Beach businesses allowed to stay

BLNR renews Kaanapali activity providers’ permits for 90 days

By MELISSA TANJI, Staff Writer
HONOLULU — Commercial activity providers may keep their chairs, umbrellas, surfboards, kayaks and other equipment on Kaanapali Beach — for at least another 90 days.

The state had considered banning commercial activity providers from setting up their gear on the 4-mile-long beach after some Maui residents complained about clutter on the sand. But the Board of Land and Natural Resources voted unanimously Friday to allow currently permitted businesses on the beach to continue operating as they have been for three more months.

During the 90-day period, officials with the Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation will work with activity providers on proposed rules that will govern how much commercial gear — if any — can be stationed on the beach. The issue will then go back before the BLNR.

‘‘Now that there’s more and more commercial activity, we need to address it once and for all,’’ DOBOR Chief Ed Underwood said. ‘‘The state should not be obligated to give a commercial entity public property to do their business.’’

Commercial activity providers at Kaanapali said they were pleased with the board’s deferral, saying they need some discussion on the matter. Several said they were surprised that having equipment on the beach was an issue again.

“They really listened. I’m happy they are postponing the decision for 90 days and they are letting us operate as we always operated,” said Beth King, vice president of Pacific Jet Sports, who flew to Oahu to testify Friday.

Beach businesses may have to move their operations to private property owned by hotels nearby, Underwood said.

The board renewed 33 commercial use permits at Kaanapali Beach on Friday and temporarily backed off the equipment ban. Ten catamarans and five monohull vessels are allowed to operate from the beach.

‘‘It’s just a mess, the whole beach,’’ said BLNR Member Jerry Edlao. ‘‘If we’re going to do this, we might as well do it right. We’re trying to go for uniformity throughout the state.’’

King, who operates Pacific Jet Sports with her husband, Ted, said they never received any criticism and knew of no incident that would cause the recommendation to banish commercial equipment from the beach.

They and other commercial activity providers said some types of equipment are needed on the beach in order for the ocean activities to operate comfortably and safely.

On Friday, Beth King said she told the board that she was afraid to have her husband, who has skin cancer, go to work next week without an umbrella. She said the umbrella helps to protect her employees.

The workers on the shoreline also provide a service for other beach users, she said. She told The Maui News that activities workers use their first-aid kits and medical training to care for the public, since there are no lifeguards along Kaanapali Beach.

Underwood said in an interview prior to the meeting that the state wants fair and equitable use of the public beach for everyone. He said the state is not seeking to clear all equipment from the beach, but the ocean recreation division doesn’t want commercial gear stationed on the beach.

When a hotel or business sets up chairs for guests and customers, they are “staking out a section of the beach for commercial use,” he said. If a company sets up an umbrella and a chair and has an employee using a laptop computer to check people in, they are using the beach for commercial purposes.

“We recommend against doing that sort of thing,” Underwood said.

Underwood said state staff will discuss the recommendation to clear commercial activity from the beach with business owners.

Beth King said commercial activity operators are scheduled to meet with state officials next week to work out a plan for Kaanapali Beach.

“Finally we are going to work as a team as we always had, and we are going to put together this win-win scenario on how we should be operating,” she said.

She said seven Maui operators showed up at the Oahu meeting.

Remaining on Maui at work, Ted King called the new round of discussions a “funny thing,” saying it seems like the ocean activity owners and the state are repeating the discussions they had in 2003. Five years ago, the land board approved a rule to require businesses to get conservation use permits, and activities operators to remove all their gear from the public beach overnight.

The 2003 board action followed disputes in which Kaanapali residents filed a civil suit and other beach users complained about the clutter of rental gear, storage containers and activities stations set up on the public beach.

Ted King said they all follow the four rules: not advertising, not blocking beach access, not soliciting on the beach and not taking money from customers on the beach.

“We are the least of their problems,” he said.

Earlier this week, Greg Vanderlaan, owner of parasailing and water-sledding companies along Kaanapali Beach, argued that the activities companies have little impact on the beach.

All he has on the sand is a worker sitting under an umbrella, he said, adding that there is no solicitation on the beach and 80 percent of his business is pre-booked. At the most, the employee has a cooler to hold their paperwork, he said.

The bigger issue is the number of permits the Department of Land and Natural Resources is giving out to activities businesses using Kaanapali Beach, he said.

• The Associated Press contributed to this report. Melissa Tanji can be reached at mtanji@mauinews.com.