Island Watch

Ma’alaea Harbor Expansion Plans Under Fire From Surfers, USFWS

Plans to expand the Ma’alaea Harbor on Maui have become the focus of a heated dispute involving surfers, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Army Corps of Engineers.

More than a decade ago, the Corps prepared an environmental impact statement for dredging and expanding the harbor. Not until 1989, however, did federal funds for the project become available. Soon thereafter, the Corps began preparing a supplemental draft environmental impact statement.

As part of updating the EIS, the Fish and Wildlife Service was asked to reassess the impacts of the project alternatives contained in the 1980 EIS on fish and wildlife habitats, as well as a more recent design alternative, known now as Alternative 6. Under this last alternative, environmental impacts would be minimized, but the turning basin would not be large enough to accommodate a 110 foot long U.S. Coast Guard cutter.

The Coast Guard, however, has no plans to berth a cutter at Ma’alaea. According to a draft “Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act Report” prepared by the Fish and Wildlife Service in July, the Coast Guard “has stated that an alternative should not be ruled out solely on the basis of whether it can accommodate a cutter.”

Resources at Stake

Despite the presence of the harbor, Ma’alaea Bay continues to support a rich variety of marine life. According to the Fish and Wildlife Service report, it has an “abundance and diversity of various marine species, which are uncommon elsewhere in the Hawaiian Islands…. The reasons for the special character of the biological resources of the bay remain largely unknown and extreme caution in undertaking any action which would alter any aspect or condition of the bay has been urged.”

Ma’alaea Bay “is one of four major breeding, calving, and nursing areas for endangered humpback whales in Hawai’i,” the service report notes. The federally protected green sea turtle also is found in the bay.

The Fish and Wildlife Service regards the coral reef fronting Ma’alaea Harbor as the “habitat of major concern.” The reef supports several types of edible seaweed, including limu huluhuluwaena, that are becoming increasingly scarce elsewhere. “The harbor area supports subsistence and sport fisheries for reef fishes, lobsters, crabs, octopi, and algae,” the report states. “Hook and line fishing from the existing mole and breakwater, spear fishing on the reef slope, and hand harvesting of edible algae from intertidal and shallow subtidal areas fronting the harbor are commonly practiced. Also, reef fishes are among the marine resources most important to resident and visiting recreational skin and SCUBA divers.”

Surfers’ Concerns

Expansion of the harbor would mean loss of reef resources, although the extent of loss entailed by Alternative 6 is far less than that entailed by the other alternatives. Apart from the destruction, there is also the prospect of gradual degradation of resources brought on by siltation. As the Fish and Wildlife Service report notes, already Ma’alaea Harbor acts as a drainage basin for upland areas. If inland development increases – as is expected to occur – siltation would be likely to increase.

The expansion plans have drawn objections from Maui’s surfing community as well. Jamie Hunter of the Protect Ma’alaea Coalition set down some of his group’s concerns in a memo to the Corps dated January 14, 1993. One of the main deficiencies of the Corps’ plan, Hunter stated, was that despite the stated goal of protecting the harbor from southeast swells, “in fact, these changes would not protect the harbor from a swell between 180 and 160 degrees. On the contrary this plan would open the harbor to such a swell, making the area where the additional moorings would be located susceptible to more surge and damage than at present.”

Corps’ Action

George Young is the Corps of Engineers’ project manager for Ma’alaea Harbor. In a telephone conversation, he explained that the Ma’alaea Coast Guard office gave the Corps preliminary indications that Coast Guard operations would be made more difficult if the size of the turning basin of the expanded harbor were limited. For that reason, he said, Alternative 6 was at first discounted. When staff at the Honolulu Coast Guard headquarters was asked for comment, however – after preparation of the draft supplemental environmental impact statement – the Corps was told that the Coast Guard did not need to have the harbor designed around its needs, but would rather live with any proposal that the Corps selected.

Thus, Young said, it is wrong to think that the Corps is not considering Alternative 6.

Still, he added, the Corps’ partner in the harbor expansion is the state of Hawai’i and the Corps would have “to have the state’s blessing” in the selection of a preferred alternative. The state “is working with the boaters,” he said. With Alternative 6 providing for fewer total berths (165) than the other alternatives (up to 228), Young suggested, it is unlikely the state will be satisfied with Alternative 6.

The economics of the project have to be considered, Young said, and “the primary economic test for water resource projects relates to how the economics of the nation are affected,” he said, adding, “I suppose this makes us pro-development.”

