The state Department of the Attorney General took legal action on Wednesday against a North Shore property owner after part of a beachfront home collapsed onto state land and into the ocean.
Community members said the property at 59-147 Ke Nui Road in Pupukea had been eroding for several months. During beach cleanups in August, it was clear to them that the home already was showing signs of erosion. However, the more severe damage, where a portion of the home’s porch fell into the ocean, began Tuesday.
The Attorney General filed a complaint on Wednesday for declaratory and injunctive relief in Oahu Circuit Court and is seeking a temporary restraining order against the property’s owner.
According to the complaint, on or about Tuesday, the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Office of Conservation and Coastal Lands received reports that a home in Haleiwa was being destroyed by ocean swells, and solid debris had fallen from the property onto state land. DLNR’s Division of Conservation and Resource Enforcement officers responded and observed large portions of the structure on state land, with debris washing into the ocean.
The complaint details the state’s request for injunctive relief to have all unauthorized solid materials, including unauthorized erosion control devices and debris, removed from the state land.
It also requests a court order declaring that the state owns the land free of any interest or claim by the defendant and seeks a permanent injunction preventing the defendant from allowing any structures, solid materials or debris of any kind on state property; it further asks that the court award damages to the state for repairing the natural resources affected by the defendants’ illegal actions.
Community members also reported that the neighboring home is beginning to fall into the ocean as well.
Both properties have been identified as being owned by Kailua businessman Joshua VanEmmerik.
State Rep. Sean Quinlan (D, Waialua- Haleiwa-Punaluu) met with officials from the state Department of Health, DLNR OCCL, the Attorney General’s office, and the city Department of Planning and Permitting on Wednesday afternoon to assess the Pupukea property.
“It’s been very difficult to contact the homeowner. I was told that he did speak to some city officials today, where he reiterated his claim that the banks own the property. However, he was seen on property today,” Quinlan said on Wednesday about VanEmmerik. “I was told that he was very noncooperative with DOCARE officers.”
‘Safety emergency’
Denise Antolini, a Pupukea resident and environmental attorney, said the issue of the houses falling into the ocean on the North Shore are “a dire public health and safety emergency.”
“This owner is already embroiled in numerous legal entanglements for his irresponsible and illegal actions on these two properties. I wish he would step up and take responsibility but he’s done just the opposite — evading the law and ignoring the damage to the public beach,” Antolini said.
“Adding insult to injury, Mr. Van Emmerik is not a resident of the North Shore and does not live in these homes — they have been used as illegal vacation rentals since he bought the properties a few years ago, showing total disrespect for our community.”
Antolini expressed particular concern about the health risks this issue and the erosion may pose to the community, stating that the disaster is a breach of public safety and public trust, and requires an urgent response from both the homeowner and the government.
“The glass, metal, wire, concrete, lumber, and other debris littering the beach and polluting the ocean are extremely dangerous. Cesspools may be breached soon and spill sewage into the beach,” she said.
Hanna Lilley, the Hawaii regional manager at the Surfrider Foundation Oahu Chapter, also raised concerns about the home erosion being a significant public health and safety concern posing immediate risk to members of the North Shore community who swim, surf, and recreate in the area.
“Especially after the private property that fell into the ocean at Rocky Point two years ago, we are all well aware that it’s only a matter of time before more properties follow suit,” Lilley said. “Two of the properties at Kammies, owned by Joshua VanEmmerik, are now falling into the ocean.”
She said the organization has been monitoring four oceanfront properties at Kammies on the North Shore that have been encroaching onto the public beach for years and is urging the state and county to seize the properties through eminent domain for public use.
“We would also encourage State and County officials to look at nearby homes that are also at risk of the same fate and are at risk of violating public trust,” Lilley said.
Jurisdiction
The Attorney General’s office said that DLNR has jurisdiction over land makai of the shoreline, with the subject property located in the state conservation district and the state owning land up to the highest wash of the waves.
“The state has a duty to protect the environment, prevent further degradation of state conservation land, and ensure shoreline and beach preservation for future generations,” Attorney General Anne Lopez said in a statement.
Besides the complaint, Quinlan also said the Attorney General’s office has been requested to ask for an order of entry to the property because it is a private property and without the homeowner’s permission, they cannot enter without a court order.
“So we’re asking for a court order so we can get Department of Health inspectors on-site to take a look at the cesspools to determine where they are, what they’re made of, how close they are to failing, because it’s really important that we prevent any of that effluent from reaching the ocean,” Quinlan said.
The city informed the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that inspectors were dispatched to the property on Tuesday, leading the DPP to issue a Notice of Violation deeming the structure unsafe and prohibiting occupancy due to its hazardous condition.
DPP is coordinating with other agencies to determine the next steps for further enforcement and to address health and safety concerns related to the structure’s current state.
Before Tuesday’s “unsafe to occupy” notice of violation, DPP had issued five other notices on the property since 2022.
One notice was for operating short-term rentals, which has since been corrected, and the file is now closed.
In October 2022, the property received a shoreline violation for adding new concrete to the seaward side of the foundation without the required Special Management Area permit.
Additionally, the property was cited for constructing a wooden gate, a concrete rubble masonry wall and a concrete slab without the necessary permits, as well as for an unsafe structure.
DLNR’s OCCL told the Star-Advertiser that the office and the City and County Department of Parks and Recreation are working on a coordinated plan to remove the debris from the home’s partial collapse from the beach.
Quinlan also said Parks and Recreation has “men and machinery that are ready to go to start cleaning up the debris on the beach, but because of the current swell, it might be several days, and maybe even up to a week, before we were able to get the machinery onto that beach.”
Michael Cain, administrator for OCCL, stated that while coastal erosion is a natural process, development on beaches and dunes contributes to the narrowing and loss of beaches by trapping sand behind seawalls and disrupting the natural seasonal movement of sand.
OCCL has taken numerous actions against property owners for alleged conservation district violations. In the Paumalu ahupuaa on the North Shore, the department is currently involved in contested case hearings concerning enforcement actions against five properties, including those where residences are collapsing.
Enforcement actions for three other properties have moved to Circuit Court. Additionally, there are six pending alleged violations that will need to be brought before the Board of Land and Natural Resources.
Cain added that ensuring compliance with conservation district rules is a “frustratingly slow process.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a case, in my time as a legislator, of a beachfront homeowner who has committed this many violations, who has been this difficult to deal with and has performed as many illegal actions. So I think in the case of this particular homeowner, it’s really important that the state and the county send a strong message that when you cross these lines, there will be consequences,” Quinlan said.
