Notes on Candidates in the Primary

Kioni Dudley

by Kioni Dudley

Kioni Dudley is a retired professor who spearheads the battle against D.R. Horton-Schuler Hawaii in its bid to urbanize 1,500 acres of prime agricultural land in 'Ewa to build 12,000 homes. The company calls the community Ho'opili. Once those prime ag lands, considered the best in the world, are prepared for the homes to be built on them, they will be lost to Hawaii as farmland permanently.

Recently, I had the opportunity to meet for an hour with both Duke Aiona and Neil Abercrombie. Both of them support our efforts to keep Ho'opili in agriculture, and to keep the rail from crossing the farmland.

Either of them would be good for Hawai'i.

Mufi Hanneman, as you know, wants to develop the Ho'opili farmland; he supports Mufi-rail; and he champions transit oriented developments on the Ho'opili property surrounding his train stations. Our biggest supports at the Land Use Commission have been the heads of the Dept. of Transportation, the Department of Agriculture, and the State Office of Planning. If Mufi becomes governor, he can change the composition of the Land Use Commission to people who strongly support him, and put people into the Director positions in the other three departments who will deliver on developing Ho'opili and supporting his train. If Mufi gets in, we can kiss the 'Ewa farmland goodbye.

In the mayor's race, Caldwell and Carlisle both strongly support rail as planned and support the development of the 12,000 houses at Ho'opili. Caldwell is just as intent as Mufi was. Panos was one of the key witnesses on our side during the LUC hearings. We didn't get the chance to call him, because the Commissioners voted against further pursuing the case before we got to our witnesses, but he is strongly on our side. His stand is against rail. However, I have been on panels with Panos where he supported changing the route to the OR&L line, and putting it on the ground, as I have argued. My feeling is that people are becoming tremendously aware that we can't afford rail and sewers and fixing roads, which is Panos' mantra. And Panos, as a traffic specialist, will get us the best transportation solutions we can afford.

In the Senate race, Mike Gabbard was one of only three senators to vote against our legislation to save the farmland. Gabbard is head of the environment committee, however, and has done a good job. Mike Golojuch, on the other hand, is strongly pro-development. Never found a project he didn't love. I recommend Gabbard.

In the local Makakilo-Kapolei-Royal Kunia race, Sharon Har is a lovely lady but, being a developer's lawyer, she has become the point person developers go to to get their legislation through the House of Representatives. She definitely supports the development of Ho'opili.

Michael Doyle, on the other hand, supports us 100%. He has been coming to Neighborhood Board meetings for about a year, supporting our projects. I hope you will give him your support.

In the primary, one can take either a Democrat or Republican ballot, but not both, and you cannot cross vote. Since only the lieutenant governor Republican race is contested, I strongly urge Republicans to vote the Democrat ballot and vote for Abercrombie and Doyle.