The panel will meet at 9 a.m. in the Planning Department Conference Room at the Kalana Pakui Building on South High Street in Wailuku, The Maui News reported.

The state Department of Transportation's Airports Division is seeking a special management area use permit for baggage screening and other improvements at the airport.

County planners are recommending approval of the permit, saying the proposed project meets guidelines aimed at protecting coastal areas and would not have any significant environmental impacts. Planners say the project also is consistent with county zoning and the Wailuku-Kahului Community Plan, both of which are necessary to qualify for a special management area permit.

According to documents filed with the county, the airport improvements include upgrading the airport's explosive-detection and baggage-handling systems as required by the Transportation Security Administration, a division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Improvements include:

i Removing the existing impact-protection devices and explosive-detection devices from the terminal ticketing area and installing them in a more secure area. Six explosive-detection system screeners would be installed behind the ticketing and check-in terminal area in the existing baggage intake area. New baggage-handling equipment also would be installed to take bags from airline ticket counters to the explosive-detection screeners. A separate structure would be built adjacent to and south of the existing baggage screening area to accommodate the new screeners and baggage-handling equipment.

i Constructing a new baggage intake area that features the installation of an approximately 7,000-square-foot concrete slab and the extension of the existing metal roof to cover the slab. New baggage-handling equipment would be installed in the area.

i Building an explosive trace detection room featuring a new 1,730-square-foot enclosed structure located south of and adjacent to the existing baggage intake area. Suspicious and unknown bags that fail the first two levels of security screening would be automatically transferred to the explosive trace detection room for inspection. Plans call for the new room to accommodate 12 TSA agents, explosives-detection equipment and tables.

i Renovation of an existing space within the holding room "C" building for a consolidated "on-screen resolution" room. Improvements include partitioning for an office and communication and baggage-control rooms. The area would accommodate as many as eight TSA agents, one supervisor and associated inspection tables, monitors, explosive-detection computer systems. It also would house the proposed baggage-handling systems monitoring and computer equipment.