ISLAND VOICES
Land-use law helps us all

Blake McElheny lives in Hale'iwa

Hawai'i manages an enormous and growing economy while simultaneously attempting to protect special environmental and cultural resources. Most of the resource-intensive economic activity properly occurs in areas designated "urban" by the state land-use law.

Lands designated "agricultural" also contribute significantly to the economy as diversified agriculture continues to grow.

Living on islands, it is appropriate we jointly discuss finite resources, how to best sustain them, and systems for reaching agreement on appropriate land uses. The dialogue provides an opportunity for people to develop a fuller appreciation of the rationale behind the law that to a large degree has successfully prevented Hawai'i from becoming completely paved over by urbanization.

However, the current dialogue would be better served by an understanding of some key facts:

• Hawai'i implemented a statewide zoning system in 1961. Since then, 12 other states followed suit and implemented statewide land-use controls. These systems occur in dynamic states, similar to Hawai'i, that rely on the protection of natural and cultural resources to support tourism industries and to retain strong agricultural components in their economies.

Hawai'i's system utilizes a careful balance of granting significant local zoning powers to the counties and retaining the ability to manage issues of statewide importance.

• The state land-use law purposefully includes lands in the state "agricultural" district that are not particularly suited for intensive agricultural activity or farming. This is because of the law's intent to prevent costly urbanization of lands far from existing urban areas where additional development is more efficient.

Though it was not labeled as such in 1961, contemporary planners might call this a growth-management or urban-containment strategy. In other words, when agriculturally designated lands restrict urban uses outside of the urban core, they serve their purpose even if they are not actively farmed.

• There is more than enough land currently designated state "urban" for a great deal of orderly growth and development. Literally thousands of housing units and other activities could be placed on the thousands of urban acres that are not being utilized to their highest and best use.

• The land-use law correctly views intensive residential development as an "urban" activity because of ensuing needs to develop expensive new services such as water, utilities, waste management, roadways, schools, and police and fire protection. Generally, most of these responsibilities and ongoing expenses are passed on to the taxpayer and can negatively affect the economy if not managed properly.

• Nearly 200,000 acres have been reclassified from agriculture since the implementation of the land-use law (creating an average of over 6,000 acres a year). It is rare for the state Land Use Commission to reject a reasonable request for reclassification from agricultural designation. In any event, the existing Land Use Commission reclassification process provides an excellent opportunity to examine proposed land uses in-depth. The unique process also allows the commission to put safeguards in place to prevent environmental and cultural damage and to create mechanisms to assure that substantial infrastructure costs are not left as burdens for the taxpayer.

Therefore, most claims that there is too much land in "agriculture" or that more lands need to be automatically opened up to urbanization without utilizing the existing thoughtful processes are not reasonable from a planning perspective. Perhaps more importantly, the claims obscure a powerful question regarding how much "urban" designation and use islands can sustain.

Substantially changing the land-use law and existing land designations based on serious misperceptions and for the benefit of special-interest groups would be a major step backward for Hawai'i. It is important to acknowledge the law's relative success in managing enormous levels of economic activity while simultaneously protecting special environmental and cultural resources from urbanization.