Beacons need help to shine on
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By Jan TenBruggencate and Susan Roth
Advertiser Staff Writers
Hawai'i's aged lighthouses still cast their far-reaching beams miles out to sea, but the future of some of the state's desolate beacons is uncertain.
Marking isolated points like Kilauea, Makapu'u, Kalaupapa and Kumukahi, Hawai'i's lighthouses are becoming obsolete, their warnings relayed more effectively to mariners by radar and global positioning systems.
And because they are old, they are expensive to maintain.
Federal authorities are planning to transfer control of many of the 301 lighthouses across the nation from the Coast Guard to other agencies, and perhaps even to private groups — although the Coast Guard would remain responsible for keeping the beacons beaming.
But don't get your checkbook out. First, the lighthouses would be transferred free of charge. Second, they won't be transferred to individuals. And finally, they come with lots of strings attached and any group acquiring one would have to commit to costly preservation and maintenance.
"There's probably very few groups that could afford to take that on," said Lt. Susan Papuga, assistant planning officer for the 14th Coast Guard District in Honolulu.
Under the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act of 2000, the Department of Interior can transfer historic lighthouses and lightstations at no cost to government agencies, nonprofit corporations and community development organizations.
Interior Secretary Gale Norton this week will turn over the first lighthouse properties to public and private organizations under the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Program.
One, the Tybee Island Lighthouse in Georgia, will be owned and maintained by the Tybee Island Historical Society. Another, the St. Augustine Lighthouse, is being turned over to the St. Augustine Lighthouse and Museum, a non-profit corporation formed by the Junior Service League of St. Augustine, Fla.
The idea is to maintain them in perpetuity, but to have someone other than the Coast Guard do it.
"We have no maintenance money," said Sherry Shirkey, Alameda, California-based chief of the real property branch for the Coast Guard in the Islands.
In Hawai'i, the Kilauea Point Lighthouse on Kaua'i has been transferred to the Fish and Wildlife Service, which operates the Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge.
"We keep it up, with the help of volunteers," said Barbara Maxfield of the Fish and Wildlife Service office in Honolulu.
"We don't do anything on that lighthouse any more," said Cmdr. Mike Cosenza, chief of the Aids to Navigation Branch for the 14th Coast Guard District. However, sailors north of Kaua'i still have a beacon. The Coast Guard maintains an automated light on a steel pole next to the 1913 lighthouse on Kilauea Point.
Moloka'i's Kalaupapa lighthouse has been declared surplus to the Coast Guard's needs, and the paperwork is under way to transfer it to another owner.
It will probably go to the National Park Service, which runs the Kalaupapa National Historical Park at the site of the Hansen's Disease settlement on a peninsula jutting from Moloka'i's northfacing cliffs.
There are no plans at this time for changes in ownership of the remaining big lights: Diamond Head, Makapu'u, Nawiliwili, Cape Kumukahi or Barbers Point.
That could come, however. The National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Program envisions most of the nation's lighthouses being transferred to other agencies, some of which may be private groups. But neither the Coast Guard nor the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Program envisions turning off the lights.
"The Coast Guard would still be responsible for the light and the maintenance of it," Shirkey said.
In the example of the Moloka'i lighthouse, the Coast Guard would retain an easement, and would continue to maintain the actual rotating beacon. The park service would maintain the grounds, keep the tall concrete structure painted, and might chip the rust off the railings and repaint them.
There would be strict requirements for maintenance of the structures, many of which are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Non-government organizations proposing to take over lighthouses would have to prove they could afford to keep them up, said Kevin Foster, chief of the National Park Service's maritime heritage program.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.
