Mililani arts center becoming reality
By Scott Ishikawa
Advertiser Central O'ahu Writer
MILILANI — After years of wishful thinking, the community's dream of a regional performing arts center may be finally taking shape.
Mililani developer Castle & Cooke Homes Hawai'i Inc. last week said it will donate three acres of land in the Mililani Mauka subdivision for the proposed facility. The center would be on a nine-acre commercially zoned parcel at the corner of Meheula Parkway and Kuaoa Street next to Mililani Middle School and Mililani Mauka Community Park.
Jeanette Nekota, Mililani Mauka/Launani Valley Neighborhood Board chairwoman and a member of a grassroots group pushing for the center, said a commitment to property allows them to move forward in formulating a business and marketing plan for the facility.
Nekota said the proposed $14 million facility would be built in three phases to include a theater, classrooms, and studios for visual arts, fine arts and culinary arts.
The Mililani vision team has already set aside $1.5 million in city money for the arts center, with an additional $700,000 in city money coming from the Mililani Mauka/Launani Valley Neighborhood Board. O'ahu's vision teams and neighborhood boards are allowed to determine how a portion of city capital improvement program money is spent on community projects.
The community group also has $100,000 left over from last year's allotted vision money to form a business plan for the arts center. Grant-writing would follow.
"Until we began putting this plan together, I didn't realize how many people teach piano or art classes in their homes, or dance classes on their patios," Nekota said. "Along with a theater and galleries, we'd like to create classrooms so instructors could rent space at whatever's the going rate and they would have their own business offices."
Alan Arakawa, Castle & Cooke Hawai'i vice president who made the announcement at last week's neighborhood board meeting, said those involved would have five years to obtain financing for the arts center.
"We think five years is a reasonable timeline, and our company will help out anyway we can in bringing together the center," Arakawa said. "We want this project to succeed."
Community residents for years have asked for a performing arts center for school musical performances and other concerts. The Tri-Theatre Production Company, made up of students from area high schools, perform regularly out of the Mililani High School cafeteria.
Mililani also organizes activities for students who are on break during the area schools' modified year-round or multi-track schedules. The scheduling prevents many children from participating in summer fun programs.
"We are looking for alternatives such as plays, music and art," Nekota said. "People in Mililani have this stereotype that all our kids play sports, when really only about a third do."
Community leaders were initially looking at city-owned property at the Mililani Mauka park-and-ride and additional land next door for the arts center.
Harry Saunders, Castle & Cooke Hawai'i president of operations, said the company has no immediate plans for commercial activity at the site of the proposed center. The company is still looking for an anchor tenant for its commercial parcel near the entrance of its Mililani Mauka subdivision.
Reach Scott Ishikawa at 535-2429 or sishikawa@honoluluadvertiser.com.
