My latest Civil Beat column takes a look at the Hawaii Supreme Court decision issued last week in a case involving the seawall fronting a number of buildings on the Diamond Head end of Waikiki (“Ian Lind: No One Has Won The Fight Over Fixing This Waikiki Seawall“).
What caught my interest initially were the conflicting news reports.
For example, Pacific Business News reported, “Hawaii Supreme Court says state responsible for Waikiki seawall.”
But Civil Beat saw it differently, reporting: “Waikiki Residents Lose Fight To Force State To Repair Seawall.”
So I checked the stories. I concluded that both claims are wrong. What the Supreme Court really said was, “split the check.” Repair and maintenance of the seawall is a joint responsibility between the landowners and the state, which the court concluded has an “implied easement” for public access to and from the ocean. But you wouldn’t know that from the news reports.
This leads back to a (longstanding) gripe of mine.
When you’ve got a court decision, you really should look to the decision to see what it says. You can’t ask the judges for comment. The decision is their comment.
But reporters these days–apparently with the support of their editors–rarely look to the decision. Instead, they seek comments from the parties to the case and report their spin on the decision.
In this case, Attorney General Doug Chin put out a press release. Reporters who started with that release reported the landowners had lost the case. Those who started with comments from the plaintiffs’ attorney, Robert Klein, dutifully reported they had won.
But the answer of whose going to pay the bills–the landowners or the state–is buried down around pages 57-59 in the 80-page decision, most of which deals with technical legal issues that aren’t particularly relevant to regular readers. But the substance most important to the public–the answer to the question of who will have to pay–just wasn’t reported.
And, by the way, the answer isn’t straightforward. It was left to a future trial court to weigh how the cost of repairs should be split.
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Actually, the decision is very clear that the landowners cannot force the state to put up ANY money for seawall maintenance. That is totally a prerogative of (a) the Legislature providing funding and (b) the governor releasing that funding.
Similarly, the state may have oversight and responsibility for roads, but I cannot force the state (or the city) to repave the road in front of my house.
Well, perhaps. But I didn’t see that point made in the decision. Perhaps you can enlighten me by pointing to where that is made clear. Thanks.
But it should be done soon.
Just a point. We need lots of infrastructure investment to prevent flooding. For instance the Ala Wai canal, needs a raised sea wall. Something has been done on this. But what is happening is strong resistence to lots needed public infrastrure.