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Department of Health cites Kaneohe Yacht Club for discharging pollutants into Kaneohe Bay

KANEOHE, Hawaii — Kaneohe Yacht Club was ordered to pay a $72,300 penalty for violating its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit, according to a Hawaii Department of Health news release.

DOH issued a Notice of Violation and Order for discharging contaminated stormwater into Kaneohe Bay and failing to comply with inspection, stormwater sampling, and reporting requirements.

In response to complaints, the DOH Clean Water Branch inspected the Kaneohe Yacht Club in 2016 and 2018. Inspectors noted boat repairs and other maintenance activities like painting and sandblasting may lead the facility to discharge contaminated stormwater into Kaneohe Bay. DOH informed the yacht club that it must stop performing the maintenance activities or acquire a NPDES permit, which requires adhering to stringent requirements. Kaneohe Yacht Club obtained a permit.

According to DOH, inspectors returned to the yacht club on March 22 after not receiving monitoring reports required by the permit. They saw an oily sheen within the drainage inlet in the boat haul-out maintenance area. The oily sheen came from a boat stored within the maintenance area, and the drainage inlet let out into Kaneohe Bay.

The yacht club violated other rules like not doing regular inspections, training personnel, submitting a report for 2022, and submitting a late Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan.

Along with the fine, DOH is asking the yacht club to address the violations. This includes immediately ceasing to discharge pollutants into Kaneohe Bay and hiring an environmental compliance manager.

The yacht club has 20 days to contest the findings and request a hearing.

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The state Department of Health fined the Kaneohe Yacht Club $72,300 for violations of its state permit regulating water discharges.

The violations include the unauthorized discharge of contaminated stormwater into Kaneohe Bay, failing to comply with inspection requirements and failing to implement a best management practices plan, among others, according to a DOH news release.

The department said the yacht club was in noncompliance with the terms of the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit issued by the department about a year ago.

In addition to the monetary fine, DOH ordered the yacht club to hire an environmental program manager to ensure compliance with the permit, and to submit a corrective action report, succession plan, and inspection and stormwater sampling plan.

The club also must provide stormwater training for facility personnel.

DOH’s Clean Water Branch conducted inspections at the club at 44-503 Kaneohe Bay Drive in 2016 and 2018 in response to community complaints, according to the news release. At the time, inspectors found that boat repairs and maintenance at the facility were at risk of discharging contaminated stormwater into Kaneohe Bay.

DOH told the yacht club to cease these industrial activities or obtain an NPDES permit requiring it to adhere to stringent practices for storm water discharge, the release said. The club opted for the NPDES permit, which it obtained July 1, 2022.

In March an inspector observed an oily sheen from a boat stored within the drainage inlet at the club’s haul-out maintenance area — considered a violation because the inlet discharges to Kaneohe Bay, DOH said.

Health officials said the yacht club failed to submit quarterly discharge monitoring reports, collect stormwater samples or conduct routine facility inspections. Additionally, the club was late submitting its required Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan.

Kaneohe Yacht Club, which owns the 5-acre facility, said it plans to request a hearing to present its case, which must be done 20 days after the notice of violation and order is issued. The notice was issued July 17.

“Kaneohe Yacht Club is preparing a response to the recent notice from the Clean Water Branch of the Department of Health to report the significant progress that has been made to comply with the conditions and requirements therein,” said the club in a statement from Commodore Bill Atherton and Vice Commodore Jane Sawyer. “It is the clear commitment of KYC leaders, management, and members to work more closely with CWB officials and conduct appropriate monitoring practices to protect water quality in our marina and Kaneohe Bay.”

Home  News  Kaneohe Yacht Club Claim Back-to-Back Sears Cup Victory

Kaneohe Yacht Club Claim Back-to-Back Sears Cup Victory

SEABROOK, TEXAS (August 14, 2023) – After three days of close racing, Makani Andrews, Noelani Velasco, Bryce Huntoon, and Jaxon Hottinger from Kaneohe Yacht Club overcame a slow start in Sunday’s Gold Fleet racing to claim their second consecutive Sears Cup.

Second place came down to the last race, where the San Francisco Yacht Club team of Hailey Thompson, Rhett Krawitt, Julian Levash, and Mark Xu were able to best the Austin Yacht Club team of James Brock, Ryder Getson, Zachary Romberg, and Lily Wind on the final leg. San Francisco finished with 42 points, while Austin Yacht Club finished with 44 points.

