MELISSA TANJI
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“Mediation between developers, community groups failed, attorneys say”

The Honua’ula master-planned community of more than 1,000 housing units and mixed-use development will head into a contested case hearing.

A mediation ordered by the Maui Planning Commission last month between Honua’ula representatives and intervenors Maui Tomorrow and Ho’opo-nopono O Makena, has failed, attorneys on both sides said during a commission meeting Tuesday afternoon.

The contested case hearing will begin on March 22.

The challenge to the project comes as Honua’ula, formerly known as Wailea 670, is seeking a Project District Phase II Development approval, which is likely to be its final discretionary approval to move forward. Other county administrative permits are also needed.

The project, south of Maui Meadows and mauka of Wailea Resort, calls for about 1,150 new housing units, including 288 workforce housing units, 515 single-family residential units and 346 multifamily residential units; 24 acres of village mixed use; 103 acres of recreation and open space; and 170 acres to be placed in conservation easement with the Hawaiian Islands Land Trust. All will be on-site.

Maui Tomorrow, an environmental advocacy organization, and Ho’oponopono O Makena, which seeks to preserve and protect cultural and historical sites in Makena and surrounding areas, say they could provide more information to the commission for its decision-making, including on cultural sites in the area that they say were not reported in documentation provided to various government agencies.

Some intervenors are Native Hawaiians and descendants of the area who have traditional and customary rights. Others are neighbors of the project.

At the commission’s meeting on Feb. 22, Honua’ula did not oppose the intervention.

The project’s attorney, Cal Chipchase, said in the February meeting that the process could help clear up “confusion.” Chipchase said that both the State Historic Preservation Division and Office of Hawaiian Affairs have approved the historic preservation plan and that the claim that cultural sites were not documented and that there are other maps out there that have not been provided “is just not true.”

At Tuesday’s meeting and following an executive session of more than an hour, commissioners granted a motion by the intervenors that Commission Chairman Christian Tackett recuse himself or be disqualified from participating in the contested hearing.

Intervenors in their written motion said Tackett “made a number of comments at the February 22 meeting that demonstrate personal bias or prejudice,” and that it raises significant questions regarding impartiality and prejudgment.

Tackett told the commission Tuesday that he would hear the facts of the case and weigh it fairly, and that he did not make a decision on the project. However, he left the matter of disqualification up to the commission.

During the vote to disqualify Tackett, commissioner Kelli Pali called him “esteemed” and said the move was just to keep “the record as clean as possible” to ensure there were no assumptions or potential future views “that could muddy the water.”