Mayor Kim's response- same letter four times over

Please be assured that the County of Hawai‘i is pursuing many different options for dealing with East Hawai‘i’s rubbish in both the long term and the short term. We have committed publicly that trucking of East Hawai‘i trash to West Hawai‘i is not under consideration. What we are doing includes:

· Application for extension of the life of the Hilo Landfill by steepening the slopes. This application has been submitted to the Department of Health and we expect that it will be approved in several months. In the meantime, pending approval, we have informed the Department of Health that we are already proceeding to do preliminary work to steepen the slopes. For your information, an engineering study has been completed by an outside engineering firm that demonstrates that this action is feasible and safe. We expect this approval to gain at least two more years of life and as much as four more years.

· Construction of a reload facility that will replace the Hilo Transfer Station with a plain tipping floor to accept trash from both commercial and residential sources. This will be a “plain vanilla” facility that can eventually be used as the front end for a waste reduction facility or for shipping trash off-island. While the Hilo landfill is still operating, the trash from the reload facility (after some recycling off the floor) can be trucked to the Hilo landfill. Since it can be adapted for different uses, having this reload facility on line can shorten the time it will take to implement other options.

· Reviewing the possibility of shipping East Hawai‘i trash off island. Two different companies have approached the County to ship trash to landfills on the mainland. This may be feasible, and it is under serious consideration for the short term or interim period until a waste reduction facility can be put in place.

· Pursuing a waste reduction facility to handle East Hawai‘i’s trash. The Stage 1 Request for Proposals was issued at the end of December. We are working very hard to enter into a contract to construct and operate such a facility. With the permitting requirements and construction time, this is several years away, which is why it is so critical to extend the life of the landfill and have an interim method such as off-island shipment under consideration.

Under state procurement laws, a specific process must be followed for proposals to be considered. Unsolicited proposals cannot be considered or accepted. We have encouraged companies interested in making a proposal to the County to participate in the ongoing Request for Proposals process so their proposals can be accepted.

The bottom line is that there will be no shipment of trash to Kona. I hope this information is useful in helping you understand that we are pursuing many different options, and that trucking to Pu’uanahulu is not under consideration.

Aloha,

Harry Kim