Would the loss of natural resources be a factor in evaluating the economics of the project? Young was asked.

“For purposes of this document” (the EIS), “no dollar value is assigned to natural resources. The Corps has no guidelines for this yet,” Young answered.

As to Hunter’s charge that the swell studies were inadequate, Young said that the consultants employed by the Corps made their analysis on the basis of computer models combined with on-the-ground conditions in other parts of the state where the geography was similar. Their studies indicated that southeasterly swells were not a significant threat to safe harbor operations.

The Corps was continuing to work with the state’s Coastal Zone Management Program to address recreational impacts including surfing, Young said. Other issues that continue to be studied include water quality impacts and traffic impacts.

No decision on a preferred alternative would be likely before fall, Young said.

UH Study Critical Of Conservation Practices

The University of Hawai’i’s Department of Urban and Regional Planning undertook a review last fall of the way in which the Department of Land and Natural Resources handles applications for activities in the state’s Conservation District. The results of that study, done under the direction of Luciano Minerbi, have been released, along with very specific proposals for changes in state law, departmental rules, and, finally, procedures that the Office of Conservation and Environmental Affairs uses in handling Conservation District Use Applications.

The methodology used by the study team – David Kimo Frankel, Lane Otsu, and Richard Minatoya – involved a review of what literature was available in this area, examination of a number of CDUA files, and visits to sites along the West Coast of the Big Island that were the object of several of the CDUAs reviewed.

The team arrived at 10 findings. CDUA approval was determined to be almost routine, with the Land Board rarely denying CDUA’s on “substantive grounds.” “Although substantive reasons for denial can be found in the comments from DLNR divisions and other agencies, the Board appears to look for procedural grounds to deny the CDUA if it is denied,” the report states. “Similarly, and perhaps more disturbing, the Board does not rely on environmental grounds to deny CDUAs. CDUAs are granted where serious negative impacts appear to be inevitable… The Board merely requires mitigation measures, the implementation of which is never monitored or enforced.”

Rarely, too, does the Board look at the cumulative impacts of granting CDUAs. “Not only do applicants later amend CDUAs, but other applicants in adjoining parcels tend to seek CDUAs as well,” the study states.

The OCEA “does not make a concerted effort to synthesize the comments received from the various departments. Instead, these comments generally become the conditions upon which the CDUA is approved. Planners should be more than compilers. They should synthesize the comments and examine the proposed suit from a holistic perspective.”

Modifications to dwellings in the Conservation District are treated inconsistently, and the dwellings that are approved “are quite large.”

The study team conducted field research at the sites of several of the CDUAs that had been examined. That yielded the following findings, among others:

“Enforcement is a serious problem.” The team saw seawalls for which no CDUAs existed and found access to state land and the shoreline blocked by a private gate.

“OCEA should not permit structures close to the shore. These structures are subject to erosion and some are threatened by high surf,” it concluded.

The Conservation District subzones give little idea as to the nature of the land contained within them. “Lands within particular subzones,” the team found, “are as different from each other as the subzones themselves are supposed to be different from each other. For example, in the resource subzone, we found an industrial quarry, a native forest, single-family residences and the remnants of an ancient fishing village. The subzone designations often did not appear to correspond with ecological realities.”

When the Land Board grants easements, it should receive something in return, the researchers noted. “The state approved an access easement and a separate waterline easement across state land at Wailea Bay, but received no reciprocal access to the beautiful beach there. If the state is going to allow private landowners to benefit from the use of state lands, the public should receive a benefit in return – particularly when the state is under no legal obligation to grant the privilege.”

The department is “unaware of what takes place in the Conservation District,” the study notes. “OCEA staff need the resources to be able to engage in follow-up monitoring.”

To learn more about the report, readers may write the Department of Urban and Regional Planning (attention: Luciano Minerbi), Porteus Hall 107, 2424 Maile Way, University of Hawai’i, Honolulu 96822.

DLNR Panel Reviews Conservation Rules (Again)

In June, the Department of Land and Natural Resources appointed a 42-member panel to review Conservation District rules and statutes. This is the third such review undertaken in the last year. (Aside from this effort and the UH review mentioned above, there was a series of workshops conducted by consultant Gail Atwater. Her report was little more than a compilation of concerns expressed by representatives of developers and conservationists who attended the workshops.)

