Proposed surf meet rules meet with opposition

Speaking in measured voices that occasionally betrayed intense emotion, members of the North Shore and surfing communities delivered carefully prepared testimony Tuesday on proposed rules governing shore water events.

Most of those who attended the City and County of Honolulu’s public hearing at the Mission Memorial Building opposed specific provisions of the draft rules. North Shore wave rider Jeff Hubbard called for a complete rewriting with community input.

“The rules are not in alignment with park users, for people who don’t have the resources WSL does,” Hubbard said, referring to the Australian-based World Surf League, which holds the famed Triple Crown of Surfing, among many other professional surfing events, on Oahu each winter. He argued that all wave riders — bodysurfers, bodyboarders and surfers — should have the opportunity to share in the 64 days allotted for competition on the North Shore each year.

Taking a spiritual view on public access, Kahekili LaBatte, a surfer and cultural practitioner, said he opposed the rules because they served moneymaking interests rather than the traditional Hawaiian values and the meaning of hee nalu, or wave riding, that he had been raised to respect. “People from elsewhere getting permits — I oppose this,” LaBatte added.

“The World Surf League seems to have an unjustly large proportion of surfing competition hours on the North Shore,” said retired City and County of Honolulu lifeguard Mark Cunningham, testifying on behalf of bodysurfers and bodyboarders who held contests at Pipeline since the early 1970s but whose applications have been denied in recent years.

“Bodyboarding is a hugely popular sport in Hawaii,” Cunningham noted. “The balance is weighed too heavily in favor of board surfing.”

Enforcement was a hot topic. Stacy Moniz, a member of Hui o He‘e Nalu, a local organizer of surf meets, complained that both the proposed and current rules provided “no process or mechanism in place to verify information.”

Ed D’Ascoli, founder of the wetsuit company Xcel, said some surf meet promoters have made false representations to secure permits, then failed to deliver but were still awarded permits repeatedly.

However, the biggest issue for North Shore residents like himself, D’Ascoli said, was traffic.

Written testimony will be accepted through July 11; to view the current and newly proposed versions of Title 19, Chapter 4 of the Honolulu Administrative Rules Shore Water Events and to send comments, go to parks.honolulu.gov.