Hololani seawall proposal puts offshore profits over people

West Maui communities are rising to protect our oceans, reefs and streams. Longtime fishermen, including myself and my family, have witnessed changes in the ocean while development has proliferated along the shore. As parts of the shoreline were hardened against winter storm waves, adjacent beaches receded, makai lands eroded, and limu stopped growing in the volumes that it once did.

The Sadang ohana, the last Hawaiian family living on Kahana Bay, lost pig pens, chicken coops and moved their house several times while flanking erosion from nearby development claimed their lands. In the past few years, the Sadangs and other Kahana beachfront owners met with Maui County and have come up with a proposal for a regional beach nourishment project to protect property and restore our community’s legacy beach.

For years, Hololani Condominium balked at participating in the regional nourishment project and is now trying to construct a 400-foot-long, 20-foot-wide seawall — almost entirely on the public shoreline. The seawall could undermine efforts to nourish the beach and set off a ripple effect, as flanking erosion forces adjacent beachfront condo owners to install hardened seawalls. All of the condos, including Hololani, have had protective structures on Kahana’s shoreline for nearly a decade, but Hololani now seeks special treatment.

Hololani wants a permanent seawall to protect against the sharp risk threatening investment yields to its owners living outside of Hawaii. Most Hololani condo owners do not live in Hawaii, listing their units on websites like AirBnB to obtain returns on their investment. Only five of Hololani’s 66 units are owner-occupied. Hololani is an off-island owners’ investment vehicle and not a home for Maui’s people.

In December 2017, the state published its Sea Level Rise Vulnerability and Adaptation (SLR) Report, recognizing the erosive impacts of seawalls and specifically in Maui. Just minutes after it approved a resolution requesting the state and counties to implement the SLR report, the state Senate Committee on Water and Land took testimony on the Hololani seawall easement approval, Senate Concurrent Resolution 63, and then approved it by a 3-2 vote. This falls far short of the leadership we need. The measure has since been deleted from an April 13 legislative meeting, but vigilance remains.

The SLR Report recognized that officials are “facing increasing pressure to allow shoreline hardening to protect private and public development.” Hololani has hired an army of Bishop Street lawyers and bigshot lobbyists to pressure agencies and legislators to railroad through necessary approvals to build its precious seawall.

We need leaders with the integrity and commitment to Hawaii’s public to withstand the pressure of moneyed interests seeking to turn our public resources into their private insurance policy against the natural consequences of their own private, risky business decisions.

In the face of sea level rise, the Hololani seawall would stake a precedent under which the state is willing to prioritize private investors’ need to maximize profits over the public’s right to the beach, reefs, fisheries and the environment for any group of investors who can hire enough well-connected attorneys and lobbyists. This isn’t about one seawall, but about for whom our government works. Maka‘ala!

Archie Kalepa, of Lahaina, Maui, is a retired lifeguard captain, Hokule‘a crewmember and professional waterman.