\u201cIt\u2019s not that I don\u2019t like ResortTrust. You just got the potato at the end of the game,\u201d Board of Land and Natural Resources member Keone Downing told the company\u2019s representatives on September 14.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne potato, two potato, three potato, four. You\u2019re the fourth,\u201d added fellow member Stanley Roehrig.<\/p>\n
That day, in an attempt to resolve longstanding disputes over the hotel\u2019s use of a 1.28-acre beachfront parcel, the Department of Land and Natural Resources\u2019 Land Division proposed issuing a new permit to the ResortTrust Hawai`i, LLC, which took ownership of the Kahala Hotel & Resort in 2014, to officially authorize a variety of existing uses, including some that would be commercial. (See our cover story for more on this.)<\/p>\n
Downing and Roehrig were two of the more skeptical board members during discussion of the permit, which was ultimately deferred due to a contested case hearing request. But Downing noted that ResortTrust wasn\u2019t as bad as the hotel\u2019s previous owner, which he said kicked him and his friends off the public beach several years ago. He even commended the company for trying to be responsive to the public\u2019s concerns. \u201cThey tried to post signs \u2026 They could have done nothing. They\u2019ve taken chairs off the beach part,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
During public testimony on the matter, state Senator Laura Thielen, who headed the DLNR several years ago, warned that the decent tenant it has right now may not be there years from now. And by simply issuing or renewing revocable permits for the property fronting the hotel, the department was failing to do what was best for the area, she argued.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen it comes to access to our beaches and public lands, it\u2019s an issue near and dear to my heart and my constituents,\u201d said Thielen, who represents Kailua, Waimanalo, and Hawai`i Kai.<\/p>\n
She said that the hotel and its predecessors have had revocable permits for the property since 1968 and \u201cthey\u2019re looking to continue management authority for the next 50 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Because the parcel is beachfront property, subject to erosion and sea level rise, she recommended that the board consider what\u2019s going to be occurring on the property over that period.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s the estimated high tide line going to look like in 10 years, 15 years? \u2026 We\u2019re going to be losing a lot of beach in 50 years. \u2026 We need to be having a policy of retreat. How is this property going to play into that when that beach area is going to become smaller and smaller? You don’t wrestle with those issues that you don\u2019t have data on in an RP process,\u201d she said, adding that such questions could only be answered in an environmental assessment.<\/p>\n
She said that she appreciated that ResortTrust was trying to be a good neighbor, but said the state could have three successive owners over the next several decades and recommended that the Land Division scrap the permit proposal and instead restart efforts to put the land under a long-term disposition.<\/p>\n
Board chair Suzanne Case reminded Thielen that when the company tried to obtain an easement a couple of years ago, it was met with opposition by some members of the public. Downing noted that complaints about the hotel\u2019s use of the area erupted when it sought the easement, and ResortTrust\u2019s own attorney Jennifer Lim admitted, \u201cit probably wasn\u2019t the best idea.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even so, Thielen suggested that by keeping the property under a revocable permit, the board won\u2019t ever discuss what should be done with it in the long term.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr. Downing mentioned [ResortTrust] got stuck with the potato. That game\u2019s not over. At some point the public wears out, the institutional knowledge gets lost. It may be as you wrestle with [a long-term lease or easement], you’re going to come up with different types of requirements,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
David Kimo Frankel, who requested the contested case hearing on the permit, also argued that an environmental review needed to be done for the property to cover the uses proposed by the Land Division, but he did not echo Thielen\u2019s view that such a review could only accompany a long-term disposition such as an easement or a lease.<\/p>\n
\u2014 Teresa Dawson<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“It’s not that I don’t like ResortTrust. You just got the potato at the end of the game,” Board of Land and Natural Resources member Keone Downing told the company’s representatives on September 14. “One potato, two potato, three potato, … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[3],"class_list":["post-10651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-october-2018","tag-teresa-dawson"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}