The efforts to preserve Honolua Bay and Lipoa Point
Community coalition seeks way to block Honolua plan
The Maui News
Thursday, April 19, 2007
By LEHIA APANA, Staff Writer
LAHAINA - A grass-roots organization is taking aim at Maui Land & Pineapple Co.'s proposed development of its land around Lipoa Point and Honolua Bay.
In January, ML&P submitted a request to the Planning Department to have the development included in the General Plan for Maui, to provide an 18-hole golf course, 40 homes, a cultural park, coastal trail and a surf park.
Members of the Save Honolua Coalition spoke out against the proposed plans at their weekly meeting Tuesday night at the Lahaina Civic Center, seeking to preserve the natural areas around the bay considered one of the prime surfing sites on Maui.
"This place is worth saving," said Lance Holter, Maui County Democratic Party chairman and a Sierra Club member who was a guest speaker at the meeting. "It's one of the most tremendous places left on Maui."
Coalition President Elle Cochran said the group is talking to community members to find out what they would hope to see at Honolua Bay and Lipoa Point in the future.
"Right now, we're feeding off the community and seeing what they want. We want to incorporate everyone's values in whatever the vision will be at the end," Cochran said.
ML&P spokeswoman Teri Freitas Gorman said her company agrees that the area should be protected. She said people have been leaving behind junk cars, garbage bags filled with trash, old appliances and human waste on Lipoa Point, and that the land is being damaged by people riding dirt bikes and all-terrain vehicles through the old pineapple fields and dirt roadways.
She added that providing proper facilities such as restrooms and infrastructure is one way to mitigate the damage.
"Our intention has always been to do the right thing. Leaving it the way it is now is really not the right thing," said Freitas Gorman. "It was manageable back in the day when Maui was a smaller place. Now with the increase in residents and visitor traffic it has become a destination that a lot of people are using, so we have to come up with a comprehensive plan to manage the area properly."
She maintained that the company's goal has always been to "save the bay."
Freitas Gorman said that the 40 homes will be built mauka of Honoapiilani Highway, with a golf course on the coastal cliffs around Lipoa Point makai of the highway.
"The reason for a golf course there is because we wanted to maintain an open green space there," she said.
Still coalition members say they are worried that the proposed development will do more harm than good.
"Development is the last thing we need in that area. It's such a peaceful area and to create more urban sprawl would take that away," said Cochran, who has lived in Honolua Valley for the past 11 years.
Holter said he is "blown away" by the pace of development on Maui.
"I'm astounded by the level of progress they're putting us through here," he said.
Holter said one way to stop development is to elect officials who will support the efforts of organizations like the Save Honolua Coalition.
"If we're going to be an effective force, we have to impact an election with thousands of votes," he told the crowd of more than 100 people.
Lahaina resident and lifeguard Freddy Vermey said he was offended by comments made by ML&P Chairman and Chief Executive Officer David Cole in a Viewpoint in The Maui News Opinion section on Sunday.
"It was very insulting to me, calling us drug dealers and drinkers. We're just regular people with regular families who want to use the beach without having all that development right there," Vermey said.
Sierra Club member Brittney McKee, who successfully opposed development at the world-famous Trestles Beach in California, encouraged the audience to keep "fighting the good fight."
"Honolua is one of those beaches you can't lose," she said.
Under current county land-use processes, the proposed development must be designated in the West Maui Community Plan before the land can be classified by the state Land Use Commission and seek appropriate county zoning.
The new General Plan will establish "urban boundaries" for all regions that will strictly restrict urban-type developments to areas within the boundaries.
The proposals for house sites and a golf course would require the Honolua project to be included within urban boundaries of the West Maui Community Plan.
Coalition invites others to join effort
The Maui News
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Formed by individuals who have a common interest in preserving the natural environment at Honolua Bay and Lipoa Point overlooking the bay, the Save Honolua Coalition still welcomes other participants.
"We're really a grass-roots organization," said President Elle Cochran, one of the organizers of the effort to have Maui Land & Pineapple Co. reconsider its plans for developing around the bay.
The coalition meets weekly at 6:30 p.m. Tuesdays at King Kamehameha III Elementary School in Lahaina. Meetings are open to the public.
