Housing update: Koa Ridge, Kahauiki Village make progress
Posted on Nov 29, 2017 in Capitol Connection, Featured
Castle & Cooke breaks ground for more housing at Koa Ridge
Governor Ige joined Castle & Cooke executives and community leaders last month to break ground for Koa Ridge, a new master planned community in central O‘ahu. “We thank you for your perseverance,” said the governor, noting that his son was in preschool when Koa Ridge planning started some 20 years ago.
The project will provide 3,500 new homes — a third of which will be designated as affordable under City and County of Honolulu guidelines. The first 170 homes are expected to be finished in mid-2019.
At a recent Building Industry Association summit, the state reported it is still on track to build 10,000 housing units by 2020. “About 5,300 units have been produced since the governor first took office. Forty percent of those are affordable. Another 1,400 units are under construction, and another 4,500 units are in some stage of planning,” said the governor’s senior special assistant Denise Iseri-Matsubara.
Gov. Ige checks progress at Kahauiki Village with Mel Kaneshige and Maj. Gen. Joe Logan
On the other side of the island, members of the Hawai‘i National Guard are pitching in to help prepare Kahauiki Village near Nimitz Highway for the first group of homeless families to move in by mid-January. The plantation-style village was launched by Duane Kurisu and his aio Foundation to provide affordable rental units for families who are employed but in transitional housing.
Kurisu credits the governor’s emergency homeless proclamation and transfer of the 11.5 acres of state land for moving the project forward, plus help from other state departments and many community supporters.