Keaau likes sound
of $50 million boom

New schools, a road and more
mean big changes in the former
Big Island sugar town

By Rod Thompson
Star-Bulletin

KEAAU, Hawaii -- Roughly $50 million of construction in the village of Keaau south of Hilo is coming not one moment too soon for Cheryl Mattos.

"It seems like we've been waiting forever," said Mattos, who manages the Puna Federal Credit Union in Keaau. "Finally it's coming. Suddenly it's all coming at once."

The building boom in this former sugar town of about 1,800 people consists of five government projects and three private ones.

Among them are a bypass road, two public schools and one private school, and retail projects.

Just four miles from the outskirts of Hilo, Keaau's location at the crossroads of the upper and lower portions of the Puna District gives it problems and opportunities.

Perhaps the worst has been the traffic bottleneck.

"In the morning, it's just total. It's terrible," said Mattos.

The planned bypass to lower Puna was supposed to speed traffic, but it has now been designed with three traffic lights.

"It just isn't a bypass anymore," said David Taylor, president of the Puna Community Council.

Mattos, who lives in Volcano and has two children attending high school 23 miles away in Hilo, is grateful for the new schools.

But Keaau also needs other businesses such as a theater, she said. "We could use a good family restaurant."

By Rod Thompson, Star-Bulletin
Bob Saunders shows off architects' renderings.

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Gladys Nakamura, president of the Keaau Senior Citizens Club, has her own wish list. "We do need a medical facility," she said. And a dentist. And a bank.

In other words, even with all the construction, the transformation from a crossroads to a full-service town won't be complete.

No one knows that better than Bob Saunders, president of W.H. Shipman Ltd., which owns most of the land in and around Keaau.

He points to a survey showing about 5,000 households in a five-mile radius of Keaau, with a total annual income of $265 million by the year 2000.

"It's all driving by us, basically," he said.

But Carl Okuyama, president of Sure Save supermarkets -- which has its biggest store in Keaau -- has put expansion plans on hold. If some families have good incomes, a lot of others are on food stamps, he said.

"There's a significant need for new industry," he said.

Saunders knows that too. His company recently renamed its industrial park, a half-mile from the town center, the Shipman Business Park to attract a wider clientele.

Troy Rimel, principal of Christian Liberty School, said school officials wanted a site that would be convenient for students coming from upper and lower Puna and Hilo.

"We wanted to move to Keaau because we feel it's the central location, the hub," he said.

Shipman plans to start zoning changes within six months for a 118-acre residential project between the three public schools, Saunders said. A child growing up there could go from kindergarten to high school without ever being more than a quarter-mile walk from school, he said.

In a controversial move, Shipman tore down rotting old buildings in 1995, and new buildings are radically changing the face of the town. But one landmark, the Puna Hongwanji, seems likely to remain.

Senior citizen Nakamura said the church just celebrated its 95th anniversary. The present building, built in 1937, is in good shape, and most of the congregation expect to see it still standing at the 100th anniversary, she said.