State Department of Accounting and General Services Comptroller Keith Regan (from left) and Maui County State Sens. Lynn DeCoite and Gil Keith-Agaran chat in front of the McKinley Community School for Adults in Kahului during a site visit on July 26. State officials have to decide what to do with the historic building as they move forward with plans to build the future Kahului Civic Center, a $192 million housing and civic center project across from the Queen Ka‘ahumanu Center. — The Maui News / COLLEEN UECHI photo
KAHULUI — In a humid, breezeless classroom of the McKinley Community School for Adults, several of Hawaii’s top-ranking senators sit in the sweltering July heat.
A recent fire next door knocked out electricity, so there’s no light, no air conditioning and no cooling winds moving through the room.
Some day state officials hope to see this 5.6-acre property transformed into a $192 million project of 300 housing units, a sprawling civic center, commercial and government space.
But first, they have to solve the dilemma of the aging school building.
“The struggle with this building is … we can’t preserve it in place because it obstructs our potential development plans for the whole property,” Chris Kinimaka, public works administrator for the state Department of Accounting and General Services, explained during a site visit last week. “The second alternative was to move the building, but it’s very difficult because the foundation is built into the ground and the building is anchored to the foundation. So it’s not one of those where you can slice the building in pieces and cart it away to a new site.”
State Department of Accounting and General Services Public Works Administrator Chris Kinimaka discusses the future Kahului Civic Center project with state senators at the McKinley Community School for Adults on July 26. — The Maui News / COLLEEN UECHI photo
The Kahului Civic Center Mixed-Use Complex is in the early stages of planning, so Kinimaka is hopeful the old building won’t hold it up. However, she acknowledged if there were any roadblocks to the project starting within the next couple of years, it would be the building, which is why senators are pressing state officials to iron out the issues early on.
If one historic building could hold up a project, “that’s not going look good that we invested all this money in there,” said Oahu state Sen. Donovan Dela Cruz, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee that visited Maui last week.
The Ways and Means Committee is a powerful panel that oversees the funding and projects allocated in the state’s massive budget. Two of Maui County’s three senators — Gil Keith-Agaran and Lynn DeCoite — sit on the committee, which made several stops across Maui County last week to see firsthand some of the sites and projects that may one day come to them for review.
The Kahului Civic Center Mixed-Use Complex is a collaboration between DAGS and the Hawaii Housing and Finance Development Corporation. The agencies are proposing about 300 affordable and market-rate multifamily housing units along with a 66,000-square-foot civic center with about 38,000 to 43,000 square feet of state office space, 16,000 square feet for the new Kahului Public Library and 7,000 square feet for the state Department of Education’s McKinley Community School for Adults. The project may also include 5,000 square feet of community-oriented commercial space.
The building that currently houses the school for adults was constructed in the 1930s, according to the State Historic Preservation Division. It serves as a good example of early 20th-century academic architecture, “designed and built in the Hawaii-plantation style,” Architecture Branch Chief Jessica Puff said on Thursday via email.
Hawaii Housing and Finance Development Corporation Project Manager Stan Fujimoto talks about the housing portion of the future Kahului Civic Center project on July 26. — The Maui News / COLLEEN UECHI photo
Stan Fujimoto, project manager for HHFDC, said the state offered the building to Maui County but said the county did not respond by the deadline. So, Kinimaka said they are planning to approach the State Historic Preservation Division with the offer to properly document the building before demolishing it.
DAGS is responsible for the civic center portion of the project, so “before we can construct we have to resolve this issue,” she said. “We’re just starting our planning, so we have time.”
When asked if the agency would support demolition, Puff said, “I wouldn’t say that SHPD is ever supportive of a historic property being demolished,” as they try to find ways to move projects forward without affecting historic resources. However, it’s not out of the question — she pointed to an example of a similar state project that proposed demolishing the remaining old Kahului Elementary School campus buildings to build a civic center in 2011. At the time, SHPD recommended documenting of the building before demolition.
