HONOLULU — This week the future of Haiku Stairs was put before an appellate court panel when lawyers argued to either preserve the World War II-era mountain staircase above Kaneohe or see it permanently destroyed.
A temporary injunction to halt dismantling the stairs was granted June 20 by the Intermediate Court of Appeals, despite an effort by the city to block the injunction requested by Friends of Haiku Stairs.
After years of debate, the city decided to demolish the stairs over safety issues and complaints about trespassing and disturbances to nearby residents.
The $2.6 million demolition job — to be done by the contractor The Nakoa Cos. via a Hughes 500D helicopter and roughly a half-dozen ground workers set to hoist 664 steel stair modules — is expected to be completed by October.
At the hourlong appellate court hearing Wednesday, Friends lawyer Tim Vandeveer said the city failed to complete a new or supplemental environmental impact statement to allow the demolition to lawfully proceed.
The city’s prior final EIS, or FEIS, was completed in 2020.
“This case raises novel issues of environmental law,” he said, “and so there is a real public interest that this appeal be allowed to move forward.”
He asserted the city violated the Hawaii Environmental Policy Act, challenging the city’s demolition plans for the “Stairway to Heaven” on several grounds, including the city’s need to follow the required environmental review process.
Vandeveer said the city could reopen the stairs under plans previously created by former Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s administration in 2019. “The stated goal of the city was to open the stairs up to the public and provide managed access,” he said.
He said closure of the Haiku Stairs has also caused more hikers to trek up the Moanalua Valley Trail — causing greater harm to trails on the Leeward side of the Koolau range.
“So by forcing folks to go up on the Moanalua side, it caused erosion, landslides, slick conditions — much more dangerous,” he said. “And so the city contends that the EIS mentions this — that the Moanalua trail was gaining in popularity — but the EIS does not contemplate this huge diversion in the intervening time period since the EIS was completed” in 2020.
He noted the city also did not study “the safety valve,” which he argued the Haiku Stairs represents as well, if hikers find themselves in trouble.
“If they can come down something with a handrail and stairs, it’s much safer than trying to go back down that trail,” he said. “It was not studied in the EIS at all.”
In addition, Vandeveer said demolition of the Haiku Stairs will harm federally protected and endangered species, including the Hawaiian hoary bat, which he claimed were scientifically verified to be in the vicinity of the stairs.
Daniel Gluck, a city Deputy Corporation Counsel, advocated for the city’s removal of the Haiku Stairs.
“Currently, there are 37 stair modules that have been completely separated from the mountain. They are, I believe, fastened with metal ties, but they are loose,” Gluck said. “And so if we have people trespassing and climbing on them, it’s a significant danger.”
He added there are also “two concrete platforms that had railings around them.”
“The railings have been removed so that the helicopters can land,” he said, noting it posed a danger to anyone who might trespass onto the government property. “So we hope that the court will retract the injunction and allow the city’s contractor to proceed.”
Moreover, Gluck said this case “comes down to whether a supplemental EIS is needed.”
“This is not about what the city should do, not about whether the stairs should stay or should be removed, but whether the procedures were followed and the city can continue with its removal efforts,” he said.
Citing case law, he noted that “the EIS does not need to have every single detail in it,” and the “courts follow the rule of reason, so that there can be some changes between the time an EIS is finalized and the time that the action is actually taken.”
As far as endangered species like Hawaiian hoary bats that may be harmed due to the Haiku Stairs’ removal, Gluck said he did not recall any state report being cited by the appellant’s brief to the court.
Still, Gluck said that “even if there are bats in the area … the EIS contemplates those being present and has mitigation measures in place to account for them.”
As far as Moanalua Valley Trail, he said the FEIS “predicted that if the stairs were removed, then the amount of traffic coming from Moanalua would be reduced.”
However, Gluck noted that the Haiku Stairs have been legally off-limits to the public since 1987.
At the hearing’s conclusion, acting Chief Judge Katherine G. Leonard said “the court will take this under advisement, and we will get back to you as soon as we can.”
Legal actions related to this case did not end there, however.
By Thursday the Friends had filed a formal “notice of correction of the record” with the Intermediate Court of Appeals, after the group claimed the city presented incorrect information to the three-judge panel.
According to Vandeveer’s notice of correction, Deputy Corporation Counsel Gluck wrongly stated work had begun on the Haiku Stairs when it had not started at all.
“Specifically, (Gluck) stated that the city’s contractor had removed or destabilized parts of the Haiku Stairs, giving the court the impression that an injunction would endanger the public,” the notice states. “This statement was inaccurate and misleading because it conflates the two distinct sets of stairs that are involved in the city’s demolition project — the Moanalua Saddle Stairs with the Haiku Stairs.”
“When presented with this information, attorney Gluck agreed that the section of Stairs he was referring to the Moanalua Saddle Stairs, but declined to file a notice of errata or otherwise inform or clarify with the Court,” the notice of correction states.
Justin Scorza, the Friends’ vice president, told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser via text that the notice of correction was filed to ensure “the court doesn’t deny our request for an injunction because of false claims that the Stairs are now more dangerous than they were before.”
He stressed that if the city’s false claim was intentional, “that would be perjury” — a criminal offense.
“I’m not saying anyone has committed perjury,” Scorza added, “we just want to make sure the facts are clear.”
The Mayor’s Office did not immediately respond to questions about the notice of correction.
