Mindy Pennybacker: Threats to public ocean access grow

Waimea, Big Island resident Roland Shackelford grew up surfing in majestic Waipio Valley, where as a boy he’d get dropped off with his surfboard at the top of the cliff and run down the steep, narrow nearly a mile-long public road to the black sand beach, “after which his legs would be so shaky he could barely surf,” says his wife, Heather Nahaku Kalei.

Nevertheless, she added, Shackelford managed to surf all day at the sandbar near the rivermouth, then he’d hike back up the road to catch a ride home.

Her husband “still has that connection to the valley,” said Kalei, also a surfer, “and we were going there several times a week; our sons were growing up there.”

The family’s visits ended abruptly Feb. 25, when Hawaii County closed Waipio Valley Road to the public under an emergency order from Big Island Mayor Mitchell Roth. The order cited an imminent threat of falling rocks in a geological survey by an engineering firm.

Community group Malama I Ke Kai ‘O Waipi‘o filed a lawsuit April 22, alleging Roth relied on a flawed engineering report, and “there appear to be no records of incidents of injury or death to persons from rock fall, landslide or roadway failure along Waipio Valley Road at any time during the last 50 years,” according to the nonprofit’s website, oceanaccesswaipio.org.

A hearing is scheduled for June 18; an online petition seeking reopening of the road has received 1,284 signatures.

“On the Big Island, there are so few areas to access the ocean for surfing and fishing compared to Oahu,” said Sally Lundburg, who teaches high school art and farms with her husband on his family’s homestead land; the couple and their daughter surf at Waipio.

“And more and more (access points) have been shut down, whether due to lava, infrastructure issues, or private property owners,” Lundburg said.

Respondents to a community survey said they went to Waipio to hike, fish, surf and do other ocean activities, and worked in diverse occupations, as teachers, businesspeople, cultural practitioners and in health care, she said, noting being in the ocean benefits community health by relieving stress.

And “it’s having a huge impact (that) we’re not able to bond with each other” as a community while enjoying the ocean at Waipio, she said.

Throughout the islands, waterfront property owners build sea walls, pile sandbags, and let their vegetation sprawl onto the beach, erasing public access to and along the shoreline below the highwater line, which is a state constitutional right derived from traditional Hawaiian law.

On Oahu’s North Shore, houses and sea walls are tumbling into the ocean, actively threatening public safety; on Kauai, landowners have blocked access to Hideaway Beach in Princeville, while in Kilauea, the county has filed suit against a developer to reopen public access to Secret Beach, and a high stone wall constructed by billionaire Mark Zuckerberg has partially blocked access to Pila‘a Beach.

“All over Hawaii there’s such a big effort to sell paradise,” Kalei said, “and it’s disproportionate to the effort to care for the land and the community.”

Surfing is integral to traditional Hawaiian culture, said U‘ilani Macabio, a surfer, hula dancer, mother of two sons and cultural adviser who teaches high school Hawaiian language, geography and social studies. “I got introduced to Waipio when my aunty’s halau went down to malama ‘aina (help care for the land), and luckily somebody had a bodyboard they let me use,” she said.

Macabio, Lundburg and Kalei are founding members of Malama I Ke Kai ‘O Waipi‘o, which seeks to open a problem-solving dialogue with the county government and Waipio landowners, kalo farmers and vacation rental operators, on how to manage visitor overload that has been causing wear and tear to the road and the valley’s rich natural, cultural, historical and recreational resources.

“The biggest misconception about this closure is that it comes with some kind of lasting management (plan) — it does not,” Kalei said.

Noting that Waipio Valley landowners, farmers and residents are still permitted to use the closed road, “it’s also very divisive within the community,” she said.

In good news for Hawaiian surfing, Kauai rookie Gabriela Bryan won second place in the World Surf League championship tour event at Margaret River, western Australia May 4, saving herself from being cut from the tour at its halfway point.

Oahu rookies Luana Silva and Bettylou Sakura Johnson, along with veteran Malia Manuel of Kauai, moved on to the Challenger Series, seeking enough points to rejoin the CT next season.

On the CT, Oahu’s Carissa Moore and John John Florence remain in second place; Barron Mamiya and Seth Moniz avoided the midseason cut; and Zeke Lau and Maui’s Imaikalani deVault have moved to the CS.

If beach access continues to shrink throughout the islands, so may the dreams and opportunities of future young surfers, as well their community connections.

The closure at Waipio “is really scary and heartbreaking,” Kalei said, “because it’s also a loss of the ability to pass on traditions.”

Her 3-year-old son’s first place word was Waipio. And while three years can seem like forever to a young child, what his parents fear even more, she added, is that the closure and the management issues it fails to address might stretch on indefinitely.

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Reach Mindy Pennybacker at mindypennybacker@gmail.com