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Joe Uno, a member of the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation’s board of directors, has been frustrated in trying to get the board to discuss ideas for an unspecified “Plan C” for how to complete and fund the city’s troubled rail project, which faces a budget shortfall of $3.68 billion.
HART board Chairman Tobias Martyn has repeatedly told Uno that board members first need to be “educated” on the city’s obligations under the so-called “Full Funding Grant Agreement” between the city and the Federal Transit Administration.
So Uno was disappointed that a briefing on the FTA obligations was not scheduled for this month’s board or committee meetings and has yet to be scheduled for any public meetings in April.
Without a discussion on the implications of the Full Funding Grant Agreement first, there will be no discussion about alternatives, leading to even more delays on how to proceed, Uno said.
“I was very disappointed,” Uno told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. “I’d like to have Plan C on the agenda and he (Martyn) told me, paraphrasing, ‘I believe you don’t understand the FFGA, and I’d like to educate you and the other board members on the FFGA before we have a discussion on the ways forward.’ He promised me that we would have this discussion about FFGA and then we’ll have a discussion on the other items, … The next opportunity would be during one of the committee meetings in the next three weeks.”
Martyn declined a request for an interview, and HART spokesman Joey Manahan said Martyn wants to discuss the issue with board members first.
Manahan said Martyn might schedule a discussion of the Full Funding Grant Agreement in April.
“They’re planning to have at least an internal discussion or at least a prep meeting to discuss how the FFGA came about,” he said.
U.S. Rep. Ed Case told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser in an email, “The current Full Funding Grant Agreement between the FTA and the City and County of Honolulu states that failure to complete the entirety of the project to Ala Moana would constitute a default under the agreement, giving the FTA a claim against the City for return of federal funds advanced under the FTA to date.”
But Councilwoman Heidi Tsuneyoshi said the scope of the project, which would have initially built rail to the University of Hawaii, continues to change, including current plans to move the guideway farther mauka on Dillingham Boulevard to reduce the need to relocate all utility lines and, ideally, save money.
“So much has changed and so much about this project isn’t consistent,” Tsuneyoshi said, adding that HART officials should be working with federal officials on other ways to adjust the rail.
“They’re much more likely to work with us if we come forward now,” she said. “We need to have a fuller discussion of what is actually going on.
“Whether you’re for or against rail, it cannot be something that drains all of the resources from the city,” she said. “Tying it all up into one project is irresponsible. We cannot build this project without absolutely no budgetary constraints. The definition of insanity is to do the same thing repeatedly and expect a different result.”
Uno, who owns his own engineering company, has not proposed specific alternatives, but believes the board should be considering “out-of-the-box thinking” to both fund and finish rail.
In a Feb. 14 op-ed in the Star-Advertiser, Uno wrote, “This is a good time to reassess rail. The existing guideway construction contract ends at Middle Street, and HART has not yet designed or contracted for any guideway beyond Middle Street. Based on recent experience, there is no reason to believe that we will not encounter problems in relocating utilities such as those on Dillingham Boulevard as we move toward Ala Moana Center.”
Lori Kahikina, HART’s interim CEO and executive director, has insisted that the rail line has to continue all the way to Ala Moana Center, Hawaii’s largest transit hub, or risk losing $800 million in federal funds.
Others believe the U.S. Department of Transportation and Federal Transit Authority — under Transpor-tation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and President Joe Biden — are likely to help HART and want to stimulate the national economy through infrastructure projects and rail, in particular.
A Dec. 31 deadline for HART to provide the FTA with a plan to fund the final four miles of rail, for instance, was met with an extension until the end of this year.
And U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, helped include $70 million in the latest federal stimulus to aid HART in making up for the 2020 loss of general excise and transit accommodations taxes due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“While we recently secured an extension on federal funding that buys them more time, HART and the City must still update their financial plan and come back with something that can actually work,” said Schatz in an email to the Star-Advertiser. “We will need a clear-eyed plan so it is encouraging to hear Lori Kahikina speaking more frankly about the challenges ahead.
“I will continue to support them in any way I can in the Senate and with the Biden administration, but the first steps must be taken by HART and local leaders.”
The issue of how to proceed — or whether to even complete the 20-mile, 21-station project all the way to Ala Moana Center — comes during another period of crises for rail.
The price tag has now grown to $12.45 billion, and the completion date has been pushed back to March 2031.
At the same time, there is a new administration in Washington, D.C., a new Honolulu mayor, five new City Council members, new HART board members and a new interim HART CEO and executive director.
“I think there’s a lot of pressure all the way around,” said HART board member Natalie Iwasa. “The Council has been asking questions. … Personally, I think the public deserves to have a conversation on the alternatives.”
Both Uno and Iwasa emphasized they were speaking to the Star-Advertiser as individual board members and not for HART or the HART board.
Uno told the Star-Advertiser that the Full Funding Grant Agreement — what he called “an important document” — should at least be posted on HART’s website, along with an interpretation from Martyn about what it means for rail’s future.
Until then the Full Funding Grant Agreement can be read at bit.ly/3lLQjVf.
On Friday, Uno sent an email to Martyn and other HART officials that read:
“Why is this seminal document so hard to find on the HART website? I went looking for it and couldn’t find it there. Can we please have the website administrator add it to the home page?”
ON THE NET
The Full Funding Grant Agreement can be found here:
hartdocs.honolulu.gov/docushare/dsweb/Get/Document-16914/ 20121219-full-funding- grant-agreement.pdf
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