I would like to introduce to you Terry Fredis-Gorman, the President of the Maui Native Hawaiian
Chamber of Commerce.
Please Aloha.
Thank you Kai.
When we planned this forum no way in our wildest dreams did we think we would get 18 candidates
to say yes and they did.
So please thank them for showing up tonight.
I think it's a real testament to the feelings that our candidates have for the Native Hawaiian
community and for that we thank you very much.
Because we have 18 candidates we're not going to be able to wait until everybody has had
their food to start the program.
We're going to start now and we're also concerned about the weather.
Judge Mosman, Judge Boyd Mosman was supposed to be our moderator this evening.
He's been delayed by the weather.
We don't know if he's going to make it.
I was the backup pinch hitter so I'm going to be filling in for Judge Mosman this evening
along with Cori Vicenz.
Because of such great participation this night we're going to have a fairly tightly timed
program.
These candidates, the order that the candidates will be appearing in this evening was selected
this weekend randomly.
We pulled the various council districts out of a hat.
And the same thing with the questions.
They were selected randomly.
The questions were sent into the Maui Native Hawaiian Chamber of Commerce by our members
and they've been sorted and selected randomly.
We will be timing, Mahina Martin is our official timer this evening.
So for the candidates we will ask you the same question two times.
You each have two minutes to answer two questions and then we're going to give you one minute
to tell us what we need to know about you, basically make your case for what voters need
to know about you, why they should vote for you.
We have the timing box there.
When you have one minute left the yellow light will come on and you'll know that you've
got one minute so please wrap up.
At 15 seconds the red light will start flashing and when your time is up the blue light will
go on and when that happens your microphone will fade.
So even if you want to continue to vola au no can.
So two minutes for the first question and I'm going to start the first question with
Council Member Don Couch representing the South Maui District.
Don, South Maui's population is forecast to grow.
How do you see your district being able to deal with such rapid growth straining the roadways,
housing inventories, the filled elementary schools, no high school yet, and crime at
area parks?
Thank you.
Is this on?
Yes.
Alright.
So all of Maui is projected to grow and grow pretty big and pretty quick.
So in South Maui we have come up with the Maui Island plan and in South Maui we've
set the areas where we want development to go.
Right now we have approved somewhere around 1,800 homes in South Maui, 600 of which are
being built now.
Maybe a little bit more than that because we have some rentals.
So we're going as the best that the Council can.
We also have to deal with the extremely high cost of roads.
Our water and our sewer we're not at capacity and the Council is working on coming up with
the fee structures to make sure that the water doesn't run out and that the sewer doesn't
run out.
Schools, we keep encouraging the Department of Education to get the schools coming in.
We're trying to work with some developers to build, kind of like Kamali was built.
Oh, and parks, we just, you know, the more people we get, the more we have to get more
police officers to take a look at, or park rangers.
We have a park ranger program too.
So those are some of the things that we're, it takes a while to have that happen and we're
slowly building that up.
Thank you, Don.
Kelly, same question, South Maui's population is forecasted to grow.
How do you see your district being able to deal with such rapid growth, straining roadways,
housing inventories, elementary and high school, and crime at area parks?
Thank you.
Well, we're doing much better on schools right now than we were when my kids were little
and we had almost 2,000 kids in Kihei schools.
So the populations in the schools, we have some time on that, and with the Kihei Charter
School expanding especially, that gives us some leeway and the high schools coming in,
as you mentioned.
Specifically, what we need to work on now is infrastructure, and we also need to work
on, you know, which means roads and housing, of course, but we also need to work on wastewater
facilities and what's happening with our shoreline.
We have some of the worst water on the island in Kihei, right around Cove Park, due to the
effluent that's coming out of the wastewater facilities.
There are some solutions that have been proposed, but they're falling on deaf ears right now,
and so we really need to get involved in that and save our reefs that way.
As far as roads, we need to look at that, the upper road, what they're calling P'ilani
Malka, and a lot of the development is using the idea of P'ilani Malka, but it hasn't
been mapped out yet.
So I think what's going to happen in our community, and I've been talking to people
in the community, talking to the Kihei Community Association Board, that we do want to get
involved and we want to help set priorities as we review our Kihei McKenna community plan,
but we need to know those ideas are going to be respected, and we need to know that
what we come up with in the review is going to have the force and effect of a real guideline,
which hasn't been done so far, and that's why we almost got the Promenade Mall in an
area that's supposed to be light industrial.
So I see potential for real collaboration with developers on affordable housing.
I've been talking to developers across the county, and they do want to be involved.
They have ideas.
People in the parks have talked to park rangers who have ideas about bringing the homeless
in to do some part-time work with cleaning up the parks.
We need to start listening to them and create these programs.
Thank you, Kelly.
Thank you, Kelly.
Thank you.
Can they hear me?
Aloha, Kelly.
This question is going to go to you the second one.
Individuals, families, and communities and our social service agencies are stressed to
the max.
What are your plans to address the considerable burdens on our Maui social infrastructure?
And number two, second part of it, are you willing to raise property taxes to fund your
proposals?
Well, thank you so much for the question, because I agree that social services are not
currently keeping up with demand.
And it's interesting that none of the forums up till now have actually mentioned social
services.
They've all been on different topics.
