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Alternative Communities
At Affordable Portable Housing Hawaii, we are working in three major areas- 1- Working towards creating a manufactured home industry in Hawaii 2- Designing and building portable and permanently situated affordable housing that is outfitted with alternative power & sanitation systems. 3- Proposing legislation that will make exceptions for affordable housing projects that serve the homeless and those in desperate need of affordable housing in areas that are currently lacking infrastructure.
The central theme with creating “alternative communities” is to hopefully create opportunities for community members to own something. This naturally promotes pride of ownership, a civilized and clean atmosphere and a way to accrue equity. Equity offers families a chance at financial opportunites and equilibrium. Our focus is on permanent single level dwellings and also mobile housing, so this concept will generally work primarily in rural areas. The biggest hurdle to jump over is getting the county to allow more than the currently allowed number of structures on one piece of land. Our mission is to work for legislation that will grant variances for specific projects that are truly affordable. Mobile home parks are not legal in Hawaii. Our hope is to create a mobile home park developed strictly for truly affordable housing. There is no hope for affordable housing if you have to work with the current restrictive regulations and the insanely high cost of land in Hawaii. We are opposed to sleazy mobile home parks, and think that It is possible to create projects that are not sleazy, but rather, attractive projects that have very strict rules and security. There are a lot of really ugly properties in Hawaii everywhere right now, so we feel the argument that a mobile home park would be necessarily ugly and trashy is not really valid when you consider how many ugly properties exist right now. We are for strict rules and security with no exceptions. We think the time is right to consider such projects, with strictly enforced rules and security, in specific areas that make sense.
The state is very focused on homeless solutions and affordable housing. Our current Governor, Linda Lingle, is committed to both causes, so we are hopeful. We applaud Lingle’s new Kaka’ako and Waianae projects, which will house many homeless people. That project required special permitting to allow that many people to live on one property, so it can be done. Obviously its easier for the state to get this kind of variance. In mid-2006, the state announced a huge affordable condominium project in Waipahu. The starting price point is a little higher than we would like, but that will help the many working people who qualify. We salute the state for using state land for this awesome project and creating opportunity for many working families that will not need to leave Hawaii. We think that a project such as we are proposing would have a starting point cost of about $225k, which is easy for people to afford, and would give working people a chance at ownership. Where we come in is in the area of single level rural communities, mobile housing, alternative power and sanitation systems.
Alternative Hawaiian agricultural communities
Imagine a Hawaiian community in windward Oahu or on the neighbor islands with Hawaiians raising Taro and other native crops and living on the land totally powered by alternative power, both solar and wind. Imagine how ownership would cause everyone involved to take pride in their new community. The Hawaiian people are owed a lot. Why can’t state & Government lands in areas such as Waiahole and Waikane valleys be used for this purpose? Perhaps Visitors could experience ancient Hawaiian life with 21st century technology working side by side perfectly. Establishing communities like this would also be a great thing for the visitor industry, so the benefits would extend far beyond giving Hawaiians a place to live and farm. That is a true win win situation. It is a vision we are dedicated to help make happen. What are your thoughts? We think it is vital that they live on the land that they farm for many reasons. For one, agricultural theft is a very serious problem, and two, they deserve to. I am sure that if they can own the land and operations, they will take excellent care of it. Ancient Hawaiians took the best care of their lands, and enforced very strict rules regarding that. It would be nice to allow them a chance to reconnect with that lifestyle again. Offering people an opportunity for ownership would make all the difference.