a on a fixed budget it really impacts i will have to instead of riding the bus will have to walk i have right now i have i'm on disability and so that's going to be a substantial burden to myself if you could provide a concluding sentence where your timeless has expired thank you so basically what i'm saying is that for th students and seniors i believe that this is very unfair for them to eliminate a discount for us ok thank you very much members any questions for the test and the people living on fixed income i stand by for you to express my concerns as the import absolute importance of following through on the latest polls all regarding the bus fare the molly bus or the paris trances service is discriminated against on the basis of race color sex age religion national religi disability low income or limited english proficiency the original proposal by rick rickey hall comma violated the rights of the people of this community h w bush fairness and dignity for the people with disabilities to ensure the basic guarantees of freedom of choice control of their lives and the opportunity to nikki to blend of good morning mr chair and council members my name is skip clark johnson today i'm addressing the proposed bus fare increase by the county of which i do not support the personal stories that you're hearing today describe the hardships that we would endure to increase bus fares which would make life more of a struggle my budget is very tight all rely on the bus since i cannot afford to drive my car parking is also a problem and why local town weekdays as you are well aware i'll be returning to college which means my finances will be even harder to manage the bus reduces traffic congestion the bus is better for the environment the bus allows people to access different parts of the island and please don't cut bus service either the proposal caused a lot of anxiety here and depression what is it that the county is penalizing the low income or no income by cutting services and raising fees there are people whose need is greatest we are talking about brothers sisters aunts uncles mothers fathers in our friends as concerned citizens and voting members of the community we are very concerned about this growing trend but government agencies of cutting services and increasing fees have you ever tried giving up a car for a month and have little or no money to live on i request that you reconsider the bus fare increase and do what is on the gulf he's proposed for the resistance with court and retirees with rigs in court i do not have the statistics for the comparative number of grounds play during the year as compared to the pr the observation the number of rounds must be sure must surely be much less than past years the proposed rates basically increase the current rates by fifty percent for  the residual card and by hundred percent for retirees with card such an increase may most likely reduce the number of plays by these golfers which would most likely reduce the revenues and increase the subsidies from the general fund there are statement made statements made that nothing is free to which i agree with the proviso that  sharing of the burden must be fair the operations the operation of the golf course is highlighted due to the county requirement that since the golf course operation is an enterprise fund it must be separated from the general fund this of course highlights the amount of subsidies needed from the general fund however the recovery of costs for for the swimming pools tennis courts and other recreational activities are not discussed because the general fund subsidies for these operations are not highlighted i am not proposing fees for these record recreational activities but i am requesting that the money county council the general fund subsidies record for the golf course operations in concert with the subsidies for these other recreational activities and facilities golfers may not be swimmers or tennis players and swimmers and tennis players may not be golfers so the bird burden of the general fund subsidies must be shared among these recreational activit suggestions to improve the conditions but the problem still remains today the audit also recommended not to increase the go fees until the conditions of the golf course are improved and to moderately increase the fees as the golf course conditions improve i propose that before any increase in golf is me a follow up audit of the gov me and discuss i sincerely hope that the foregoing testimony will provide an good morning good morning council chair members of the county council when he was greg how earth the president line a diver's incorporated i also own a company line a dive and surf l l c i'm here to testify today regarding the commercial ocean recreation activity permit fees and or stand that there's been a lot of debate and discussion on where fees are going i know that the mayor has had some pretty lofty goals on a budget but a six hundred percent increase in any business fees is exorbitant and should not be expected those businesses can can carry that the changes that are being proposed to go to the fee structure is disingenuous when you take into account the way the actual permit fees operate forcing people to take on one park eliminates the safety of being able to go to multiple parks during different weather conditions and different times we've had excess instances where we've had concerns over marine life incidents as well as surf and runoff it also puts the operators in a position of having to choose it also makes it difficult for the local residents to be able to access these services as well i request humbly request that you delay the discussion until you've had a chance to work more closely with the operators and take into some of those  am here to testify that the proposed increase in corporate phase is unfair disproportionate and will do irreparable harm to my community small schools like mine collectively employ up to four hundred local instructors and guides this big increase hurts small schools and puts many of those jobs at risk chorus cools instructors provide safe instruction for ocean recreation in the sports of surfing windsurfing kayaking snorkeling and scuba corps instructors also prevent many accidents in the oceans by informing the public as well as performing interventions and many on water rescues if you read the news you will know that the ocean can be a dangerous place now he has said more than its fair share of accidents and tragedies in the water many county doesn't even have enough lifeguards and they are spread very thin now he has one hundred twenty miles of coastline thirty miles of beaches but there are only about eleven lifeguard towers and this budget might also reduce fire and rescue personnel as well so how do we make the ocean safer millions of people visit mainly beaches not only the locals but also the majority of miami's visitors beaches to engage in some sort of ocean based recreation and most of them totally unsupervised cora has the ability to office safe surfing lessons scuba certification experience kayak and snorkel guides and sport specific instruction in windsurfing and kiteboarding this is a far better alternative to people attempting to learn the sports on their own people need access to safe ocean recreation instruction without proper guidance an inexperienced ocean nugent's could quickly become a danger to themselves and to others the core industry helps to provide a safety net for partizan bins and helps