For this, Kyo-ya Hotels & Resorts LP, which owns the Sheraton and the neighboring Royal Hawaiian Hotel, is preparing an environmental impact statement that will meet both state and federal requirements – state requirements, since the project will require a Conservation District Use Permit for activity on submerged lands; and federal, since the work will be done in navigable waters, subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The project, estimated to cost roughly $4 million, has already drawn criticism from surfers. The deadline for comments on the EIS preparation notice passed last January, and release of the draft EIS is months away.
Bringing Back the Beach II: Now, contrast the Sheraton’s project to one proposed for Iroquois Point, immediately west of the Pearl Harbor entrance channel. There, Ford Housing LLC is proposing to build nine groins along 4,200 feet of shoreline that has been eroding dramatically over the last four decades. The stems of the “T,” the part that runs perpendicular to the shore, would extend seaward about 140 feet, while the crosses on the “T” would be between 100 and 200 feet long.
The total volume of sand required to fill the cells between the groins and restore the dry beach is estimated to be about 97,000 cubic feet, more than six times what the Waikiki project needs. Some 4.6 acres of submerged land would be covered with stone for the groins and sand, to be dredged from Pearl Harbor.
Despite the massive scope of the work, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is requiring Ford Housing to prepare just an environmental assessment, a draft of which was released earlier this year. Because the area lies within the Naval Defensive Sea Area and is bordered on all sides by military reservation land, no state Conservation District Use Permit will be sought for the work. According to Dolan Eversole of the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Office of Conservation and Coastal Lands, typically the federal government exempts itself from compliance with state laws that do not have an underlying federal authority, such as the Coastal Zone Management Act or the Clean Water Act.
In this case, however, the federal government is not the proposing party. Instead, the applicant is Ford Housing, which, as the draft EA states, has obtained a 99-year lease (to expire in 2102) on the Iroquois Point housing area, developed nearly 50 years ago. The economic consequences of the loss of housing to shoreline erosion are spelled out in the DEA. Over the next 30 years or less, some 30 houses along Edgewater Drive and Iroquois Avenue will be lost. “This will in turn result in a very significant loss of rental income or proceeds from the possible sale of these homes… These homes presently rent for approximately $2,500 per month, or $30,000 per year. A conservative cost assumption would be that the homes are lost by year 30 of the 50-year lease life, thus losing 35 years of rental income, or $31,500,000 (30 homes x $30,000/year x 35 years). Estimated demolition costs of $20,000 per home would add $600,000 to this loss. Thus, a reasonable estimate of the No Action cost in terms of lost revenue is about $32 million.”
A copy of the draft environmental assessment is available on the Corps of Engineers’ website, www.poh.usace.army.mil (click on the public notice link, and the URL for the environmental assessment may be found in public notice POH-2005-552). Comment deadline is April 13.
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