Superferry sets off the battle of Kauai

Los Angeles Times ^ | October 9, 2007 | Tomas Alex Tizon

[Lorianne]

LIHUE, HAWAII -- The woman in the sun hat wants to crack someone in the jaw. It's been a bad day. Actually, for Kaiulani Huff, it's been a bad few decades.

She has watched as her home, the island of Kauai, changed from a wild garden of secret places to -- in her eyes -- an overcrowded amusement park for rich people.

"Welcome to Disneyland," she says one day while driving around the island. "See the natives. Watch us dance the hula. Clog up our roads. Buy up all the good land. And please, help yourselves to our beaches!"

Development on Kauai has been so unrelenting that Huff's sentiment has become widespread among longtime residents, although until recently it was a quiet simmering.

In late August, with the arrival of the Hawaii Superferry, the first inter-island car-carrying ferry, the simmering boiled over. Islanders, in the face of Coast Guard gunboats, formed a floating blockade at the harbor entrance and, after a three-hour standoff, forced the $85-million ferry to turn back to Honolulu. The protest had turned into a citizen uprising.

The crowd represented a motley army of beach bums and businessmen, lawyers and ex-cops, dopers and doctors, and at least one college instructor -- many of whom discovered for the first time that they shared the same concerns. How many tourists and resorts and subdivisions can a little island take?

"The population is saying, 'Enough already,' " says Dennis Chun, 57, who with his surfboard had helped lead the human flotilla.

At the forefront of that protest was Huff, her face covered in war paint, like her Polynesian ancestors going into battle. Unlike her ancestors, she wore a bamboo sun hat.

[bboop]

YOUR beaches? YOUR taxmoney too, then, that WE would be sending if you did not generate your own revenue? It is NOT 1492, so sorry. And Hawaii is NOT paradise. But don’t worry, I won’t be coming to Hawaii anytime soon. Beautiful it is, but the attitude sucks eggs.

[SandwicheGuy]

Nice summaton of the situation, balanced and concise,

[caisson71]

Thanks. I guess the Superferry ball is now in the legislative black hole. Our legislature has refused to address many issues, ie. land use reform, ceded lands - though that is still with the State Supreme Court because the legislature refuses to peoperly legislate - and I doubt they’ll tackle this one before the superferry leaves.
However, maybe the threat of lawsuit by the feds, for their guarantee of the loan to Superfery - will force them to bite this bitter pill?

[Kevmo]

“Our beaches”? Someone can’t go to “your” beach?
***They’re NIMBY ladder pullers. Once they get to where they wanted to be, they pull the ladder up so no one else can get there.

[Arthalion]

I stayed at a hotel in Hana, Maui that seemed to act as if a beautiful local beach was their property. While we were on the beach they had someone coming around to check that we were registered at the hotel. Apparently the hotel does own all the land surrounding the beach.

That's usually what happens. A hotel or private owner cannot legally buy the beach, but they can buy all of the land used to access it, effectively cutting it off from public access. Unless you can point to a boat, parachute, or some other means of access other than land to explain your presence, they'll nail you for trespassing. Even if they can't get the police to arrest you while you're actually on the beach, they'll watch you like a hawk and detain you when crossing their property to leave.

Also, most hotels place loungers and other items on the beaches for their customers to use. No matter HOW you got onto the beach, you cannot use those items if you're not a guest. If they see you lounging on one of their chairs, they may ask to see proof that you're registered with the hotel. If you're not registered, they can have you arrested for theft of services (usually they'll just ask you to leave, and reserve arrest for the belligerent).

California has a law declaring the beaches public property, and requires landowners surrounding those beaches to provide some sort of public access to those beaches. Most landowners comply willingly, but the few that fight it usually have a public easement taken against their property to permit it anyway. The logic is that you can't use your private property rights to block public access to public property. Hawaii apparently doesn't have a law like this.

[SIDENET]

Not all CA natives who buy in MT are Libtards.

