Help Halt D.R. Horton Ho'opili Development

From Randy Ching, Sierra Club, O’ahu Group:

We need your help in stopping the proposed D.R. Horton development called Ho`opili.  Please write to the Land Use Commission and/or a letter to the editor (letters@staradvertiser.com).  The Ho`opili case is docket A06-771.  Our case resumes on Thursday, November 17 and 18.  If you could send your message by the 18th, that would  be great.  Here are talking points:

Ho`opili talking points

BACKGROUND
D.R. Horton, based on the mainland, is America’s largest home builder who  wants to build 12,000 homes on 1,500 acres of ag land in Ewa which has been identified as prime land best suited for the production of food, feed, forage and fiber crops by the rating system used for the “Agricultural Lands of Importance to the State of Hawai`i” (ALISH) study.

TALKING POINTS
1.   Ho`opili will put at least 12,000 more cars on the already very congested freeway adding at least a half an hour each way. Studies show that most freeway cross-streets will be Level of Service F, the lowest rating. Traffic will be at a standstill.
2.  Because of the warm air, plentiful sunshine, sufficient clean water, and good drainage, this ag land can produce 4 crops in a year, compared to one crop a year in most places in the world.   It is also close to markets.
3.  This farmland produces almost 80% of the locally produced pumpkin and Kobacha squash, 98% of honeydew melon, over 75% of sweet corn,  41.67% of broccoli, 48.88% of the green beans, 40% of the Romain lettuce, 47.34% of the zucchini, and 70.96% of the cantaloupe produced locally.
4.  Once good productive farmland is covered over for houses, it is lost forever.
5.  Food grown here is fresher and retains more of its nutritional value than imported food.
6.  We need food grown on Oahu to help ensure food security because we only produce 15% of our own food and have only a week’s supply of food to sustain us should imports cease arrive at our shores.
7.  Zoning is in place for over 30,000 new homes in Ewa, so why aren’t they being built first? Why the rush to convert this prime ag land into urban uses?
8.  If one of the goals of the Hawai`i 2050 Sustainability Plan is to “Increase production and consumption of local foods and products, particularly agricultural products” how can we reach that goal if all our ag land keeps getting paved over?
9.  For Hawai`i ( Oahu ) to be truly sustainable, government must lead and set an example. Preserving and protecting Hawaii ’s lands and encouraging those uses to which lands are best suited is the Land Use Commission’s responsibility.