Land Board Adopts Plan To Cut Coastal Erosion, Curb Beach Loss

posted in: December 1997 | 0

The Department of Land and Natural Resources, working with University of Hawai’i geologist Chip Fletcher, has developed a Coastal Erosion Management Plan. The plan was unveiled in September at the DLNR’s Sustainability Summit and was adopted as DLNR policy at a meeting of the Board of Land and Natural Resources on November 20.

In recent years, the correlation of shoreline hardening, or armoring – from revetments, walls, and other hard structures along the coast – and beach loss has become better understood. The management plan describes this process in layman’s terms and makes clear why the process must be interrupted or reversed if Hawai’i is to continue to have some of the best beaches in the world.

One of the points brought out in the plan is the way in which public access to coastal marine resources is inevitably restricted when beach loss occurs as a result of shoreline hardening. “Where there is armoring along the coast there is reduced public access to coastal marine resources. The public shoreline of Hawai’i becomes privatized by walls that keep the public away. Under the public trust doctrine, the state holds beach resources in trust for the public and must defend, preserve, protect, maintain, and perpetuate that resource. Because the state owns the beaches, and is the trustee of that resource, it is the state that has the fiduciary responsibility to take the lead in beach management,” the plan states.

Several non-controversial technical measures are proposed, including development of erosion risk maps; beach monitoring programs; implementation of a beach nourishment program; research into off shore sand reserves; and development of alternatives to seawalls and revetments.

Where the plan becomes more controversial, however, is in its policy recommendations. Here, the plan calls for adoption of much more restrictive state and county regulations for development in the coastal area. Rather than having setbacks set arbitrarily – usually 40 feet from the certified shoreline – the plan calls for an initial “Hazard Buffer Area” to be defined as the area extending from the first line of stable coastal vegetation (or the certified shoreline) mauka to “the landward toe of the most seaward dune.” This, the plan states, “would establish the baseline for measuring the setback.” All this land should be included in the Conservation District, the plan recommends, noting that “the rationale of the Hazard Buffer Area is that it uses the width of the coastal dune as a nominal measure of long-term stability in the face of multiple hazards (i.e., tsunamis, hurricanes, etc.) that assail the Hawaiian coast. In this sense it is a useful gauge for determining the set-back, and because the coastal dune is part of the beach sand-sharing system, it serves to protect this valuable feature.”

In addition, the plan calls for establishing an “Intermediate Erosion Hazard Area.” This is an area extending inland from the mauka boundary of the Hazard Buffer Area, back a distance equal to 30 times the annual erosion rate. Under the plan, “Only light construction of a non-permanent nature should be allowed within this zone, such as detached lanais, buildings for non-residential use, public bathrooms, etc. No slab on grade construction should be permitted. Landscaping should emphasize natural coastal vegetation and topography… The use of soil fill should be avoided.”

Immediately behind the Intermediate Erosion Hazard Area would be the long-term erosion hazard area, extending a distance equivalent to 60 times the annual erosion rate. Here, “single-story, wood-frame, pole houses and other non-slab constructions should be permitted with architectural features that promote the relocation of the building.” Here too, size of houses would be restricted and the size of developable lots “should ensure the incorporation of the 30-, 60-, and 90-year erosion hazard areas and the Hazard Buffer Area.”

To address the problem of coastal areas where erosion trends threaten existing development, the plan proposes establishment of a revolving fund that will allow the state to buy out owners of land whose homes are vulnerable and who might otherwise be compelled to armor the shoreline fronting their properties. According to the plan, the fund would be implemented under a new Coastal Lands Program (CLP), which is to “focus on land acquisition, rezoning, resale, and redevelopment as a tool for implementing strategic development at erosion hot spots” – those areas where “the coastal environment is threatened because of the desire to protect coastal property from the impacts of erosion.”

“The CLP would use public funds to purchase private developed lands in an erosion hotspot and then resell them to the development sector under a new zoning regime,” the plan says. “Revenues from the resale would infuse the Coastal Lands Program to purchase additional lands in other coastal hotspots under the same strategy.”

The CLP would be a new government agency whose function would be to see that the technical recommendations and policies of the plan are carried out, especially in erosion hotspots. “This is best achieved through voluntary, incentive-based participation of the counties and local population,” the plan says, adding, “The CLP will function such that the considerable discretionary power and autonomy of the counties is preserved.” Experts on the CLP staff would work closely with staff of the state’s Coastal Zone Management program, county planners, and other government workers “to devise additional management strategies to mitigate shoreline degradation.”

Yet another element of the plan is the recommendation that responsible state and county agencies adopt the guidelines on shoreline hardening proposed by the Office of Environmental Quality Control in 1995. The DLNR, the plan says, “must establish a position and take the lead on this issue.”

Although the plan has been approved by the Land Board, its implementation requires legislative approval as well.

Volume 8, Number 6 December 1997