to protect the public as well local ocean recreation schools like mine have worked in partnership with the county for decades these legitimate operate is a closely regulated by the county and followed forty two pages of rules and have to meet strict standards core is made up of many small schools and instructors that follow the rules about a laws create jobs pay taxes and contribute to the local economy please do not suddenly increase their permit fees so high without proper justification no other industry on maui has had to suffer such a severe and disproportionate increase of fees even the downhill biking permit proposed fees and significance when pro compared to the proposed core increases make no mistake the proposed fee increase is an industry killer members questions mr coach thank you mr chair and thank you mr durham for coming to testify i just want to get a clarification you said you were a small small business just a small school that you lot but joyner testifying as an individual in my third decade on this platform speaking about the three can plan curbside recycling those of us who favor this or  do so because we really believe that curbside recycling needs to be maintained we thank you for the six dollars cap which you have placed in the budget on that service and i believe that we can live with that if the three can plan curbside recycling is terminated now we believe that it will never be restarted the energy we still waste plant may never happen and that would leave us with only the maximum difficulty recycling we really need curbside recycling and we believe if the energy a plant does not happen then the curbside recycling needs to be expanded  i have passed out a copy of the report from the solid waste department says the cost is twenty two dollars per person per month and i find that  this is bogus the mayor promised us that this report was supposed to provide the incremental cost associated with curbside recycling in reality it did does they throw in everything they possibly can as an example estimated depreciated cost of dedicated refuse trucks excuse me do the trucks depreciate more because they're picking up a green can or a blue can than they do for a brown can absolutely not estimated maintenance on the cost of refuse trucks is the maintenance greater for blue and green cans than it is for brown cans not these numbers  relevant and should not be in here the cost of maintenance repair and storage of one of the trucks it's the same there should not being in here the annual costs of county staff to maintain this program  forty forty seven thousand dollars did you guys approve more money for staff for the three can plan i don't think so i think it's the same staff this number should not be in here annual cost of staff to manage the program is shown in here is there are additional costs did you did you guys authorize additional hires for that that's totally wrong come down to the bottom on the left hand side says total annual program cost and then below that it says inflationary cost increase over ten years period three percent annually where in the world did that number come from i can't even get to that without a network which actually includes eight additional neighborhoods and it's an electronic bulletin board and we discussed that and the clear clearly there is great support for the six dollars additional cost and in reality when i run through these these numbers on this on this thing and i take out all of the bogus stuff and i look at the actual incremental cost it turns out in my opinion that you guys actually can make money on this because you save money on the landfill and this report does not include the value of the recycle lytle it's where is that the all of the high five items the sale of the of the paper the plastic is not included in this so yes i think that the six dollars will work with the public and we will and those of us in support of this will work very hard to implement roger simon and good morning on council members and counselors here my name's jeff stron i'm the general manager of a dive shop i have been for about thirty years now i would like to speak out in opposition of the six hundred percent increase of the core permits i recognize that that things cost more money in permits need to go up but i'd like to just talk about two  topics of it in why it be that an increase of that high would be devastating to us in our industry we have a need for having multiple permits ok there are a variety of different reasons the most common reason is is because of safety if there's big surf on one side of the island we need the ability to go to another side of the island after the shark attack we need obviously don't want to go in there but there's many many other reasons why our business needs multiple permits  variety as you well know if you're going to become a certified divers you're going to make sixty eight dives during that certification process and people in that class get a little bit tired of diving the exact same beach time and time and time again they want to see a variety of different places we have eight stores on the island and therefore there's a convenience argument the convenience is is that if someone is being serviced by one of our stores in la hina it doesn't make sense to send them down little beach in south maui so we need to have multiple person permits there's also a disbursement argument if you go to request for proposal or you raise the rates where the permits are so so costly when we started this process some twenty years ago and joe and johnson asked me to sit on this committee for fifty a nominal fee dollars fee i could do any discipline in any par and that went to two hundred fifty dollars and then it went to five hundred dollars and then it went to a fee per park and then a per park per discipline and my fees this year last year were four thousand dollars i have eight permits this year the proposal is to go to twenty four thousand dollars so in a twenty year period of time my fees have gone from fifty dollars which was ridiculously cheap to twenty four thousand dollars which is absurd it's absolutely absurd there's been comments i think mr white you you even made them about the comparison between what someone on on kaanapali would pay it's completely apples and oranges there's no fifty passenger cat south there's no we've got a space in wheelers village i've seen the studies there's no three hundred fifty thousand people a foot traffic going by there and someone operating out of a county park just can't justify that kind of great that you guys can get that at the hotel but it's apples and oranges really really really so in conclusion i just want to say please reconsider raising the fees and you have time to to stay this a little bit more thank you members questions morning chair and council members my name is roger simon on here representing myself in a small company i have with my eco tours with the in relation to the core of increasing fees i don't really have a prepared i don't really have a prepared speech here this morning but i just wanted to come down and show our concern regarding this astronomical increase i do hold three permits with that company and typically we only use one beach park the other ones backup parks this kind of increase is very you know it's a hardship on us between the inability perhaps to raise investment capital for new equipment and things like that it's also a safety concern if we don't have those back up beaches you