DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM
At the old "heliport" area by the Ala Wai Small Boat Harbor, people carried and posted signs yesterday protesting the privatization of the harbor. Surfers say privatization would reduce access to the ocean.
Picture an Ala Wai Small Boat Harbor with a restaurant and shops in the middle of it with storage space for surfboards, kayaks and canoes. Boat harbor panel
submits planThe ad hoc group is asking the
Land Board to amend its proposalBy Diana Leone
dleone@starbulletin.comThis would be accomplished by moving some parking spaces into a bermed parking structure with a grassy area on top, similar to the one used for Honolulu Hale.
Hawaii Yacht Club, which currently has 28 slips in the harbor, would expand to 78 slips, with parking. And there would be an overall sprucing up, with landscaping, signage and improved pedestrian walkways, including a sidewalk on the jetty, a better sidewalk from the harbor to Magic Island.
That is the vision of the Ala Wai Harbor Ad Hoc Committee, a group of 15 people who have been considering what amenities they want the harbor to offer -- whether or not the state proceeds with its plans to privatize it.
The group also said in its report given to members of the state Board of Land & Natural Resources yesterday that it is against any commercial boating activity in the harbor, changing the number of slips available by more than 5 percent, reducing the surface area of the water in the harbor or building anything more than 25 feet high.
The Land Board was to consider at its meeting this morning whether to amend its plans to privatize the harbor based on committee recommendations.
During a harbor tour yesterday by five members of the state Board of Land & Natural Resources and the ad hoc committee, an angry group of several dozen surfers protested that they do not want privatization. As the officials rode in a van through the heliport area where surfers park, surfers held signs that protested losing parking spaces or access to the beach.
"I've been a surfer since the 1960s," said Tony C. Agao. "We're concerned about land we paid for as taxpayers. I don't want to see someone come in here (as a private harbor manager) with no responsibility to locals. If the state wants to make money (at the Ala Wai Harbor), they need to get some akamai guys that want to work and make money for the state."
Mililani resident and surfer Earl Mizumoto said he and friends have been surfing off the Ala Wai Harbor "since we were small kids -- and we want our kids to have a place to go."
"It was always like this, run by the state," Mizumoto said. "If it was private, there would be metered parking, gated access."
Agao and others accuse the state Department of Land & Natural Resources with neglecting upkeep of the harbor, then claiming the state cannot afford to catch up with repairs.
The state has estimated that its harbors statewide need as much as $250 million worth of work to bring them up to par.
Privatizing the Ala Wai would allow a private investor to upgrade the facilities, since the state cannot afford to do it, said Gil Coloma-Agaran, chairman of the Land Board. He said he does not agree with committee member Bill Mossman's assessment that crediting a harbor management company for improvements they make to the property will be a loss for the state.
