Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

Federal government
helping pay for Big Isle
storm damage

---

By Rod Thompson
Star-Bulletin

HILO -- The federal government is paying the major portion of the $18.1 million cost of cleanup and repairs following the East Hawaii flooding of Nov. 1-2, Hawaii County Public Works official Jiro Sumada said today.

The largest project, building a new bridge on Hilo's Komohana Street for $4.8 million, is 100 percent funded by federal money, he said. The bridge is 70 percent complete and scheduled for opening on Feb. 8, although work on it will continue until Feb. 28.

Other projects may not be completed until the spring of 2002, Sumada said.

In all, the county has identified 169 projects in the wake of the flooding. Of those, 102 were approved for federal funding and 34 are still awaiting approval. The remainder, generally costing less than $1,000, will be funded by the county, Sumada said.

The 169 projects do not include state projects, such as replacing three bridges and constructing a new fourth one on the Hawaii Belt Road near Pahala, he said.

In a news conference, he identified four agencies providing 75 percent to 100 percent funding for the projects: Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Federal Emergency Management Agency.

One project causing some dissatisfaction is the delayed cleanup of tarlike pollution found in dirt under a bay-front soccer field.

Mayor Harry Kim has said he does not want the area, subject to flooding even in normal rainfall, to be restored as a soccer field. "It's not a healthy area for kids to play," Kim said.

Kim will seek the use of nearby state park lands for a new field.

Sumada said cleanup will begin as soon as state Health Department tests on the tar are complete and FEMA gives its approval.

Besides the Komohana bridge and soccer fields, one of the hardest-hit areas during the flooding was Wood Valley in Kau.

Sumada said 15 projects have been identified there -- primarily road damage -- and eight have been approved for $2.2 million worth of repairs. The others are pending approval.

Cleaning up numerous streams choked with debris is expected to cost $250,000.