Kahala senior center plan causes rift
By Suzanne Roig
Advertiser East Honolulu Bureau
KAHALA — Plans for a 250-unit, independent-living senior housing center on the grounds of Star of the Sea Church are moving forward despite residents' concerns over traffic and density.
The Kahala Nui, as it will be called, will use 7.9 acres on the Honolulu side of the church grounds. The school and the church will remain on the Koko Head side, said Joyce Timpson, vice chairman of the Kahala Senior Living Community Inc., at a recent community meeting.
The main entrance to the church and the senior living facility will be off Malia Street. It's the expected increase in cars on tiny Malia Street that has residents upset. They also are concerned because the not-for-profit's board of directors hasn't showed them any drawings of what the apartment-like center will look like.
"How can we be for something if we don't know what they're proposing?" said Doug Carlson, a Wai'alae Nui resident. "I'm going to be against it until they tell me not to be."
The senior facility can go up to 60 feet high, Timpson said. Construction isn't expected to begin until the fall of 2002.
In the meantime, the developer plans to sell priority slots to prospective tenants, said Charles Swanson, Kahala Senior Living Community Inc. chairman. A $100 deposit will hold a slot on the priority list, but a 10 percent deposit will be required to reserve a space, Swanson said. Units will sell for $225,000 to $625,000, he said.
"The units haven't been built and won't be until they're presold," Swanson said. "It won't happen overnight."
Kahala Senior Living Community Inc., operating as Episcopal Homes of Hawai'i, first proposed such a center in 1989, but the project stalled in 1994 after $12.4 million had been spent in planning and marketing.
Approval was granted in 1991 by a state agency for 309 independent-living apartments, 20 assisted-living units and 60 skilled-nursing units.
That proposal has been scaled back and was recently approved by the same agency for a 251-unit independent living apartment house, 62 assisted-living suites, 21 memory support Alzheimer's suites and 60 nursing beds. All will be built on the land leased from Star of the Sea School. Kahala Senior Living also has all its required government approvals.
To address residents' concerns about traffic and congestion, Kahala Senior Living will build a three-level underground parking lot under the school's soccer field to accommodate 440 cars, Timpson said. To reduce the use of cars, residents of the facility will be offered free van service.
The development firm also has promised that it will make presentations to the community as the project moves along, Swanson said.
Area residents aren't satisfied.
"The community is up in arms with the parking," said Gerri Digmon, a member of the Wai'alae- Kahala Neighborhood Board and 'Ainakoa area resident. "It's a heavily used thoroughfare, as small as it is. It changes a resident neighborhood to a commercial one. We don't want the entrance and exit on Malia."
The short street has become a well-known shortcut around the Kahala bottleneck for residents going into town from Hawai'i Kai or for residents coming east, Digmon said.
"There will be some increase in traffic," Swanson said. "But I don't think there will be much. It's a good project."