know there might be some some a little bit of pressure to to go when perhaps if you had a back up beach a relocation is more appropriate and i didn't want to make one mention commercially in the state and so we're also you know we're getting hit on you know multiple levels here as well  we want to continue operating we know there's a value in using the beach parks but i think you know if we see if we stop and think about this if it's if the problem we're trying to solve is a financial one maybe going into a percentage or a fixed analysis yesterday and he did inform me about the changes that the state has put forward the three percent of the two hundred dollars and he also said that if they turn somebody down they're not going to come to the park to go to the beach so there are some some new type of core business you have it sounds like and scuba diving but it's kayaking kayaking yeah so ok so you only go out of one beach out of the three that you could go right ok and that's just logistics it's it's a simple operation we have a small but important paragraph at the end of the budget ordinance that make significant changes to the program budget as relates to how and when budget amounts for salaries operation and equipment can or cannot be used interchangeably without  approval the proposed change will require that all programs not only stay within their budget of the house which is currently how we do things but all programs must stay within their alligator allocated category of use salaries operations equipment budgets and not intermingle without council approval there are other changes related to doing work across departmental e as well which i'm not testifying on today but quite frankly i'm not sure what all will be effect on that proposed change i didn't testify on this during the presentation of the budget and answer your specific questions that i thought was more of a general issue than a departmental issue but i'm here today i have two observations on this change the first is that we will be more conservative in our spending and on and in response to issues that come up they require spending than we have been in the past this is a natural reaction it will be universal across the  guarantee of course that those changes will be approved so naturally we will err on the side of you guessed it not going to jail the first area where this could appear is our response to non depending on the time of the year the funds remaining be to minimize or operational costs and work primarily on scheduled work times and hours my second observation is that this is a significant change to how we budget and spend funds and the change is very abrupt and without the broad discussion and analyzing all the impacts i'll conclude here quickly certainly there's pros and cons to it i'm not saying there is no pro here there are definitely pros and cons to it but i don't recall more than an hour to a discussion on this item during the deliberations resume full and broad discussion should be had in budget committee as a separate item therefore my recommendation is to not change second section seven at this time and refer the changes to committee we look forward to a for our annual budget several weeks ago to the budget committee and i'm here to explain why we're asking for operating budget of sixteen thousand this year fifteen years ago we had to work for five years to get  a facilities here our clinic our vet center and our vocal rehab program we have the opportunity to do the same thing this year we're looking at expanding and moving all those to one site we're going to need quite a bit of money and a lot of lobbying he cuz there's some opposition to that the current clinic and the other programs have bought brought in over the last fourteen years six million five hundred thousand dollars into the economy and we decided to do an evaluation of the type of money that the veterans here bring in we think with the new law and one complex which is going to be larger and with the emphasis on going after the afghan and iraqi veterans we're going to bring in about ten million dollars over about an eight year period so we think this is a real sound investment and this sixteen thousand dollars will probably carry us very well  about a year or two and then we can go back to the nine thousand that we've been getting i know about a ten years ago we used to get eighteen thousand and then we split that nine and nine for molokai which we support  also aging so we need outsource a bunch of our parading and other cost but we're asking you to really look at the the impact that this new facility will bring and what we've already brought in we have over three thousand veterans using a clinic and a vet center and we have had over almost a thousand people with invoke rehab program which is actually better to the life of those thousand families so we ask you for your generosity and understand that the return it will be very large but also will support the veterans we have done twenty thousand hours of work in the last fourteen years and we haven't asked for one penny in return so thank you consul thank you mr members questions for the test fire see none thank you for being here this morning morning chair council members but like to apologize to the chair the chair of the finance committee sandy bars in the council members for not being on top of this earlier this year we had our own little internal things going on over the years we've spent a lot of personal money trying to lobby for different things we were in danger of losing the expansion at the high school we need to be able to have the extra funds so we can effect lobby at the state level at the v a level in honolulu and it's nice to be able to go over and try to talk to your senators face to face because they don't get over very often it takes a long time because you've got to get on a plane you've got to go we got to hang around you got to wait for the meeting gotta fly back we have the will power to do this but we lack the funds over the years  veterans expansion to the cemetery we're still working on getting that done i'm still scared of thoughts going to be down on time however the extra money we're asking for will be well spent lobbying as we always have to bring better benefits for veterans if we every time we get a veteran through the system and he gets service connected that's three thousand dollars of unearned income brought to this island and spent every penny of that gets spent on this island i think it's important that you help us out here years ago i had eighteen thousand dollars in personal deposition costs going against the v a when we were trying to get the first clinic care expanded i can't afford that anymore i wish i could i would have to come and ask you guys for money i realize we slipped through the cracks by not effectively lobbying you guys before this so i'm asking you to take into consideration the things we've done the right rosario good morning counsel thank you very much for allowing us to have testimony today my name is lisa darcy and i come here as a very active community member i am interested in testifying on the process by which the bus fare recommendation happened and i understand the decision has been postponed or tabled and the increase is not expected to happen however i would like to testify on the process by which this happened in my opinion our communication system for the fare increases is broken as an active member of the maori disability alliance as the transportation