And so it's good that we have a chance, because I think especially the Hawaiian community
and the Filipino communities have big concerns about things like domestic violence, cultural
sensitivity.
There's a lot of stress being put on multiple households.
And so that leads to some of the drug abuse and some of these things.
I really feel like we have a very good core network of nonprofits here.
And I've worked with a lot of them.
I was on the board of Huy Malama Learning Center for eight years.
I've worked with big brothers, big sisters.
I've worked with Mental Health Cocua.
And I think that the first thing we need to do is to look at our current services and
how we can work with the nonprofits, the government, the for-profits, get some funding in.
There's a lot of funding that's not being tapped on the federal level, on the state
level, and even the county.
There's a lot of fat that could be trimmed off the administration, and there's a lot
of funding there.
But what we need to do is shore up our nonprofits and figure out, you know, they're doing a
tremendous job with how little they have.
And if we can get to the point where we can actually figure out the plans and the benchmarks
and then put money into those, the action plans where we can actually have, know when
the successes are, what are we trying to do, and when do we know that we've been successful,
we can build, forge these partnerships.
And I would be willing to raise taxes if it got to the point where we couldn't.
But I feel like the money, there's money out there that's not being tapped, truly.
And the other thing I would want to say about the nonprofits is that we need to look at
a biennium budget system because every year these nonprofits have to spend so much time
and energy coming back to the council, begging for money, and we can make it so much easier
if we went to a state system of a biennium budget.
Thank you, Kelly.
Mahalo, Kelly.
Appreciate that.
Don, same question.
Go ahead.
Individuals, families, communities, and our social services, service agencies are stressed
to the max.
What are your plans to address the considerable burdens on Maui's social infrastructure?
In part two of this, are you willing to raise property taxes to fund your proposals?
Well, that's a really good question, and to answer it in two minutes is really tough.
So what I'll do is I'll hit on a few things.
One, we have in the state the best funding to our nonprofits in the state.
And in fact, just one sector is the kupuna.
I tried to get some services for my mom on the mainland when she had some heart problems
and needed the stuff that we do here we take for granted here.
They don't do that.
They don't do that in Idaho and Southern California.
You would think Southern California with all the money that's there that they will do that.
They don't have anywhere near the services we have for our kupuna.
In fact, when we go to the National Association of Counties and talk to our peers around the
state, around the country, Maui has the best elderly care in the nation.
I'm very proud to say that I helped and approved the funding for that.
It's very important that we take care of our kupunas, and we're having a lot of people
move here to retire here.
So that's just getting bigger and bigger.
There are many other areas, the homeless especially.
That's the other end.
We need to get affordable housing and also home in place where they have a place that
they can store their belongings and go to their jobs and feel safe and secure.
Then we can work on rehabilitation and getting them the services they need.
Because we have all the services they need.
It's just they're at capacity.
As far as raising taxes, just a quick fact is that of all the homeowner taxes we raise,
we raise about $20 million in taxes from all the homeowners on Maui.
That pays for about one-third of the police department.
The rest is done through businesses, hotels, long-term rental homes.
All of those people.
Thank you, Don.
Thank you, Don.
For those of you who are standing in line or having conversations off to this side,
I'd like to ask you to please be respectful not only of our candidates, but also of the
people in the audience who came here to hear what they have to say.
By all means, have a good time, enjoy your conversations, but just keep it down.
Thank you.
Our last question.
All the candidates will answer this question, and you have one minute, and that is, what
would you like voters to know about you?
Kelly?
Okay, one minute.
I would like you to know that I've been on this island for 37 years.
I have a vast experience, not only as a wife and a mother who raised two children on board
and raised on Maui, but as a business owner, as an environmental advocate, as an active
nonprofit board member, and former public official, and I served on the State Board
of Education for four years back in the 90s, and what's really important to me as a people
know, I'm not looking for a job.
I have a job.
What I'm looking for is an opportunity to serve Maui and to step up, because this is
such an important election on our home front here in County.
We have a chance to make real change, real positive change.
I don't believe that the County Council position is reactive.
I believe in getting involved in the community to learn what's going on, making informed
decisions, and working with all of you to make the things happen, and I'm an action-oriented
person.
I get things done, so I want you to know that, and I respectfully ask for your vote, and
thank you very much for having us here today.
Thank you, Kelly.
Don, what would you like Maui voters to know about you?
Well, I'm in my sixth year as a County Council member.
That's a third term, we have five terms, term limit.
I feel I've done quite a bit in my six years I've been there, and I need to continue on
this.
As you heard, there's plenty of issues still to go.
I would love for it to be, in two years, you can solve all the problems you can't.
You have to just move right along.
I started off, I'm very proud with the fact that we started off with the Maui Island plan
in my first two years.
We got the Maui Island plan set, so where we have said this is how we want to start
planning our communities.
Recently, we worked very hard with the Maui Invasive Species Committee.
We put in an extra $1.2 million to just work on eradicating cokey frogs.
We know it's going to take a while.
We know it's not a sprint, it's a marathon, and I just want to let you know I've been
out there running the marathon for a long time.
Mahalo.
I ask you for your vote on November 8th.
Thank you.
Everybody, many thanks for the candidates for the South Maui Sea.
Thank you.
Thank you.