Cochran said the group formed in February after a handful of people concerned about Honolua Bay came together after a Maui General Plan Advisory Committee meeting.
The coalition includes people of all ages, backgrounds and expertise and has invited a number of individuals to speak including Council Member Jo Anne Johnson, former Council Member Wayne Nishiki, archaeologist and Maui Community College administrative assistant Janet Six, former county environmental coordinator Rob Parsons, state aquatics biologist Russell Sparks and Jeff Hunt, Maui County planning director.
Coalition members recently selected an executive board and committee chairs. They are Elle Cochran, president/GPAC chair; Donna Willard, vice president/cultural chair; Tamara Paltin, secretary/public awareness chair; Kathy Corcoran, treasurer/cultural co-chair; Shawn Reid, Web site administrator; Doug Pitzer, fundraising/events chair; Nikki Stange, legal chair; Kanoa Nishiki; environmental chair; Wayne Cochran, environmental/public Awareness co-chair; John Carty, stream restoration chair; and Wayne Nishiki, board member.
Information on the coalition can be found at www.savehonolua.org.
County urged to purchase Honolua Bay land
The Maui News
Saturday, April 21, 2007
By ILIMA LOOMIS, Staff Writer
WAILUKU - Council Member Jo Anne Johnson is calling for the county to acquire lands at Honolua Bay to prevent the area from being developed.
Johnson introduced a resolution urging the county administration to negotiate for the property at Friday's County Council meeting. She said she would follow up by asking the council to earmark $1 million in park assessment funds for the deal "as a show of good faith."
"I'm hoping we can come to some kind of agreement," Johnson said.
A Maui Land & Pineapple spokeswoman said the company had already spoken with Mayor Charmaine Tavares about acquiring the property and would be open to working out an acquisition by the county. Teri Freitas Gorman said it was too early to put a price tag on the approximately 100 acres at Lipoa Point.
"The company is open to a situation where we could talk about a combination of cash and something like park credits," Gorman said.
A tsunami of testifiers from the Save Honolua Coalition flooded the Council Chambers Friday, inundating the council with hours of testimony that stretched well into the afternoon although Chairman Riki Hokama advised them the resolution would be referred to committee.
"The community, I think, has spoken loud and clear," Johnson said.
Tavares confirmed she'd had "preliminary" talks with the company to discuss preserving the land in open space.
"It's not formal negotiations," she said. "We're just exploring options."
Tavares said she wouldn't oppose the council setting aside $1 million toward the deal, but didn't think it was necessary.
"The talks will continue regardless," she said. "If it's important enough, it will be up to us to find the money for it."
Other council members said they were open to the idea of acquiring the property, but had reservations about dedicating $1 million to any acquisition effort without more information.
"We need to look at the price tag and where the administration stands," said Council Member Mike Molina.
Council Member Gladys Baisa said the county had a "responsibility" to preserve the area and should look at acquiring Lipoa Point through purchase, "swap" or some other kind of arrangement.
But Baisa said the council also had to budget for major obligations including water system and sewer upgrades and looming payments to government employee pension plans. A recent report found the state Employees Retirement System will require an $11 billion infusion to cover health insurance benefits for future state and counties retirees.
"There's needs and wants, and I'm obsessed with needs," Baisa said.
Maui Land & Pineapple has proposed an 18-hole golf course and 40 luxury home sites on lands at Lipoa Point formerly in pineapple cultivation, as well as a cultural and surf park at Honolua Bay. The company had previously approached both the state and county to create public parks around the Lipoa Point area, but wasn't able to generate interest in the idea, Senior Vice President Ryan Churchill told the council Friday.
Due to concerns raised by the Save Honolua Coalition, the company has "taken a step back" to form an advisory group made up of community members to develop a plan for the property, he said.
Scores of members of the Save Honolua Coalition lined up Friday urging County Council members to support Johnson's resolution to buy Lipoa Point.
"Honolua Bay is a very special place," said Tide Rivers. He said growing up surfing the bay kept him out of trouble, and that today's youth should also have Honolua as an "outlet."
"Think of our younger generation," he said.
Ocean lifeguard Tamara Paltin said she didn't like the changes she was seeing in West Maui, and said buying Lipoa Point was a viable way to preserve the area.
"The kind of developments taking over the west district do not benefit the community," she said.
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