“Winning a second year in a row with the same crew is incredible, it’s an indescribable feeling,” said trimmer Bryce Huntoon. “Being able to train and compete with a consistent crew is massive. We’re all good friends at home; many of us are training partners on other boats, so it’s just pure fun racing with this team against some of the best sailors in the country.”

Competitors at the Chubb US Youth Triplehanded Championship saw a wide range of conditions on Clear Lake, with lighter conditions in the morning building to a 15-18 knot seabreeze from the Gulf of Mexico in the afternoon. Racing took place August 11 – 13 in Lakewood Yacht Club’s fleet of RS21s.

First awarded in 1921, The Sears Cup is US Sailing’s oldest youth trophy, and serves as a pathway into keelboat sailing for youth sailors. Two teams from each US Sailing area can qualify for the Sears Cup in a local area qualifier.

Each year, US Sailing coach and event staff choose a winner of the Sportsmanship Award, based on a display of sportsman-like conduct to their competitors. This year’s winners were the team from San Diego Yacht Club: Ava Gustafson, Madilyn Anderson, Kaya Hancock, and Taylor Ashton.

Unique to the Chubb U.S. Youth Triplehanded Championship is the Sears Shipshape Award, awarded to the Triplehanded team who demonstrates the utmost care and attention to detail for their borrowed boats during and after the Championship. This year’s winners were the team from Mission Bay Yacht Club: Liam Kaseburg, Carlin Fretwell, Efe Derman, and Ariana Ludwig.

This year’s event had a strong showing of mixed gender teams, with 4 boats driven by female skippers, and 14 of the 19 boats having mixed gender crews.

US Sailing would like to thank title sponsor Chubb Insurance, national sponsors Gill Marine, and host Lakewood Yacht Club for their support of the 2023 Chubb US Youth Triplehanded Championship.

Download photos from the event: https://usst.photoshelter.com/galleries/C0000i0ovCgmMqmk/2023-Chubb-US-Triplehanded-Championship

Full scores: https://theclubspot.com/regatta/s3GaFfesRY/results

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Toxic Runoff At Issue As State Considers New Permit For Kaneohe Boat Facility

For years, routine boat maintenance at the Kaneohe Yacht Club may have leached pollutants into Kaneohe Bay, endangering its unique coral reefs. That finally stopped in 2018, after the Department of Health issued a citation requiring the club to take steps to reduce the environmental impact of its maintenance activities.

Now, the state is ready to grant the Kaneohe Yacht Club a permit that would allow the boaters to resume working on their boats, hoping that the permit’s requirements would sufficiently curtail the pollutants’ spread.

But some neighbors and at least one scientist say the permit’s limited jurisdiction and lack of supervision makes them worried that the yacht club would continue to release chemicals via dust and water runoff, posing a health risk to the surrounding community and further damaging the ecosystem of the bay.

Public comment is being accepted on the permit until Monday.

Kaneohe Bay Kaneohe Windward Oahu aerial.

Robert Richmond, a research professor and director of the University of Hawaii’s Kewalo Marine Laboratory, said one activity in particular — the yearly task of sanding and repainting the bottom of boats with anti-fouling paint — releases pollutants that could have a catastrophic effect on the bay’s coral if not properly contained.

Richmond said that anti-fouling paint contains significant amounts of heavy metals such as copper — which is toxic to almost all marine organisms — and that sailors coat the hulls of their boats with this paint to deter barnacles and algae from sticking to their boats.

Copper also prevents coral larvae — essentially baby coral — from attaching to the reef and becoming a polyp, the precursor to the mature coral that make up a coral reef.

“Copper is the main ingredient in anti-fouling paint because it’s very toxic to marine life, and it will prevent larvae from settling,” Richmond said, “but it will also inhibit the ability of things like corals and other animals to reproduce.”

But some are concerned about potential risk to humans when dust from the maintenance becomes airborne and carries potentially toxic substances on the wind.

Howard Green, a lawyer and former Kaneohe Yacht Club member who owns property adjacent to the yacht club, said that he first grew concerned when he moved to his house in 2011 and discovered that the sanding of paint produced dust clouds. The Kaneohe Yacht Club lacked appropriate infrastructure to contain pollutants that can be found in larger facilities, he said.

Green said the yacht club rejected his initial request to cease all maintenance activities, so he commissioned Whale Environmental Services to perform a private environmental study to analyze the pollutants that made their way to his property.

What he found surprised him.

“Once the environmental experts began talking to me about it, I realized it was not only bad, but it was a whole lot worse than I thought it was,” Green said.