chair a participant in the maori homeless alliance as  membership chair former mental health america board member current hawaii public housing board member and participant on the persons with commission with prisons persons with disabilities i was shocked to hear that this proposal happened  the county has over fifty five hundred individuals on fixed incomes and that means that they're living on about seven hundred forty dollars a month there are countless more who live on less as an active member of all of these committees and in the community i recognize if there was no inclusion with our voice in this process and that fair recommendation my testimony is to acknowledge the needs of those community members who are not being valued in this process and i again stand before you respectfully asking and requesting that the council provide access to the as alliances and boards to participate in this process as a result of this information maui economic opportunity has actually changed some of their processes and is implementing changes to provide education and forums for this community in order for their voice to be heard i respectfully request that the commission and the council who is responsible for gathering this information include these individuals and value their information there are solutions to support individuals to become independent in our community and we have to find those solutions this proposal came about without much consultation from our community even though i understand again that this is being tabled and the proposal for the fare increase will not go forward it is really important that this council recognize and bring in information that will be valuable to this entire community thank you thank you mr see members any questions f show you actually that the bus fare hike it's good like devastate my income as you can see i get general assistance for three hundred forty eight dollars i get food stabs which is two hundred ninety seven dollars total so this after my rent for the bus pass that i pay now and my hygiene now and my phone it cuts to this and then it leaves me this much money and laugh and i was thinking like ok if i get this for money money and this is for my food stamps  end up getting less than this i don't know if the consul people understand this but it's going to be a hardship i walk all over the place right now because i can't really actually ford the bus fare either and i wanted to know if they'd like taking account for everyone to has disability that it's really hard for us to even managed just to get through this month to month thing and i hope that you take in account price and thank you very much thank you very much members any questions  before you go on would she be willing to leave that so that we have an actual copy if you'd be willing to leave yes i would say please and i'm not a dish times that year but at a little point i you know like these different copies to be submitted and that's why we're thank you very any other questions for the test fire see none thank you for being here this to start off by saying we have probably the fastest growing bus system in the nation we also have one of the so one of the easiest bus routes to read and follow we care about this bus system so much that most of us ride on a daily basis and rely on it for our necessary public transportation needs to go to work and for basic travel destinations in different parts of the i mean depending on where the person needs to be and in what time i am a regular on the molly bus and i do see areas of this bus is a bus system that may need some work on as our system is still developing i am hoping we can meet our communities needs as we work on the next step to improve our transportation if we are going to start paying the same fares as all then i would like you to find some solutions on ways you can make our bus system match wahoos bus system s driving and have less fatalities plus people are just simply too tired to drive home community pans on the molly bus and i hope we can come to an understanding on this also there are a lot of people who can't afford a car neither along pay for gas they can barely afford in monthly bus pass would a lot of people who are at poverty level making ends meet best we save money not spend spend more so please please think of ways and please communicate first so we can work together to develop those fears in ways that will make a difference in our my name is rob dwarf i'm here to testify on behalf of being a now i count he citizen that rides the bus and this is regarding the rate increase i i'm going to keep this simple i'm a senior bus pass monthly holder and i've been a monthly bus pass holder for the last two years it's my major transportation and i mean this in a very respectful way i see a lot of people here that i ride the bus with i don't recognize too many of you council members riding the bus this rate increase is going to harm us a lot of us that are in in low income financial positions there are other ways it could benefit if we need to raise rates and one option could be i notice a lot of tourists riding the buses they're happy to pay the low fare that for for themselves being on vacation there's ways that would be fair that would would be easier for them to help with the raising the the rates but i believe for a lot of people if we could keep the monthly rates where they're out it would help even if it's a daily increase on a on a daily rate but the monthly bus passes are a very beneficial way for a people that don't have vehicles to get around maui all right that's it thank you thank you members any questions for the test fire scene done thanks for being in this morning it's a double stick raise on the price on the my bus will not affect my pocket directly i am epileptic not allowed to drive and consider disabled you may remember me from a couple of years ago thank you for putting out the disabled pass as needed however this affects my heart and mind and many of my friends and neighbors this also is why i'm here i'm certain there are many ways you the county can make monthly money without doing this if you would just think about it so you are all very smart and powerful people right it seems as though you have turned writing the bus into a money making business rather than in stead of a low cost service to the public prices have doubled in the last couple of years and while the price of gas has gone down by about two thirds you could find other ways everybody i've ever talked to about it even a bunch of the drivers of the bus think we should have later ro coming home from kabul manu you know even the last of the shoppers that means at least like ten ten thirty or even on through to the end of the night like as some other people have said to catch all the junk drivers so that they wouldn't be as many write the bus several times a day nearly every day i'm not allowed to drive you get used to buy the new buses a year later possibly raise the temperature in the bus if that's not a health hazard everyone including the tourists and even a lot of the drivers think it's freezing cold on the bus i know that you the county have other ways of making your getting money without going this far fast and yesterday i went in got made a petition and got about fifty two signatures at the mall from all workers that would love to ride the hold two core permits and what we're doing here today is proposing that you consider a reconsider the increase on the core fees we've been