A story in the Garden Island last week by Léo Azambuja reports on plans for a proposed “farm dwelling” being reviewed by the Kauai Planning Commission.
It’s another one of those fake farms, a high-priced estate for a wealthy owner being built on land zoned for agriculture, pretending to be a “farm” by growing something on the side in order to meet legal requirements established to prevent just this kind of misuse.
“The zoning is agricultural, the General Plan is agricultural and the state land use (designation) is agricultural,” said county planner Lisa Ellen Smith, reading the Planning Department report.
The “farm” will be on a one-acre section of the nearly 17 acre agriculturally-zoned property. The one acre is where they plan to grow their farm crop…grass. According to the planning consultants pushing the project, it’s a sod farm. Right.
On the remaining acres alongside the “sod farm” will be a 5,930 square foot home with a covered lanai measuring 1,777 square feet, a 4,513 square foot pool, a 8,505 square feet of driveways and sidewalks, according to the story. The estimated cost of construction is not reported.
The owner of the property is CEO of a Canadian-based multinational corporation.
“Who are we kidding?” one planning commissioner reportedly asked.
For several years, the legislature has been trying to clamp down on these projects that exploit legal technicalities to exploit farm land and erode the state’s base of agricultural lands.
Presenting this sod farm proposal to the planning commission were two consultants, Roland Sagum from Applied Planning Systems and Sean Combs of Land Strategies Hawaii, Azambuja reports.
Readers of the Garden Island readers who don’t recognize Sagum’s name might have benefited from being reminded that Sagum is perhaps better known as State Representative Roland Sagum III, a Democrat first elected in 2006 to represent a district that includes Niihau, Lehua, Koloa, and Waimea.
He faces competition in the primary this year from county parks employee Daynette Morikawa, a former high school golf coach. She is described as an active HGEA member, and is vice-chair of HGEA’s Managerial and Confidential Employees Chapter, Kauai Island Division.
The story of this “sod farm” has to provide ammunition for Morikawa’s campaign.
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Sod Farm,wish I had thought of that; grass seed, a tiller, a sprinkler, a mower, that’s all it takes, oh, some petrochemicals to fertilize and control weeds. Brilliant, absolutely brilliant.
Hire a subcontractor to hire some “laborers” to tend the 1 acre while the owner and his guests sit under the covered lanai sipping mint juleps.
@ Jonthebru
You jest but I’m sure that this landowner’s next move will be to apply to the county for permits to construct housing for “agricultural workers.” Of course, it’s doubtful that county officials will notice or care if the workers’ housing happens to resemble guest cottages…
The Brits and/or Aussies have a wonderful expletive that could apply to this situation: Sod that.
While I agree that this is a blatant attempt to game the system, I also think that people like this are not what’s eroding our state’s agricultural lands… it is the fact that the cost structure for agriculture in Hawaii makes being a farmer a long-odds bet.
I seek out local produce whenever possible, but I have to shake my head when people go out on an autarkic limb. Hawaii is never going to grow all of its own food. If this canadian was pushing farmers out of the way to build his mansion, then thats one thing. But if this land was just sitting there, better to employ some construction workers and then some landscapers than nothing at all.
If this owner is claiming a sod farm, then somewhere along the line there should be a harvest and sales from that harvest. If he digs up his yard every year and sells off the grass, then it’s a sod farm.
Perhaps that should be part of the requirements. A “farm” has to generate a salable product in proportion to the amount of land being claimed for agricultural use.
All it takes is an occasional inspection by some state official to confirm that a parcel is indeed being used in accordance with zoning.
This is unquestionably a factor in pricing legitimate farmers out of ag. When “ag lands” are more profitable for non-ag purposes, the price of those lands will shoot up beyond the ability of farmers to compete.
Zoning laws are intended to keep ag lands in ag to prevent that upward pressure on the costs of ag lands.
The Garden Island News has a good column on the related “ag worker housing” issue and suggests criteria for deciding whether a property is really being used for “agricultural” purposes. The problem of distinguishing between real ag and fake ag is not insurmountable. Government agencies have to come up with more honest standards or all ag lands will be developed as estates for the wealthy or transient accommodations.
This is worth a read:
http://thegardenisland.com/news/opinion/guest/article_dbb713ba-7133-11df-b0a4-001cc4c002e0.html
I notice that no one is surprised to see Roland Sagum, one of the new “good old boys” at the Capitol, named as the consultant representing the applicant. Well, planning IS his profession, and people ARE entitled to representation before government agencies. Still, I would want to know things like:
1. What has Sagum disclosed on his Ethics Commission filing with regard to this client or others in his practice?
2. What other kinds of clients does he represent, i.e., does he represent pro-agriculture/preservation interests as well?
3. What position has he taken on legislation dealing with land use, generally, and preservation of ag lands, in particular?
4. He says that his votes against civil unions are a reflection of his constituents’ opposition to the legislation; if this “sod farm” is also opposed by a majority of his constituents, is he willing to accept the consequences at the polls?
As you say, Ian, “Investigate. Instigate.” Geev um!!
Thank you Ian.
I wish you had a column in the paper.
Dean, you wrote *exactly* what I was thinking! Well done.
