Hawaii County is considering acquiring the long-vacant former Kmart store in Kailua-Kona’s Makalapua Shopping Center for conversion to an events center for West Hawaii.

Read more South Africa salvages draw with late penalty after Czechs take early lead

Hawaii County is considering acquiring the long-vacant former Kmart store in Kailua-Kona’s Makalapua Shopping Center for conversion to an events center for West Hawaii.

Benson Medina, the county’s Research and Development director, told attendees at a Waimea Community Meeting Association meeting on June 4 that Micah Kamohoali‘i, a kumu hula, fashion designer and Aloha Festivals Island of Hawaii executive director, brought the idea to the county administration.

“He came in and said, ‘Hey, I think we could utilize Kmart as a central West Hawaii events center,’” Medina told a full house in a conference room at the W.M. Keck Observatory Headquarters.

Medina said he and Kamohoali‘i connected with the landowner, Queen Lili‘uokalani Trust, and “walked the place.” He said that afterward, he talked to Mayor Kimo Alameda and Managing Director Bill Brilhante about the 125,000-square-foot building, which has been vacant since Kmart shuttered in 2018.

“We see great potential in there,” Medina told the attendees. “And the trust wanted to rent the facility out. Some guys wanted to do pickleball, waterslide, whatever. But nobody has, really, the financial strength to take on a facility like that. Because, you know, with Kmart, the (Regal movie theaters) went down. They closed down there — actually had a leak in the ceiling, and there’s stuff growing in the building. … And it looks like Macy’s, they’re probably not going to renew their lease. So now, that entire area is open.”

Medina said the trust’s long-term plan was to build affordable housing in the area.

“So, their first thought was, ‘let’s build a commercial center there and all the housing around it,’” he said. “Well, the commercial center, it didn’t stick. So, they want something to happen there. And really, the only guys on the horizon that have a chance of bringing something there viable is us, is the county.”

According to the county’s property tax website, the assessed value of the building and 11.35 acres of commercially zoned land where it’s situated is $17.67 million.

“We have had preliminary discussions with the landowner about leasing the building for a multiuse park facility. A walk-through is planned but has not yet occurred,” Tom Callis, spokesman for Alameda, said Tuesday in an email.

Read more U.S. Open leader Wyndham Clark wants a redemption arc. Is that there for him?

Kamohoali‘i on Tuesday told the Tribune-Herald he was asked by the county to create a festival for West Hawaii “that would be an economic draw, especially with the return of the Japanese flights,” which were discontinued during the novel coronavirus pandemic.

“I told them, if we have a big event, I need a facility to hold it. I kinda came up with the Kmart idea because I saw it’s been sitting there for so long, empty,” Kamohoali‘i said. “My proposal to them was not just for the Aloha Festivals but to turn it into a multipurpose facility they could use year-round for anything and everything. There aren’t really any concert venues in Kona except for the Kona Bowl parking lot.”

Kamohoali‘i said he envisioned the building as a venue for events that in Hilo would be held at the 4,200-seat Edith Kanaka‘ole Multi-Purpose Stadium, home of the the Merrie Monarch Festival’s hula competition.

“I thought they could use this for concerts, they could use it for sports events, for graduation parties, or even the graduation itself. This could become part of Parks and Rec and become a multipurpose facility,” he said.

Transformation of the building — which has also been mentioned as a possible site for a new Kona hospital — would require some serious and costly retrofitting.

“It’s a beautiful building, but it’s built to be a department store — the dropped ceilings and every 10 feet there’s a pillar,” Kamohoali‘i said. “We would need to bring in engineering to cut all the pillars and then reinforce the pillars on the outside so they don’t need the pillars on the inside.”

According to Kamohoali‘i, if the county can acquire the building, either by purchase or lease, the potential is tremendous.

“You could put stadium seating in there,” he said. “It looks like a convention center. It’s massive. When I walked in, I went, ‘holy crap!’ You could hardly see the other end of the building. If you opened it up, I’m sure you could fit thousands of people in there. There’s a large parking lot.

“It’s an excellent location for a multipurpose venue, because it’s right in the middle of town where it can serve people in the area from (Kona) Palisades, all the folks in the Kaloko Mauka area. It’s close enough to the airport. It’s close enough to all the hotels.”

Read more Paraguay win knocks out Turkey. Will Almirón’s mouth-covering red card serve as a reminder?

Email John Burnett at [email protected].