Ed Henry, a planner in the Office of Conservation and Environmental Affairs, has been removed from his staff duties and assigned full-time to coordinating the activities of the Project Advisory Committee for Conservation District Review, as the new panel is called. Its members include four representatives from the “environmental community; several lawyers who have represented parties wanting to develop in the Conservation District (among them: Sandra Schutte, Steve Lim, Ben Tsukazaki, Everett Kaneshige, and Ben Matsubara); planners in the private sector (among them: Ann Mapes, Chris Hart, and Peter Simmons); and representatives of Planning Departments of the four counties.

The Project Advisory Committee had its first meeting in July. Subcommittees have been established looking into the appropriateness of OCEA procedures and rules; the problems that OCEA seems to have with enforcing the conditions it places upon Conservation District developers; and loopholes in the regulatory framework that frustrate efforts to control Conservation District activity.

Advice for Whom?

Despite the existence of the advisory committee, its advice does not seem to have been sought concerning an effort by the OCEA to change the way in which it routinely handles requests for time extensions of Conservation District projects. The proposed change was placed on the agenda of the Board of Land and Natural Resources for August 27, 1993. At a meeting of a project advisory subcommittee on August 19, however, no mention was made of any impending change.

The OCEA submittal describing the proposed change mentions that in the last three fiscal years (ending June 30), the request for time extensions increased from 17 to 31. “For the most part,” the submittal states, the requests were approved.

The submittal, written by OCEA Administrator Roger Evans, states: “Considering that no time extension would be granted unless good cause is demonstrated, staff feels that delegation to the Chairman [of] the authority to extend the period(s) … is appropriate should the judgment be favorable to an applicant.” The clear implication is that, should the judgment of the chairman be unfavorable, the decision on the time extension would be brought before the board as a whole.

Despite that implication, the actual recommendation submitted for Board action reads as follows: “That the Board delegate the authority for time extensions … to the Chairman,” with no further qualification.

Most time extensions are non-controversial. However, in several notable cases, time extension requests brought before the Board have been the occasion for additional public testimony on the projects at issue. In several such cases, public testimony has led to additional conditions being placed on the developer.

On occasion, the testimony reveals lapses in the OCEA’s enforcement of conditions that it has placed upon developers. As such, the removal of public scrutiny from time extension requests may be a means of the office avoiding embarrassment. Aside from that, there seems to be no public interest served by moving the focus of decision-making away from the board to the chairperson.

Kaua’i Test Facility Under New Management

Sandia National Laboratories, the government-owned, contractor-operated entity that runs the Kaua’i Test Facility, will soon come under new management. In October, operation of the laboratories, based in Los Alamos, New Mexico, will be turned over from AT&T to Martin-Marietta Corp.

For the first year of the contract, Martin Marietta will receive $10.3 million in fees, according to published news accounts. Fees for later years will be based on performance. In addition to the Sandia labs, it has the Department of Energy contract to manage Oak Ridge National Laboratories in Tennessee and smaller DOE contracts elsewhere.

Martin-Marietta has worked previously in Hawai’i. When the Army needed to prepare environmental documentation for an open burn/open detonation facility at Makua Valley; it turned to the Energy Department for help, which in turn contracted with Martin-Marietta to do the work. (This is reviewed in a [url=/members_archives/archives_more.php?id=1133_0_32_0_C]November 1992[/url] article of Environment Hawai’i.)

More recently, Martin-Marietta came under the scrutiny of Congress’ General Accounting Office, which had been asked to review certain costs incurred by Martin-Marietta and reimbursed by the DOE. The GAO found, among other things, that “in fiscal year 1991 MMES [Martin-Marietta Energy Systems] charged over $320,000 in recreational costs, allowable under the contracts, for such items as golf balls ($7,300), the rental of a theater and swimming pool for MMES employees and family members (about $3,500 and $1,600, respectively), and a Christmas party for the children of MMES employees (about $20,000).”

The report states that the golf balls (350 dozen of them) “were provided as prizes for several golfing activities MMES sponsors.” MMES also charged “$19,000 for individuals to officiate and keep score for employee softball and volleyball games.”

In 1992, Martin-Marietta received a $30 million contract from the U.S Air Force to convert Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missiles into launch vehicles which then would be used to loft Defense Department test payloads, most in support of Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (Star Wars). The converted missiles would be launched from the Kaua’i Test Facility, among other sites, according to a report in Aerospace Daily of May 21, 1992.

If contract options are exercised, Martin Marietta could covert up to 44 missiles, for a total cost to the government of $133 million.

Volume 4, Number 3 September 1993