holding permits for ocean recreation activities for over twenty years and we understand and expect increases for operating expenses but we and we welcome them actually especially when you're going to use the funds or appropriate the funds for beach improvements because many of our beach park student improvements we are small family owned family run operation it keeps my husband busy with work my children my son in law and just a few others as a mom i don't think it's selfish of me to want to keep my children here in hawaii we've been living here they were born and raised here the proposed makes it very difficult for them to stay here because it's hard to operate with these extreme increase proposal such as starting at one hundred fifty percent and going on up as i understand his proposed i feel it's an extreme hike and i respect respectfully request that you consider a more modest or reasonable increase maybe starting at around one hundred percent please consider a more gradual increase for us which would allow us to continue operating our family business as well as keeping our kids here on the island of their birth this will also allow us to keep our ticket prices affordable for our customers keep them coming back to our valley aisle so we welcome again as i mentioned these permit increases if if you folks would appropriate some of the funds to improving the locations of these parks they're really in need in some cases our intention is to keep our family here on the island that they love and we want to turn our business over to our children and hopefully our grandchildren one day we take pride in giving our customers a fun experience here when they come but also safe and by operating with these under these core rules  that includes having these liability insurance says so this covers the county's liability as well and we want everybody to be safe and to be taken care of that way this will keep the visitors coming back increasing the revenue for  our economy so this will benefit the whole county of maui and the state as well so please help us keep our business viable you can do this by considering a more modest reasonable corps a permit fee or perhaps deferring this for being here next testifier is rick to be followed by pamela tom pop recreational business been kora permit holder assistance section of this or arrangement yearly we proved to be fully compliant with the core state federal  tax laws and we worked hard to build on this business every year we apply for a new permit and before we can even apply all of these features our taxes are have to be cleared so apparently we've been doing on its legal business all these years now we as my wife mention the state and county has it insured so that as we hand held our four hold our hands of our customers and bring them to the beach for a which we are a very small part of the tourist industry employs hundreds of people in the state of hawaii bringing millions of dollars in revenue to not just mali but the state of hawaii in general we have travel agents we have management companies who bring in thousands of corporate people here to enjoy maui in what he has to offer we have airlines hotels transportation car rentals restaurants gift shops grocery stores and our activities ocean or land of coral permit holders we're just a small part of a large industry that contributes to the economics of hawaii in general couple questions of what are the fees being used for at this point we've been paying these fees for the for the park is it for enforcement is it to improve the parks is it to take care of the illegal operators that are right outside the park safety hazards there's no water no toilets i'm bringing in corporate america to a beautiful beach and we have to watch that we don't kick ourselves on bench that's overturned or a piece of pipe sticking out that's just dangerous business like when you refer to my real estate it's easy to get top money for real estate but in the interim we remove a lot of people that used to live here because you can't afford the texas or dissonant saw think about that when it comes to a business i suggest we respectfully suggest we make an amendment to perhaps a modest increase like my wife says hundred percent maybe some thousand dollars for the first park and five hundred for any other parks after that but we can deal with to be followed by alan aloha and good morning chair white and council members i'm hamiliton pop president of the maui chamber of commerce and i thank you for the opportunity to be here to testify in the budget today we know that you have many competing interests and you know we really appreciate you taking the time to hear all of those and at the chamber we haven't kept continued to ask the county to focus on priorities pay down our debt make strategic investments that net significant returns in terms of economic growth and look at ways to reduce costs for the county in many cases this year we have appreciated that you've worked to reduce costs and bring down important things like taxes with real property assessments going up that you've brought down the tax valuation so we appreciate that  homeowners rate has historically been low so we feel it is ok for that rate to stay the same not in my testimony that we submitted but i do want to echo that i was glad to hear that you're looking to keep the bus rates the same and that change  been proposed again to keep them the same and i would just like to advocate for an annual pass to be able to sell an annual pass and i think that you could also make additional income as a mother who frequently buys those passes if one is lost or stolen or whatever needs to be replaced there's  be a nominal fee like ten dollars could be charged for replacement of an annual pass i do want to of course support economic development initiatives and your continued support of small businesses as well as your continued support of our agriculture our high tech our manufacturing and most importantly our visitor industry by your increased investment in these industries we are netting significant returns and that's very important to our community on the issue of fuel tax chambers of commerce and motor vehicle registration tax chambers of commerce are supporting on a national level an increase in these taxes because we know that we need reinvestment in our roads our highways our bridges and transportation areas and we know we need that here too so we but we're worried about the staggering because we're worried about how this is getting looked at as an increased tax on a federal level possibility of state and county so we'd like to see more and we'd like to have a better understanding that if that tax were pas that it was going to be used for its intended purpose i also want to talk about increasing fees and the big fee as you know because i've reached out to you is the core of permit fee hike six hundred percent is astronomical well we've worked in talk to people in the industry and while they're willing to help participate that fee is just too high and all businesses we've talked to feel that it's outrageous it would be very harmful to their industry and because of the high proposed it gives them cause for concern we feel there is room to allow new permit operators because as i've heard you've heard today there are permits that have been released and so they've gone from four hundred seventeen to one hundred eighteen permits that gives us room additional beach parks clerk alan d s to be followed by deborah green