THE SENATE	S.B. NO.	2183
THIRTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2024		S.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

 

RELATING TO RESTORATION OF BEACH LANDS.

 

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

 

     SECTION 1.  The legislature finds that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the world's leading authority on climate science, stated in its Sixth Assessment Report that the Panel has high confidence that global sea level is expected to rise for centuries to millennia, regardless of whether humans slow carbon emissions into the atmosphere.  Additionally, the Hawaii climate change mitigation and adaptation commission, established pursuant to Act 32, Session Laws of Hawaii 2017, stated in its Hawai‘i Sea Level Rise Vulnerability and Adaptation Report, updated in 2022, that Hawaii is projected to experience between 3.9 and 5.9 feet of sea level rise by the year 2100.

     The legislature further finds that sea level rise poses a serious and imminent threat to Hawaii's coastal communities and residents and to Hawaii's natural resources, primarily beaches and coastal ecosystems.  The legislature recognizes that the State has an affirmative duty to preserve beaches as a public trust resource for the people of Hawaii, and that beaches are culturally important and provide natural resilience to sea level rise and associated coastal flooding.

     The purpose of this Act is to amend the definition of beach restoration used in laws governing the board of land and natural resources' powers to engage in beach restoration by expanding the types of activities the State recognizes as restorative and beneficial to beach lands in response to the increasing threat of sea level rise and beach loss.

     SECTION 2.  Section 171-151, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending the definition of "beach restoration" to read as follows:

     ""Beach restoration" means [the placement of sand, with or without stabilizing structures, on an eroded beach from an outside source such as offshore sand deposits, streams, channels or harbor mouths, or an upland sand quarry.] any activity undertaken to:

     (1)  Maintain and improve eroded beaches and degraded dune systems through management and restoration of sand and native dune vegetation; or

     (2)  Remove materials abandoned on beaches and dunes that pose a risk to public health and coastal ecosystems."

     SECTION 3.  Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken.  New statutory material is underscored.

     SECTION 4.  This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2050.

 

 

Report Title:

Beach Restoration; Activities; Board of Land and Natural Resources

 

Description:

Amends the definition of "beach restoration" used in laws governing the Board of Land and Natural Resources' powers to engage in beach restoration to include activities undertaken to improve eroded beaches and degraded dune systems and to remove abandoned and remnant manmade materials that pose a risk to the health of the public and ecosystem.  Takes effect 7/1/2050.  (SD1)

 

 

 

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