Posted on: Thursday, October 24, 2002

Kaua'i seeks court rein on landowner's activities

By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Kaua'i Bureau

LIHU'E, Kaua'i — The county Planning Department is seeking court oversight of landowner Jimmy Pflueger's grading activities on his Pila'a property.

In a complaint filed at 5th Circuit Court yesterday, the county says Pflueger from 1998 to the present has violated shoreline management area regulations, creating problems with runoff that is running into the ocean and onto the reef.

The state Department of Health and the federal Environmental Protection Agency already cited Pflueger for the improper work.

Coastal homes were damaged by a mudslide from some of the graded property during November 2001. Pflueger is the subject of multiple legal complaints as a result of the Pila'a activity.

Pflueger has said earlier that he was impatient with the government permitting process, and his attorney Max Graham has said his client admits the grading work was done without permits.

The county complaint said Pflueger, without county permits, built a series of roads totalling more than a half-mile in length and performed "substantial grading, grubbing and bulldozing" on land in the area. It says a county inspector saw mudslides running from the graded Pflueger property to the shoreline and witnessed heavy equipment operating in the area at the time.

The county issued an order to stop work, but an inspector found more work was performed after that order was issued. The complaint asks for a court injunction ordering no further work without a permit.

The county is asking the court to conclude that Pflueger violated the county's special management area regulations, and that his unpermitted work "constitutes a hazard to the public health, safety, welfare and the environment."

Contractors working for Pflueger are now performing remedial work to limit further erosion under a mitigation plan overseen by county, state and federal agencies.