am opposed to the fee increase i want to start my testimony with reading the parks department mission statement provide safe satisfying and cost effective recreational opportunities for the residents of and the visitors to my count this could be my business mission statement and that's what i've been doing for the last thirty years and i want to read a portion of the hawkeye state wide comprehensive outdoor recreation plan two thousand and fifteen update this from page forty seven if it is are the single most popular outdoor recreation activity among visitors to hawaii it also says in the first three words of the first strategy i'm sorry what i'm saying is the first three words of the first strategy of the first call of the hawaii state comprehensive outdoor recreation plan for two thousand and fifteen are support each activities and also says a little further down on page eighty nine support lifestyle sports activities that we teach our life time sports surfing windsurfing kite surfing and the other core activities scuba and kayaking our lifetime sports ziplining has its place but if you ever heard someone say i'm a zip line or i'm a banana boat rider you know that the maui residents that have taken up the sports that we introduce to them go back to the maui water sports shops and buy boards and equipment and roof racks and board short six cetera the shop then orders more inventory from the manufacturers the manufacturers keep their workers employed and so on the visitors return year after year for instruction and guidance they rent cars stay in hotels dine out our water sports schools support more than one industry in the last week i was here and i in council chambers and i had the opportunity to listen to some great to choose from some great people for some great ideas they were all asking for grant money from the  help to promote its destination and cultural assets to the visitors while furthering economic development now i'm not asking for a grant but i'm asking you to ask yourself what is the difference between their pitch to o e d and what i am and the rest of ocean recreation service providers doing to better the economy to promote tourism to teach and guide these lifetime sports with a high degree of professionalism to act as lifeguards where there are none and last but not least to stewart and to be stewards and educators of the environment in closing i want i just want to be appreciated acknowledged for the work we have done to build and maintain a portion of both the maui economy and visitor industry moore good morning hon chair council members staff members of the community my name is deborah green and i currently serve as president of the mountain meadows neighborhood association and i'm testifying on behalf of the association and its constituents we wholeheartedly support the council's proposal to reinstate the three can curbside recycling program at six dollars a month and we thank you for seeing that that's the sensible thing to do we have polled our membership and about ninety three percent agree to pay at least six dollars a month for the service we oppose the mayor's proposal to charge us twenty two dollars a month for a service that we've been told costs about six dollars a month if money is an issue reinstating the three can plan could actually save the county money because of the contract for processing recyclables at the drop boxes curbside recycling is substantially less expensive than dropbox recycling and with about fifteen hundred key hey area households potentially affected that represents a significant savings if energya is the issue it could be several years before that operation is up and running along with some significant obstacles to overcome along the way in the meantime we need to keep recycling and protect the environment we also object to the way the department of environmental management has gone about this whole process engaging in misinformation and putting forth numbers that change different numbers at different times and most recently highly questionable numbers as my colleague buck joyner described there are many line items in the proposed twenty two dollars a month that don't belong there clearly padded to make it look like the three can program is more expensive than it really is and their so called survey that was sent out wouldn't qualify a survey by even the most generous of definitions it was insulting to the intelligence of those who received it it was a text intensive two page mailing that was clearly biased and designed to elicit the desired response to kill the program for starters it stated that if you disagreed with the twenty two dollars a month you could simply not return the survey this bogus option allowed the department to count all non returned surveys as  vote regardless of the multitude of reasons why people might not respond is the administration not embarrassed by these blatant biased and unprofessional actions on the part of that department as we understand it that department is undergoing an audit because of unanswered questions and confusion around fiscal management in this light we believe that a subsidized program that was prematurely halted by that department be reinstated and were willing to pay the six this morning to clerk next testifier is david moore to be followed by good morning chairman white and council members my name is david moore i'm here representing myself as a resident of maui meadows and i ask you to reinstate the three can plan at the six dollar a month fee i believe it is a viable plan partly based on my experience of having lived in a town called upper link in ohio previously in one thousand nine hundred two that city council implemented a solid waste plan that essentially charge a nominal fee for green waste collection and refuse collection and agreed to collect recyclables at no charge that plan has remained in effect essentially on that basis for the last twenty three years upper arlington is part of the metropolitan columbus area columbus had an unfortunate experience a few years ago when they built a trash burning electrical power plant the cost of operating what was then a new technology proved to be so high that the plant could not be operated profitably and had to be demolished essentially in the long run i thank you for your kind attention thank you mr moore remembers any questions for the test fire  are willing to pay the six dollar a month fee that this would incur deborah green and black joiner already discussed some of the financial aspects of this i would like to discuss this  issue in terms of the environmental aspect there are many highly successful curbside recycling programs in many states and countries in the world who are all moving towards sustainability we live on a precious little island where sustainability should be a very important issue just recycling paper alone saves so many trees that we need for our for clean air it reduces recycling we do says dependence upon far fossil fuels preserves world resources reduces landfills as far as the conversation about after jia maine one company that is proposed to come in here and build  a plant a huge incinerator to burn our rubbish before world war two there were hundreds of these types of incinerators burning rubbish  what happened was that the effects of these plants were that they produced sense of odors noxious gases and irritating particular it's in the air we are already impacted here by by the vog by cane burning by pesticide spraying and we have