Hawaii lawmakers are looking for a way to save Hawaii’s beaches from disappearing, as efforts by some beach-front property owners meant to protect their property create increased erosion of beach sand.
The law currently permits landowners to install emergency protections such as sandbags and tarps, which some homeowners say have kept their homes from being swept away, according to reporting by ProPublica. Yet, while those measures are only supposed to be temporary, the state’s Department of Land and Natural Resources has permitted some to stay in place for years or even decades.
Some of that comes down to the department re-approving the protections repeatedly, while others appear to have simply been lost track of by the department, according to ProPublica. There are also concerns about the protections blocking public beaches and creating eyesores.
With the difficult and expensive process to get a seawall approved, many landowners are turning to the emergency protections left for indefinite periods as a work-around, according to ProPublica.
Concerns among coastal scientists are that the protective structures contribute to erosion of the beaches, similar to the effects created by seawalls, according to ProPublica.
Currently introduced legislation set a hard limit of three years for the emplacement of such protections, and the bill to be considered by the state Senate would also increase the maximum daily fine for failing to remove the protections from $15,000 to $25,000 for each day of the violation.
State Sen. Chris Lee (D-Kai-Waimanalo-Kailua) said that his bill in the state Senate would aim to eliminate the indefinite placement of protections, according to ProPublica.
“If you are in places where the beach is the center of the community and it’s the very lifeblood, losing that will have a devastating impact on the local economy, on local businesses, on jobs, on people who live in those communities, to say nothing of the families who will lose that beach for their kids,” Lee said.