Kauai residents fear
influx of vacation rentals
LIHUE >> Kauai residents are raising concerns over Alexander & Baldwin's latest plan for a hotel, time-shares and homes at its 1,000-acre Kukuiula project.
But the objections at yesterday's county Planning Commission meeting were mild compared with public hearings on past proposals, which date to the late 1980s.
The most controversial of the new requests to the Planning Commission is designation of the entire project as a Visitor Destination Area, which would allow homes to be used as vacation rentals without any further county permits. Three other areas already exist in Princeville, Kapaa and Poipu.
Vacation rentals are blamed in part for the island's acute housing shortage. Every residence that becomes a vacation rental is taken out of the island's available housing stock, critics contend.
"The west side is being overrun with vacation rentals," activist Bruce Pleas told the Planning Commission. "Most of them are underground and they don't pay taxes. They shouldn't be allowed in any residential area on the island."
Kukuiula -- to replace fallow A&B sugar land west of Koloa -- began in the 1980s as a residential area primarily for local residents. When the market for homes plummeted in the early 1990s, it was revived as a hotel and time-share complex with a few homes.
Now with the market on Kauai shifting to homes for the wealthy, the latest proposal calls for a project consisting primarily of upscale homes, with prices topping out at about $3 million.
Kukuiula Development LLC -- a partnership between A&B Properties and DMB Associates of Scottsdale, Ariz. -- told the county it wants to cut the number of single-family homes to 1,500 from the 3,400 previously proposed and the number of hotel rooms and time-shares to 187 from 900.
The revisions already have been approved by the state Land Use Commission. The county permitting process is expected to take about two years and the first homes will be ready for occupancy about 2007, according to the company.
