City administrators, members of the Honolulu City Council and working and former lifeguards gathered on Wednesday afternoon in front of Honolulu Hale to commemorate the signing of Resolution 24-103, which created a stand-alone city Ocean Safety Department, effective immediately.
The signing came two weeks after the Honolulu City Council unanimously passed Mayor Rick Blangiardi’s resolution to create the new department, amid active discussions about a stand-alone ocean safety department since 2023.
“It became very clear to us, if we wanted to show respect on a going-forward basis to the men and women of Ocean Safety, for that department and all that it represents for our island home, that we should do this,” Blangiardi said at the ceremony.
Since 1998 the Ocean Safety and Lifeguard Services Division has fallen under the larger Honolulu Emergency Services Department. Currently, 271 lifeguards and eight rescue ski teams staff 42 lifeguard towers on beaches across O‘ahu.
Blangiardi said creating a separate department for Ocean Safety will streamline budgeting, planning and capital improvement projects for the lifeguards.
“We have such great respect for our first responders, so that’s what that is. It puts it in its own right from a planning standpoint, from a budgeting standpoint and, honestly, from an execution standpoint,” Blangiardi said. “It makes it the priority it deserves to be.”
Blangiardi’s signing of the resolution creates the stand-alone Ocean Safety Department effective Wednesday. Managing Director Michael Formby said a formal process to create the department will take approximately six months.
Blangiardi also signed the first draft of Resolution 24-50, which will seek a voter-approved charter amendment on the Nov. 5 general election ballot to create the Ocean Safety Commission, an oversight body for the department.
Previously, Council member Andria Tupola, who initially introduced Resolution 50, asked for a voter- approved charter amendment to establish the new Ocean Safety Department. It was met with opposition from city administrators, who feared that seeking voter approval for the department could potentially jeopardize its creation.
“We went back and forth on how to make all this work together,” Tupola said. “Today we stand united with the lifeguards who have come before, we stand united with the lifeguards who are here today and we stand united with the lifeguards who will come tomorrow. We put aside our differences and all move forward, united for the good of the new Ocean Safety Department.”
“Separating Ocean Safety was critical to solving the problems that we were facing with Ocean Safety. I used my mayoral powers to be able to do that per this resolution,” Blangiardi said. “What we wanted to do is ensure that we could separate Ocean Safety, and that’s the step we’ve taken. That’s the thing that we’ve worked on.”
Similar to the commissions that oversee the Honolulu Fire Department and Police Department, the potential Ocean Safety Commission will allow lifeguards to advocate their needs directly to the City Council. Tupola said the lifeguards will do a “huge amount” of advocacy work in support of the formation of the commission.
“I think what we’re going to see, if the ballot passes and there is a commission, a lot more input from the lifeguards straight to the Council so that we can help,” Tupola said. “Everything from North Shore all the way to South Shore, all of those concerns are kind of vetted out. We work well with a lot of our commissions, and without their input we really wouldn’t know how to navigate through a budget, new items or what’s needed, so I’m looking forward to that.”
Members of the Ocean Safety Division were in attendance at Wednesday’s ceremony, celebrating an achievement Interim Chief Kurt Lager said “every lifeguard has been dreaming of for 107 years,” since lifeguards first began serving O‘ahu beachgoers.
“Change can often be scary, but with change comes opportunity and Ocean Safety is ready to grasp this opportunity. We want to provide the best service to the residents and visitors of O‘ahu. We already do, but we’re going to expand on that. We’re going to improve our services and provide safer beaches,” Lager said. “I promise you we will continue to provide a professional lifesaving service for all our residents around the island.”
To conclude the ceremony, Blangiardi issued a proclamation to the Honolulu City Council and to Ocean Safety.
“This truly is a historic moment,” he said. “It is with great honor that I signed this resolution for something long overdue, but more than anything, in recognition of the incredible men and women we have who comprise our ocean safety department.”