a high incidence of childhood asthma we have many adults with asthma and allergy problems i have seen friends of mine over the years after living here so many years all of a sudden they have asthma they have allergies because of our air why would we want to pollute our air any further with a giant incinerator i think these are very what energy is proposing then if not an incinerator i was told that's what it was yeah it's it's not a it's not an incinerator it's not it's a waste to value program as we've as it's been explained to us will be so in the fuel pellets to others but not us and i've been told that or not when that's not on the on the agenda this morning so we can't really discuss ok so this will be discussed at another meeting good morning counsel in my hair and members thank you for hearing our testimony again i brought props today i'd like if you remember joanne johnson said please think of me as mrs carrying capacity i'd like you to think of me as this is check your facts so we listen to the deliberations have made forth and we heard a few things that were misunderstandings one of the things we heard was that the corps operators are buying up a lot of permits think keeping them from others i think if you look at the statistics here about ten years ago we had over four hundred permits and in the last ten years two hundred ninety nine permits have been relinquished abandoned perhaps revoked in some cases so we're down two hundred ninety nine permits i don't think that this indicates there's any hoarding going on at least not by core operators it also leads you to believe that perhaps there might actually be some permits available so if you look at the statistics of permits that were issued this permit year and the suggested carrying capacities of the parks that were set by the cora study there actually are a few parks that have opportunity to add permits and there are even some sports that have opportunities to add some permits and then if you also remember way back when the corps a study was initially done there wasn't enough money to study all twenty nine parks that we were using at the time so they elected to study seventeen or eighteen of those parks and they said at the time when there is more money will study the rest of the parks and maybe open up some other par for our permits so if you want to if you want to give the newcomers a chance there's probably an opportunity if they're looking at some of the permits that might have been abandoned or some of the parks that may actually be available so i think to one of the things that we heard the other day is set is possible that because there is a limited quantity of korra permits they may have become a commodity like the small boat harbor slips perhaps which i don't really know what's going on with them but i can tell you we're not a commodity if if we were and they were worth hundreds of thousands of dollars i don't think you'd see this kind of abandonment of permits so what you're left with now is it's a permit operators that actually are really committed to their business it's a tough business there's a lot of expenses we don't do commercial activities in the parks all our activity all our commercial activity is conducted off site at our business location so we don't compare our all to the kind of poly kiosk and we don't compare to the one i boat tours and we don't compare to the harbor slips were completely different thank you very much for listening and please if you have any questions about the facts i'd be happy to do my part in revealing the truth morning my name is anna and i am speaking on behalf of the bus passes i have a family of five and we all catch the bus i have a two year old son that i pay forty five dollars a month for for his bus pass i have two girls that go to school i pay fifty bucks each for them to catch the bus to and from school my husband we pay forty five dollars each just about like one hundred seventy five dollars a month i pay for all of us to catch the bus we have a husband were thinking about what next changes we have to to do i come in at the bus just to catch it  sixty dollars per person my sign i'm i don't think i pay sixty dollars for my son a month to catch the bus he's only to honestly for me that's a waste of money  my husband after looking at a car the price for gas is like outrageous stats why we catch the past most of the people here are testifying on behalf of the bus passes and honestly not everybody here can afford a sixty dollars bus pass let alone a forty five dollar bus pass we do what we gotta do out there to get the bus passes cut into our savings maybe dip into our rent money not all of us have open bank accounts and stuff so i'm a registered voter and the reason why i vote chair just wanted to get her name but it's not the same name that mr if you could just state your name for the record  to be followed by eric knock i'd like to thank all of you for being here to hear us and to hear what we're talking about today and today i'm here to testify on behalf of the bus fares and i would like for you to not just consider but to keep the bus fares the same price thinking that and i'm not only speaking for myself but for the many people that i've spoken to throughout the last few weeks that were wondering what are we going to do collectively or individually to be able to afford to continue to go to work i know that there's a lot of budget cuts going on and i know that everyone scrambling including you guys to make ends meet and to stretch things as far as we can but as a single parent of three children who quite often take the bus i live in a shelter i raise a family of four on fourteen hundred a month i cannot save to get out the shelter is is what am i going to do if i have to keep on put more money out to get somewhere how is that how is that going to affect me how about the other people who are also in the same or similar predicaments that are in danger of losing their homes and they can't make ends meet now let alone continue to do this if the prices continue to go up just because i think about solutions as well as just a problem not just a problem i would like to say maybe you could propose a fair market increase in wages to reflect all of the additional costs that you're coming across and maybe some of these corporations that are make in banking millions of dollars every week offer the money that we spend in their stores maybe they can take out a few dollars of their monopoly to help put back into the please you know we've just need to remind you i appreciate the passion but please no comments no clapping after following the testimony and the questions from m wastewater infrastructure through successful programs in person now the proposed fiscal year two thousand and sixteen budget will put us back to where we were twenty years ago by reducing the amount of funds resources required for the wastewater division let me tell you how first the proposed budget th waste water treatment plant operations manager disposition oversees all five treatment plants and forty two pumps pump stations through his subordinates to assure compliance with all federal and state regulations there is also a person currently in this position so cutting this position will result in a reduction in force or layoff in terms of the private sector reducing keep personnel second the proposed budget reduces our ability to perform in house projects by reducing the amount of premium paid this means that we will pay outside contractors