City executive and water supply chief battle over landfill site
HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Honolulu Hale saw heated debate Tuesday over where to put a new landfill on Oahu.
The conflict is exposing frustration in the Mayor’s Office over opposition by the popular head of the Board of Water Supply.
Water board chief Ernie Lau’s emotional criticism of the Navy over the Red Hill fuel tanks made him very popular, and Tuesday he used that leverage against the mayor’s proposed landfill site by mashing the two issues together.
“We are kind of at that point where Red Hill was 80 years ago,” he said. “Do we do it in a fashion where we don’t compromise our drinking water resources?”
City managing director Michael Formby took offense to that comparison.
“I don’t think anybody should refer to our attempts to put a safe landfill over the aquifer as ‘Red Hill Two,’” he said. “That is disingenuous. It’s inflammatory.”
The administration proposes the landfill be built on Dole Foods land north of Wahiawa, which is part of nearly 70 percent of the island that sits over drinking water aquifers.
At a hearing of the council’s Housing and Sustainability Committee, Formby and Lau accused each other of being uncooperative.
But in addressing committee chair Matt Weyer, Formby did admit keeping plans secret.
“We apologized to Dole and I’ll apologize to you because that’s your district and I’ll apologize to anybody at any of our town halls that we didn’t do that in advance,” he said. “But we didn’t do it because we simply didn’t want to have forces already moving against us.”
Weyer politely chided Formby.
“If we’re talking about collaboration, and be disappointed in a lack of collaboration, I think it has to go both ways,” Weyer said.
“I agree,” Formby responded.
Under questioning by Windward Oahu council member Esther Kiaaina, who has one potential landfill site in her district at an unused quarry, Lau admitted never trying to suggest a better place.
“Have you and your staff just independently looked and thought to yourselves this might be an appropriate site?” Kiaaina asked.
“We didn’t actually do that exercise, council member,” Lau said.
The committee voted to stand by the council’s previous opposition to landfills over aquifers.
But other restrictions from the Legislature, federal regulations, and hometown politics could make it hard to find a new place.
Formby said they just might go to the Land Use Commission and ask to expand at the current landfill site: Waimanalo Gulch near Ko Olina.
“We may do a district boundary amendment to even give us more time at Waimanalo Gulch,” he said. “There’s no good solution.”
So far there is no new site being suggested that doesn’t have a powerful political opposition.
But from a purely political point of view, expanding Waimanalo Gulch starts to look more possible, because almost all the legislators in that area are now Republicans.
PREVIOUS COVERAGE
- ‘Everyone is kind of stuck’ as lawmakers hear debate over Wahiawa landfill site
- Dole opposes city’s landfill location in ‘heart of our pineapple operation’
- Board of Water Supply manager calls proposed landfill site ‘Red Hill Two’
- ‘Never been this angry’: Lawmakers to fight proposed landfill site in Central Oahu
- After years-long search, city identifies new landfill site in central Oahu
Any community members that would like to share their concerns on the landfill site is invited to attend a community town hall on Wednesday evening at the Wahiawa Elementary School Cafeteria. It’ll begin at 6 p.m.
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