Captain Zodiac Barred from Hanalei, And Kaua’i Works on Management Plan
On November 22, 1991, the Board of Land and Natural Resources denied the request of Clancy Greff a.k.a. Captain Zodiac, to use an area adjoining Hanalei Pier for passenger loading and unloading. DLNR staff had recommended against approval, noting, among other things, that Greff “has not submitted and apparently does not intend to submit an environmental impact statement required for this application.” Also, the Board was informed that the proposal was contrary to the Department of Transportation’s Ocean Recreation Management Rules for the Hanalei area.
At the Board meeting, Martin Wolff, Greff’s attorney, informed the Board that the EIS requirement was an unfair burden on his client – that what the DLNR was wanting would cost $5 million and take at least four years’ study to complete. In any case, Wolff told the Board, Greff was seeking now to use an area of Black Pot Beach Park near the Hanalei River mouth, several hundred feet away from the site indicated on his CDUA. Finally; Wolff challenged not only the requirement that an EIS be prepared, but the very need to submit a Conservation District Use Application.
Members of the Board voiced incredulity over Wolff’s suggestion that they approve an “amended” application, with no information more detailed than that contained in Wolff’s comments to the Board on that day O’ahu Board member T.C. Yim asked why the BLNR should proceed on this CDUA, “since the whole location of activity has changed?” Board member Chris Yuen, from the Big Island, concurred. “The proper thing is to deny,” he said, “and have him [Greff] come in with a new CDUA.”
“The law is clear,” Yuen added. “If an EIS is needed and not provided, we cannot approve it. Also, the new site changes the CDUA materially.”
According to Wolff, Greff’s operations on Kaua’i had been bringing in enough income to offset a $200,000 loss from Greff’s Maui business. Since the Kaua’i-based operations have been pared back – from eight or more rubber-hulled rafts to no more than two operating out of Ha’ena as of September 30 – the Maui end of the business has had to be shut, Wolff said.
Meanwhile, on Kaua’i, efforts are under way to develop a “Hanalei Estuary Management Plan” (a draft of which is subtitled “Plan for Commercial Boating”). The plan, which has been the subject of extensive frequently agonized public hearings, would establish “a planning framework for community empowerment and public decision making… consistent with the policies and guidelines of both the County of Kaua`i’s General Plan and the North Shore Development Plan.”
The draft plan suggests several levels of commercial boating activity; ranging from a prohibition on all commercial boating, to bans on motorized boating only, to a sunset provision for commercial boating, to motorized boating with a maximum of seven concurrent permitted operators.
In the section on policies, the plan states “All decision making in the Hanalei Estuary; as encompassed by this plan, will be based upon the following ordered priorities: marine and aquatic ecosystem protection, traditional and cultural practices, ocean research, fisheries, resident recreation, visitor recreation.”
A ‘Moving Target’
The Environmental Impact Statement for the proposed spaceport at South Point, on the Big Island, was scheduled to have been available for public review and comment in December 1991. There’s no sign of it yet, despite the appointment of a new space czar to replace Thomas Hayward, who has been assigned other duties.
Richard Flagg, who manages the EIS project for the Office of Space Industry within the Department of Business and Economic Development, told Environment Hawai`i “we’re going to have a hard time getting it in by late spring.” The anticipated completion date “is a moving target,” he said.
Ulvelings’ Secret Report
Former DBED Director Roger Ulveling has been promising the Public Utilities Commission a report on energy resources in Hawai’i for more than a year now. Readers may recall that award of the $35,000 contract to Ulveling for this report, done outside of the competitive bid process, was justified on the basis of Ulveling’s ready availability – he had just stepped down from his position as OBED director – and the need to have the report done quickly.
Ulveling has finally delivered the report, but the PUC is not ready to release it quite yet. According to a spokesman, it needs some editing and other work – which probably will not be done until after the close of the 1992 legislative session.
Volume 2, Number 9 March 1992