Some are FReepers who escaped CA for good reasons.

;-)

[wideminded]

I imagine that there must be some legal definition of what land constitutes the beach, perhaps a distance above the high tide point. In this case, besides the loungers, the hotel also had some permanent structures on the upper reaches of the beach.

[Arthalion]

I don’t know about Hawaii, but here in California the legal definition is any land seaward of the mean high-tide line. Development regulations typically also prohibit any kind of development seaward of naturally occurring dunes. Dunes usually indicate the mean high-water level in typical storms, so development seaward of dunes, even on private property, is typically prohibited to prevent structures from being destroyed (it’s no different than a municipality prohibiting construction on an unstable hillside). Since construction includes fencing, these laws have the practical effect of providing open beach up to the first dune. Technically people walking above the mean high tide line are trespassing on private property, but with no legal way to post or fence the land, it’s unenforceable. The most a property owner can do is ask the people to leave, and call the police to have them ejected if they refuse.

[Lorianne]

But, you can spread your towel on the sand beside the chairs and sit on the beach and there is nothing they can do. I’ve done it.

[Shimmer]

“The population is saying, ‘Enough already,’ “ says Dennis Chun

So while he might be Hawaiian, we know he’s at least part Chinese. So at one time he or his forebears were immigrants. INTRUDERS.
Now he wants no one else to come. I say sowwweeeee for ya.

[SWAMPSNIPER]

Well, Hell, I am about 1/2 Tsalagi. Am I an “intruder”?
There is more to life than fooking financial profit.

[Shimmer]

I was being facetious. I’m 100% American and I’m not an intruder. I’m native American. I was born here.

:D

[Constantine XIII]

How is this any different than all of the Southerners here constantly whining and moaning about all them “Damn Yankees” moving in and messing the place up?

She just had the nerve to do something about it instead of grouse on the internet. :p

[Constantine XIII]

I LOL’D

[SWAMPSNIPER]

“Facetious”is for democrats, I don’t have time for that crap, or any other sort of two faced bullshit! Hell, goodness gracious, we got all these folks around, spreading BS, and I hate liars. I am tired of all their pitiful attempts. There is not one damned one of them, smart enough to blow smoke up my butt, sorry, Rudy!

[Shimmer]

Tsiya!!!!! Lay your arms down!

[SWAMPSNIPER]

“Tsiya!!!!! Lay your arms down”!
Sheeit, that ain’t ever going to ever happen, again! If you want them, just haul your ass up, and ask for them.
Once you do that, I can tell you shove your urban dreams, up your urban hiney!
RKBA is not up for grabs!

[bboop]

It is common in tourist areas for there to be an undercurrent of ‘the tourists ruin things.’ Some of them can be very boorish. However, the locals do not OWN things, and without the tourist industry, there would be no money coming in — ie, no jobs, no tax base to pay for police, etc. Utopianism is NOT a viable economic approach to reality.

[Hostage]

Good points,

And if you cared you would take those points to a regional development authority to force shoreline setbacks on new developments, ‘setbacks’ meaning a certain minimum distance from shore.

There’s no excuse these days for architects and community activists not to work together to maintain or enhance the natural beauty of a place while allowing for development.

And just so you know, conservatives have always been better stewards of the land than liberal groups such as the Sierra Club. This group doesn’t like people period. Whereas conservatives seek to blend people into the natural environment and to set aside parks and recreation areas that preserve the natural beauty of a place.

Sounds like you’re in Florida. As a kid my family used to crab and fish in the Keys. We stayed with relatives every Summer there and we drove a car on a two lane highway down from the DC Metro area. Old folks would wave to us as they sat on their porches and rocked on their chairs. Not too many cars on the road at that time.

Nostalgia can be addictive.

[Shimmer]

i MEANT lay your arms down because you were facing a friend, not an enemy. That’s all. I’m death on gun control too, dear.