And I agree with Mahina that you should have a column in the paper, but I’ll add that it should be daily.
What a great idea. I know! I’ll start a WEED farm. I’m good at growing those. And I can start calling myself a farmer.
Yeah, that’s it.
I reject the premise of your assertion that “Hawaii is never going to grow all of its own food.”, if not the probable truth of the statement itself.
Hawaii has in the past provided for all its inhabitants. Population estimates for pre-Cook Hawaii range between 400k and 1m (i know, that’s a BIG margin of error) at the extremes, and at that period in time Hawaii absolutely provided, with some room to spare, enough food for its population. The last census estimates that as of 2000 there were 1.3m people resident. I’d say this indicates that even if we lacked the capacity to supply ALL the food we need we could at least supply most of it.
What drives the factors making farming a long-odds bet is a combination of globalization and short-sighted priorities locally. Both of these problems can be dealt with using a combination of good policy-making and strategic tax-incentives (I also have some especially wacky, but possibly very effective, ideas for making farming less of a “long-odds bet”).
What I reject categorically is that by justifying scofflaws your statement tacitly condones the practice of gaming laws that were placed to protect ag land. Put simply, even if the laws protecting ag land are of no use, then you STILL should repeal them if you don’t wish to use them anymore.
sry that was directed at WooWoo, not Ian’s post 😛
What is so depressing about this is that they are not even trying to hide the fact that this is so much shibai. Sod farm with a pool? I guess that is to wash off the manure at the end of the day.
The new Ethics director will look into it. At least it
looks like the Star Advertiser is doing more “breaking news” these days. Kudos to them.
http://www.staradvertiser.com/news/breaking/96521604.html
Ketchup-
I don’t excuse the gaming of the system. This guy shouldn’t be allowed to do this on ag land. In principal I would agree with rezoning the land (repealing, as you say in your post) to reflect current economic reality in regards to agriculture, but I didn’t go so far as to explicitly state that in my initial post because I have not done sufficient research into the particulars of this situation on Kauai.
I am not alone in questioning the population estimates of pre-Cook Hawaii that surpass 400,000. Over the last 40 years, the population estimate has tracked along the same trajectory as the social and political influence of the Hawaiian studies department. Riddle me this, Batman: If the pre-Cook population was almost as large as our current population, and managed to produce all of their own food, where did they get the water? Food production is water intensive (particularly taro). Right now, we barely have enough for water for 1.3 million people to drink with very limited agriculture. Where did the water come from in 1778 for everybody to drink AND grow all their own food? The 80-90% of the food we currently import is in many ways a form of importing water.
I would guess it rarely met the million population. Remember they didn’t have flush toilets or hot showers, or irrigation systems turning on at night to water the lawn and hedge. The valleys here on Maui are basically jungles now. If you trek through them they are covered by trees with terraces of stone below. The water started through the lo’i at the top and fell down through the taro patches toward the ocean, basically everyody who needed it got some water. When droughts occurred it was disastrous. Even in Makena now a very dry place there were wet taro patches when LaPerouse came through on his visit. His people estimated an extensive population on Maui’s south side. The forest above was complete and clouds gathered bringing rain in the mountains, Poli Poli area is like that establishing a water table. The clouds also gathered as far as Kahoolawe bringing moisture to that island though not to the extent that the Makena area got.
Damn, I love this place. Because it freaks out the spell check.
In a perfect world, permits to build a residence on ag land would require that 90% (or something like that) of the arable land be placed in production, or prepped for it. If this guy wanted to put the fancy house on one acre and prep the other 16 for sod/stolon production, I could live with that. That way, the residence would be incidental to, and facilitate, use of the land for ag purposes, not t’other way ’round as in this case. You know when we fly across the heartland, we look down to see great rectangles of fields surrounding a farm home. This proposal pays lip service to the ag classification, if that.
Here’s a related subject: “gentlemen farms” on STATE ag land. There are state ag lands in Waimanalo that have been leased out for ag and horticultural purposes. Local farmers have complained that high end operations have priced them out of the market. Maybe that can’t be helped.
Use Google maps to find a gentleman “farm” up mauka on Mahailua St. Look for the Spanish tile roof, which wraps around a large swimming pool. It appears there may be legitimate farming going on, judging by the cultivated fields. But are taxpayers providing cheap land lease to a palatial mansion and is that consistent with the purposes of the ag leases?
Again, this is a slightly different matter than imposing restrictions on private land. This appears to me to be a “gaming” of the ag lease system, probably by a well-connected person.
Here’s more info on the land in Waimanalo. Here is the exact Google map link:
http://maps.google.com/maps?client=opera&rls=en&q=%2241-879+MAHAILUA+ST%22+Waimanalo&oe=utf-8&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=41-879+Mahailua+St
Here is a mention in the minutes of the Waimanalo Neighborhood Board. The “gentleman farmer” was caught doing illegal landfill of wetlands in order to create a POLO FIELD! I’ll see your “turf farm” and raise you a polo field!
NHB Minutes:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8nT4okjpjl4J:www.honolulu.gov/refs/nco/nb32/03/32novmin.htm+%22Miguel+RAMIREZ%22+hawaii&cd=8&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=opera