“It would be great if DAGS could adaptively reuse the building, in such a way that it was incorporated into the new project design and helped to meet the needs of the civic center,” Puff said. “Moving buildings can be an effective way to preserve Hawaii’s history, as well, while also considering and responding to present/future needs. If that’s not feasible, we can talk to DAGS about appropriate mitigation measures. Documenting the building, as we suggested in 2011, might be a good way to move forward.”
Keith-Agaran, the vice chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said he doesn’t think the historic building will delay the project.
Oahu state Sen. Donovan Dela Cruz, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, speaks to fellow lawmakers during a presentation at Kulanihako’i High School on July 27. The committee visited multiple sites in Maui County last week. — The Maui News / COLLEEN UECHI photo
“I think it’s just one of those things they’re going to have to work through. I think they have to address the historic preservation concerns,” the Central Maui state senator said during the site visit. “I hope that doesn’t hold it up because I think what we really want to make sure is the housing goes forward.”
Keith-Agaran said the property is rare in that it’s zoned as B-2 Business-Community, which allows for apartments, “so that’s a lot of units that could be built right here for working people.”
“That’s what we should be aiming at,” he said. “The civic center, we can wait on that until we work out those issues, but I really want the housing to go forward.”
Kinimaka is hopeful the housing will be able to proceed without issue, since it’s located on a different part of the property from the historic building.
The week before senators traveled to Maui, Gov. Josh Green issued a year-long emergency proclamation aimed at speeding up housing projects without environmental or cultural concerns. Questioned by the senators, state officials were unsure as to whether the project would qualify under the housing emergency. HHFDC later explained that it will be up to the development team to decide if it wants to apply for expedited approval under the emergency proclamation, and up to the Build Beyond Barriers Working Group to decide if they should get it.
That could take several months — the deadline for developers to send in proposals for the Kahului project was July 26, and HHFDC said it hopes to select a developer and make a recommendation to the Board of Directors by the end of the year.
Pointing to the ticking clock of the emergency proclamation, Dela Cruz pushed HHFDC to move forward.
“Has to be one sense of urgency,” he said during the site visit. “The governor already said it’s a top priority. There’s an emergency proc. If not, it’s hard for us to keep giving you money. … You gotta really like be in it, invested in it, and then I feel like, OK, yeah, I’ll give you money. If you’re like, if it happens, it happens, then I’m not giving money.”
He said he wants HHFDC to not just wait for developers’ plans but to be proactive in telling lawmakers what they need.
“If you guys run into roadblocks and you need legislative help, we don’t read minds,” Dela Cruz said later in an interview. “You gotta let us know. But you gotta start and working these things out to see if you actually need something from the Legislature or something from the governor that you can put in the emergency proc.”
Despite concerns over the historic structures and the housing timeline, the committee’s leadership said funding for the project isn’t in trouble — they just want to see “a tighter plan,” Dela Cruz said.
“I think he’s just trying to encourage DAGS and HHFDC to be real conscious of the time,” Keith-Agaran said of Dela Cruz. “If housing’s really an emergency, then they should be a little more conscious of how long it takes. The fact that the RFP has been issued and they’re about to get responses I think is a good sign.”
According to HHFDC, the project has most of its major entitlements and has so far been awarded $11 million in loans and grants. This includes $2.5 million to Maui County for the nearby bus hub, a $2 million loan to the developer of the neighboring Kahului Lani project for improvements to Vevau Street, $1.5 million for the master plan and environmental assessment and a $5 million loan for pre-development expenses to the requests for proposals developer.
Aside from the capital improvement programs funding provided through HHFDC to Maui County for the bus hub, these funds came out of HHFDC’s Dwelling Unit Revolving Fund.
Kinimaka said next steps include requesting the release of funds for planning, hiring a consultant and starting planning in earnest, likely by the end of the year.
“We just have to do our homework and report back in a timely fashion,” Kinimaka said.
* Managing Editor Colleen Uechi can be reached at cuechi@mauinews.com.