“The second environmental guy that I hired, testified … that, in his opinion, it would not be prudent for anybody to actually live in my house.”

Green said the study analyzed samples of soil and stormwater runoff collected from various locations surrounding the yacht club, and that many of the samples contained concentrations of heavy metals such as copper, lead and zinc that far exceeded the health department’s thresholds used to determine whether a chemical poses risk to humans.

Green submitted this data to the state health department and continued to file complaints with the yacht club, which he said ultimately got him kicked out of the club in 2018 despite having been a member for 49 years.

Officials with the Kaneohe Yacht Club did not respond to requests for comment.

Is The Permit Enough?

To address these concerns, the health department is requiring the club to adopt practices to ensure that potentially dangerous pollutants do not reach state waters before issuing a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit. The permit would allow the yacht club to legally release industrial water runoff into the bay.

Matthew Kurano, supervisor of the department’s Clean Water Branch enforcement section, called the requirements “common sense protocols” that include refraining from performing maintenance in the rain or making sure that paint and other chemicals are not left exposed to the elements.

Other practices may be more substantial, such as the upkeep of a sediment retention basin large enough to accommodate the yacht club’s storm water runoff, according to the publicly available permit.

Kurano said that the NPDES permit only covers pollution that occurs through water runoff and would not cover airborne dust, which falls under air pollution laws.

Kurano said that while the Kaneohe Yacht Club would be added to the regular inspection rotation to ensure the yacht club’s compliance with permit requirements, he acknowledged that the health department was “often not nearly as involved as people would like,” given that the Clean Water Branch is responsible for monitoring around 1,200 permits throughout the year.

Ultimately, Kurano said that the yacht club itself would be responsible for enforcing the permit, making sure that its members follow all the requirements including filing regular reports to the health department.

“Really, it is the permitee’s responsibility to comply. At the end of the day, it’s like paying your taxes, right?” Kurano said. “And you don’t want them to cheat, but it’s up to the permittee or the taxpayer to comply.”

But Green said it would be impossible to ensure that every boater followed the required practices because maintenance is not supervised.

“They have a copy of the best management practices posted at the office … and yet, the best management practices are pretty much ignored by every member of the club who cleans his boat over there,” Green said.

The department is accepting public comments on the permit until Monday. Interested residents can email their comments to [email protected] or mail them to P.O. BOX 3378, Honolulu, Hawaii 96801-3378.

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Hudson River Ice Yacht Club trophy found in New Zealand

May 17, 2024

RHINECLIFF- A Loving Cup Trophy from 1904 was found in the North Haven Hospice Thrift Shop in Mangawhai, New Zealand, by a woman who had never heard of ice yachting nor the Hudson River Club. Debi Shwer of Auckland, New Zealand was visiting Mangawhai, when she stopped into a thrift shop there. The Sterling Cup caught her eye, and she was determined to find out more.

Contacting HRIYPT President Robert Wills through the organization’s website, she described her objective of learning more about ice yachting after seeing the inscription on the trophy.

“I was just visiting my mother in law in Mangawhai for Easter. I wish I had a better look around (the thrift shop) because I was on a time limit from my husband waiting in the car! I am honestly fascinated by how it ended up in a charity shop in Northland New Zealand,” she said.

Shwer purchased the trophy and sent it to the club where it now sits as a part of their collection. The club plans is to loan it to an appropriate institution this winter where it can be displayed.

The Trophy was awarded on March 5, 1904, to the yacht “Rainbow”, a Hyde Park Ice Yacht Club boat owned by Capt. Owen Roberts, for winning a ten-mile race for Fourth Class Boats. Future President Franklin Roosevelt’s boat “Hawk” came in second.

“Rainbow” was recorded in club books in 1903, and then again in 1910. It was built by George Buckhout, preeminent ice yacht builder, in Poughkeepsie. Subsequently, Capt. Roberts sailed the boat in 1912 out of the North Shrewsbury Ice Boat & Yacht Club in Red Bank, New Jersey, where it was outfitted with the most modern of hardware and sails, a “Marconi Rig” (the triangular sail used on most sailboats today), and renamed “Rainbow 2nd”. It then disappears from the records, until it shows up in Wisconsin.

Recently offered for sale there, it was purchased by the Lawrence Family of Newburgh, New York, who have been competitive ice yacht racers and Hudson River Ice Yacht Club members for generations, and were instrumental in the restoration of “Jack Frost,” the 1880 multiple world champion ice yacht of Archibald Rogers of Hyde Park, New York, and still sailed today by the Hudson River Ice Yacht Club.

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