two to three times more for the same amount of work that could have been done in house when we exhaust the funding for contractors the replacement of the equipment when i get done in our system will not be as reliable third the proposed budget reduces the amount of funding for our operations mainly coming from our electricity budget in the key here waste water reclamation facility they let you go budget for this facility was based off the actual expenditures for fiscal year two thousand and fourteen our current expenditures for fiscal year fifteen predict that we may have a savings due to our aggressive energy savings program however majority of this savings will be exhausted if we have we call failures in fiscal year two thousand and sixteen because we do not have back up energy efficient blowers for the blowers we have recently installed this means electrical expenditures would easily go over the proposed budget and result in a supplemental budget from other sources fourth the proposed budget reduces all of our funding for c h p projects by twenty percent these projects are all compliance projects that replace is old infrastructure which has reached its and useful life all of our estimates costs are for these projects are based off of projects that are currently in construction which in their scope of work if we reduce the amount of funding for these projects will not be able to proceed with the construction of these projects or will be result in a multi year projects when more funding becomes available in the next fiscal year in conclusion i respectfully request that this body restores these items in the fiscal year two thousand and sixteen budget so we can have resources required to operate a reliable wastewater system to minimize the amount of sewer spills into the environment thank you for your time thank you mister members any questions that test tough job i've been listening to testimony it's very compelling you know the decisions you have to make one of the things that is a process that was my taxpayers is that you've taken deliberate time to go and reanalyze and revisit some of these things in the hearings that you're taking like today one of the things that as a real estate professional for the last forty years is a real estate broker i was looking at the the removal of the expansion of the county facility is thirty million dollars and i was thinking wow this is the time when this is a buyer's market time to build time to do things time to invest interest rates are down and i keep thinking about every time i try to get a parking place over here to testify or to do anything and all the county facilities that i have to go to traveling all over town to different locations and i think about one main plaza as being the biggest fiasco that ever occurred we didn't county didn't buy that one but i sure would encourage the council as revisiting everything to look at maybe it made would make sense at this time to look at expanding the county facilities and consolidating its operations paying rent is sometimes you know out of your control what if you're not the landlord you have some conditions and restrictions that you have to deal with that are not necessarily favorable as opposed to being the owner of your facilities and you do have some control then on costs and expenses and the consolidation maybe some efficiencies of services or stephanie rent control for sure and i don't see the real state construction costs going down if anything i see them increasing i mean waiting just increasing your costs so if you're going to take a look at that i don't know what kind of analysis you've seen this showing you that cost benefit but maybe there needs to be done before there's a final decision done made on that and we'd ask you to respect we consider that but we want to commend you for your diligence which you're doing thank you very much along with my group of men to hold cool and where he used to hike for the bus fare a lot of us that have disabilities here catch the bus and to have the height to be fifteen dollars a month for the general pass are extremely difficult for us a lot of us catch the bus to get to our program which i'm a peer coach and we run the cycle social rehabilitation program at mental health my clients here use the bus d some of them catch a cab because it's actually cheaper for them but for the majority of us this is our fixed income here with general systems being a three hundred forty eight dollars a lot of us are pending social security at the moment so as we're waiting this is what we have to live by on a monthly basis we try our best it's difficult but as i say a lot of us here finally there will be extremely difficult for that we do understand that the buses may need to be f there's maintenance on the buses but we don't show that issue come from the citizens on the people that catch the bus i'm not sure where this money's would come from but right now we think the bus f individuals that have signed up to testify in the council chamber if there is any additional individuals in the council chamber or in the district offices that would like to offer testimony please identify yourself to the appropriate staff and proceed to the testimony lectern or district office phone at this time on office to the boss down here cool new bove move in front of the microphone please i was kind of i went to the budget meetings you know my see me back here and i was listen to the transportation directors on presentation i was kind of surprised when i read in a paper it's got a mad mr whole comment first and says oh com i wanted to raise the rates but i heard from rosemary that he was actually against it but make a long story short i might be able to swing fifty bucks but sixty bucks is a lot of money for the monthly pass so that's why i came down i am proud of my community that so many people turned out to speak and mr you have additional testifying against the law i'd like to ask that anyone who remains in the chamber they would like to test by the first gentleman in line can come up to the podium while he's testified  prefer that you all sign up at the at the podium outside so we have a sense of how many more we have but hold on a second there seems to be a little confusion didn't have all of you signed up  we don't have your sheets doing your hand ok sees you signed up for the next meeting where we're going to be did you sign up for this meeting i signed we'll get out of this meeting and then we'll start the next one ok thank you successful it did not make sense to me when it was discontinued i would like to see it reinstated and feel the additional cost of six dollars a month is very reasonable one hundred percent of the people i spoke with in the trial program would also like to have the three cam plan reinstated and are willing to pay the extra cost for this practical convenient and environmentally healthy program i'd like to thank ricky cama the budget and finance committee for including this service for six dollars additional a month in the proposed budget and i also want to thank the mayor for allowing us to keep our green and blue bin so in place so that the program could be easily reinstated and i urge the county council and the mayor to pass a budget with the three camp plan included for the additional six dollars per month thank you thank you questions for the test fire scene thank you for being here this morning strickler mr believed that concludes testimony for the public hearing and mr chair we have