Background
Ho‘oponopono O Mākena and Maui Tomorrow Foundation challenged the Maui Planning Commission’s Phase II approval of Honua‘ula Partners, LLC’s master-planned residential community in Mākena. The project district had received Phase I approval through Maui County ordinances; Phase II required Planning Commission approval of a preliminary site plan.
The challengers argued that the project failed to satisfy ordinance requirements concerning workforce housing, golf courses, and drainage; that the Commission used unlawful procedures by accepting updated plans and delegating authority; and that Hawai‘i environmental law required a supplemental environmental impact statement (SEIS).
The Court’s Holding
The Intermediate Court of Appeals held that later county ordinances mooted the disputes over the number of workforce housing units and the project’s golf-course requirements. It upheld the Commission’s determination that the Phase II application satisfied the drainage-plan condition, finding substantial evidence in the engineering testimony and the record that the Phase II plans were appropriately conceptual and had been updated in response to feedback.
The court also rejected the asserted procedural and due-process errors. The updated drainage plans did not establish that the original application was incomplete, Condition 7 did not delegate the Commission’s authority to the developer, and the challengers had sufficient opportunity to examine witnesses and argue their position. But the Commission erred by declining to consider whether substantive changes since the 2012 final EIS required an SEIS. The court affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded for that determination.
Key Takeaways
- Subsequent ordinance amendments can moot land-use challenges when no effective judicial remedy remains.
- Phase II project-district approval may rest on conceptual drainage materials when substantial evidence supports compliance with the applicable condition.
- Before approving a changed project, the agency must determine whether changes in size, scope, intensity, use, location, or timing require a supplemental EIS.
Why It Matters
The decision preserves most of the Phase II approval while requiring the Maui Planning Commission to perform the environmental-review analysis it did not undertake. An agency cannot avoid the SEIS question merely because the local permitting code does not expressly make an SEIS a condition of that approval stage.
For developers and challengers, the ruling distinguishes permissible refinement of preliminary plans from environmental changes that must be assessed under Hawai‘i’s EIS rules.