Happy New Years!

Mahalo to all of you who have sent Christmas contributions to BAH for our 2008 campaign to open gates and push for new public beach access laws! If you would like to send a donation, please make checks payable to "Beach Access Hawaii" and mail to:

Beach Access Hawaii
c/o Rich Figel
801 Kainui Drive
Kailua, HI 96734

We'll be adding a PayPal link to this page shortly for those of you who prefer to do it online... make donations, that is.

State Sen. Gary Hooser from Kauai just sent us an email last week saying he will be introducing new legislation that he feels will help protect beach access. He'll be sending a draft soon for BAH to review, and we're hoping our Oahu officials will get on board too.

But first, mark your calendars for Saturday, Feb. 2, 2008 -- Groundhog Day. From 10 AM until noon at key locations, from Kailua to East and West Oahu to the North Shore, Kauai, Maui and the Big Island, we'll be staging sign-waving demonstrations to publicize the need for stronger County and State laws to protect beach access for the people of Hawaii.

That's why we need your dollars -- to make signs, print hand-outs, and start a legal fund to acquire more rights of way on every island. And we need your commitment. If you want to help organize the Groundhog Day protest, please email me at figeli001@hawii.rr.com or call me at 262-5073.

Have a great New Years, and enjoy the Sugar Bowl. Go 'Bows! Yeah, I know they're the Warriors now, but I'm Old School.

Season's Gratings... er, Greetings

Nothing says holiday cheer like locked gates, does it? The kind folks on Kailuana Loop live on a public street that is maintained with taxpayers' money to provide them with sidewalks, streetlights, a nice paved road, and sewers. Yet they lock the public out with this lovely spiked gate. You can park legally on that street, but if you want to surf Castle's you have to double back to the public beach access instead.

They also lock out volunteers who clean up "their" beach area by Castle's, forcing the volunteers to haul collected trash longer distances to be picked up. That's gratitude for you.

Our Christmas wish: that homeowners on beachside lanes would at least leave the gates open during the day since most of the problems they complain about occur at night. Thus far, their response has been, "Bah, humbug!"

Action Countdown: Day 1

This stretch of road on N. Kalaheo Avenue between L'Orange Place and the public beach access two blocks away is an accident waiting to happen. The bordering properties are encroaching on the narrow walking path that has to be shared by both bicyclists and pedestrians since there's no room on the other side of the road to walk.

We've repeatedly pointed this out to City Council Chair Barbara Marshall and Mayor "No Can" Mufi, and so far, nothing has been done to address it. After the Tuesday night (Dec. 18) meeting of the Kailua Neighborhood Board Parks Committee, we sent more photos to Barbara Marshall. The KNB Parks Committee said it would also forward the pictures to the appropriate parties.

Let's see how long it takes before we get a response -- or will it take a tragic accident to get attention?

Kailua Access Meeting, Bowls Testimony

TUESDAY, DEC. 18, 7 - 9 PM, KALAMA BEACH PARK (BEOTTCHER ESTATE HOUSE)
Here's your chance to tell the Kailua Neighborhood Board Parks Committee which access ways along Kailua Beach should be converted to public easements, either through negotiations with the homeowners on those lanes, or condemnation by the City Council. Speak now or forever hold your peace!

WEDNESDAY, DEC. 19, 6 - 8 PM, JEFFERSON ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, WAIKIKI
The State Dept. of Land and Natural Resources will be holding public hearings on proposed changes that could result in the loss of free parking at Ala Wai Harbor. For more info, see the links and articles below about the Common Ground Hawaii rally last weekend.

NATIONAL BEACH ACCESS STORY
If you get the Honolulu Advertiser, you may have seen the Wall Street Journal article about public rights of way battles going on all over the country. If you missed it, here's an excerpt below.

"From the beaches of Hawaii and California to beaches in Florida and Texas, regulators and property owners are entering nasty property fights over erosion issues. WSJ's Kris Hudson reports..."

