In my view, there are several guiding principles or values of "good" development. The development must essentially improve the general quality of life for our community; its impact also must be thoroughly understood; we must have the infrastructure in place to support it; and open space must be provided.

The motto I have run for office on has been "Building a Better Community." That statement assumes that we will be building, moving forward, and not just trying to maintain a way of life that passed from the scene decades ago.

But at the same time, we must first and foremost preserve what is the essence of our communities: celebrating our unique blend of cultures and embracing the Native Hawaiian host culture as a guide for maintaining our sense of place.

Development pressures have been building on Maui since the late 1990s as investors poured in to acquire and develop whole sections of former Wailuku Sugar and Pioneer Mill cane lands, as well as prime leeward resort lands. Back then, as the former County Council Planning Committee chairman, I sensed that we could not truly fathom the full extent of this onslaught without first seeing what was on the table for whole communities. So I directed our county Geographic Information System Office and Planning Department to create a series of aerial maps that clearly depict the impacts we were facing.

The maps they created revealed developments at hand, color coded to identify their status: green for projects in the works; yellow for those proposed; and red to reflect somebody's idea that has not yet been fully formed.

These maps have proved invaluable in understanding the full potential and impacts of development. The West Maui map, for instance, shows conceptually all the cane and pineapple land from Olowalu to Kapalua being developed. That's problematic because we only have one roadway — the seriously overstressed two-lane Honoapi'ilani Highway— serving that community.

These maps have allowed state agencies to understand that they must reassess their plans for Maui. After years of pleading, a Maui parents' delegation successfully used the maps to get the state Board of Education to finally understand that our population growth means we must have a high school in Kihei. And in the midst of the recent debate about Kahului Harbor, we were able to show state harbor leaders that Maui is growing more quickly than they were planning for, and that we desperately need new harbor capacity much sooner than they thought.

Along with permitted projects, there must be infrastructure in place that can sustain it.

Mayor Mufi Hannemann and I share a belief that infrastructure basics must be covered first. Honolulu's earlier underinvestment in basic infrastructure, particularly wastewater, was quite instructional to us. We are making that investment this year and every year.

Another challenge is water supply. Maui has more water source than Honolulu but only about 20 percent of O'ahu's population. We won't run out of water anytime soon. But we must develop more capacity and more efficient systems.

In 2002, Maui County's voters put the water system back under the authority of accountable political leaders, so unlike the other counties, the mayor is in charge of running the water system, and the County Council is in charge of making its rules.

By making the system more open and transparent, this change empowered citizens to start challenging where system improvements would, or would not, take place. This politicization of our water decision-making policies could have long-term implications for Maui County's development.

Because I am now in charge of the community's water system, I have pushed the takeover of former plantation water systems in the West Maui Mountains near Wailuku. The waters of the four streams — known as Na Wai Eha — are currently being used as a commodity by the company that grew out of the former plantation, the Wailuku Water Co. We believe those waters are a public resource, and our goal is to acquire the water source so that we can restore the natural flow to the sea; return water to kuleana; and use some of this source for domestic use.

This action will change the water status quo that has existed on Maui since Claus Spreckels famously won those water rights from King Kalakaua in a card game a century and a half ago. It is not the type of action that a Board of Water Supply likely would have taken.

Also in 2002, the county's voters created a special fund to acquire important lands, keeping them preserved forever. We have used those funds to help the Maui Coastal Land Trust acquire the 277-acre coastal property formerly known as the Waihee Dairy; the culturally important 70-acre Mu'olea Point property in Hana; and, with additional funding, we bought 100 acres along Honoapi'ilani Highway in Ukumehame as the first step in West Maui's Pali to Puamana Parkway project.

We are working to build a better community as we preserve what makes our communities so unique in the world. As a Maui boy, I naturally believe that Maui County no ka 'oi — is the best.

Alan Arakawa is mayor of Maui County. He wrote this commentary for The Advertiser.