The story of the 854-acre Kunia Loa Ridge Farmlands keeps getting worse.
The 854-acre compound, conceived as a place where small farmers could make a living and further the goals of sustainable agriculture,
instead has highlighted the vulnerabilities left in a 2006 state law too easily abused.
The latest chapter concerns one of the “farmers” gaming the system, profiting from vacation rentals on the land.
Honolulu Star-Advertiser writer Rob Perez this week found posted advertisements on vacation websites such as Airbnb. The solicitation is for customers wanting to stay in a dwelling endowed with views of Pearl Harbor.
This compounds the existing violations: the proliferation of house-like structures, one even used as a Buddhist temple.
No residential structures of any kind are allowed on the lots. But because the nearly decade-old law did permit farm storage structures without the usual inspection process, the lessee here has been the ultimate scofflaw.
Kunia Loa Ridge Farmlands is the product of the 2006 state law that exempted leased agricultural land from county subdivision requirements such as sidewalks and street lights.
Then in 2012, state lawmakers added a new, bad wrinkle. Against the counsel of city officials, they enacted an exemption from building permits for the allowable farm buildings.
The operators of the illicit complex are garnering rental income while paying the lower agricultural property rates; meanwhile, neighboring farmers have tried to live by the rules. The neighboring residen-tial use has pushed property tax assessments upward, which does not help the financial survival of those farms.
By some counts, at least 22 families live at Kunia Loa; under the law, none should be there.
The Kunia Loa Ridge association has a part to play in righting this up-ended situation, and the city Department of Planning and Permitting should pressure the association to play it.
The association must serve as the city’s eyes and ears here and see that violations don’t persist
unpunished.
But in the final analysis, it’s DPP’s duty to enforce the laws. Because the properties are off the grid, the city can easily look the other way.
That practice can’t continue. The city must regard the project in the same way the property tax office does: as separate parcels that should be scrutinized individually. And violators should be fined if they don’t demolish the unpermitted structures.
For its part, the state should change the clearly failed laws by tightening the rules, restoring requirements for all structures to have inspections at a minimum.
This may seem a small matter in the grand scheme of Oahu land use, but if the city doesn’t crack down on the violations and the state enables weak laws, others will be encouraged to attempt the same misuse of agricultural land. And that’s at cross purposes with the state’s diversified agriculture goals.