WHOSE BEACH IS THIS ANYWAY?
By Kris Hudson

Dec. 12, 2007 SURFSIDE BEACH, Texas -- When Brooks Porter bought two vacation homes on the shore of this seaside village 25 years ago, roughly 200 feet of beach separated the properties from the Gulf of Mexico. Now, the sea laps beneath Mr. Porter's houses and those of his neighbors, sucking away the sand beneath them and gnawing on the now-exposed wooden pilings that support them.

Yet Mr. Porter and his neighbors aren't railing at Mother Nature. Rather, they are angry with the state of Texas, which notified the homeowners in 1999 that, due to the erosion, their houses were in the public right of way on the beach and the state could eventually require the homes' removal or demolition.

In the ensuing months, 14 houses were moved off the beach, and nine others were bought by the village and demolished. Today, only 14 remain on the beach...

To read the rest, please go to:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB119741959764822149.html

Kaisers, Bowls Beach Access March!

Mahalo to Scott Werny of the Surfrider Foundation for sending photos and links for the rally on Sat., Dec. 8. They succeeded in getting the public's attention and great media coverage as well. The next step is submitting testimony Weds., Dec. 19 at Jefferson Elementary in Waikiki, to speak in favor of maintaining what little free parking there is in the Ala Wai harbor area. You can learn more by reading the Advertiser article or watching the KHON report (please copy and paste urls if links below don't work).

http://www.khon2.com/news/local/12285311.html

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2007/Dec/08/br/br9147038256.html

Scott also sent this link to KGMB's coverage of Saturday's Pupukea-Paumalu celebration -- a monumental victory for North Shore residents and supporters who want to "Keep the Country, Country"...

http://kgmb9.com/main/content/view/2457/40/

Excerpt from newscast: 'The North Shore community fought development. And, with cooperation from community leaders and the government, a public trust bought the land from Obayashi Corporation. With that move, more than 1,100 acres in Pupukea and Paumalu were saved. "It means everything. I just can't believe that we've succeeded," said Peter Cole, longtime North Shore resident and former pro surfer.

"This year has just been unbelievable," Cole said. "We started off with the Shark's Cove thing being defeated. We ended up with Waimea Falls, we ended up with Pupukea Paumalu," he added.

Entertainers (Jack Johnson), surf legends (Peter Cole, Poncho Sullivan) and the dignitaries (Gov. Linda Lingle, U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie, Mayor Mufi Hannemann, State Rep. Michael Magaoay, to name a few) and North Shore residents all gathered under a couple of tents on the campus of Sunset Beach Elementary School Saturday...'

Congratulations to all who made that success possible! Now it's our turn to do the same with public beach access.

John Kelly Tribute

Despite the bad weather, the "Live the Legacy" event sponsored by Kahea to honor Save Our Surf founder John Kelly, and promote the next wave of grassroots activism, had a good turnout in Manoa. There were at least a hundred in attendance Weds. night, (Dec. 5). Beach Access Hawaii had a table, and made some new connections that we're really excited about!

Mark Cunningham from the North Shore's "Keep the Country Country" group says to count them in for our statewide Groundhog Day protest, since the planned Turtle Bay expansion could seriously impact beach access in that area. Suzanne Fraser of BEACH (Beach Environmental Awareness Campaign Hawaii) also supports our efforts, and noted that during a recent clean-up her group held on Kailua Beach, they couldn't take the trash out to the street for pick-up because of locked gates! Try to do something nice for the folks who live next to the ocean, and they literally slam a gate in your face. Nice.

By the way, I was told the vintage Sand Island sign (pictured above) that was on display near the panel tables was the original art work of John Kelly himself. The man did it all -- made signs, printed his own flyers, talked the talk and walked the walk. BAH, Surfrider, Kahea, and all the other groups that were there, are carrying on in his spirit. Mahalo, John.