"We know that our young people like to come up to our state parks and harbors and do their drinking," Aiona said at a news conference yesterday at Wa'ahila Ridge State Park, atop Saint Louis Heights. Aiona said the pilot program of stepped-up enforcement will continue through the Labor Day weekend.

Uniformed officers will check the state's 54 parks and 21 small-boat harbors in clearly marked cars at regular intervals throughout the nights and early morning hours, officials said. Some 310 officers will be involved in patrolling the parks seven days a week, said Department of Public Safety Director Jim Propotnick.

Yesterday's announcement comes on the heels of a petition effort by users of the Wai'anae Small Boat Harbor asking the state to do something about what they describe as years of deteriorating safety at the harbor.

Ron Steiskal, author of the petition, said he'll believe the state's promised crackdown when he sees it. The 62-year-old recreational boater said he has been using the boat harbor for six years.

Ron Steiskal, at the Wai'anae Small Boat Harbor, has circulated a petition signed by boat owners and harbor users complaining about the homeless campsite. Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser

The area is a breeding ground for illegal activity, he said. At night, "young kids come down here, get drunk." He said the parking lot is filled with drug paraphernalia and, he said, "some homeless come down here and steal."

Steiskal and other harbor users say that residents of a homeless shantytown that sprang up last September near the harbor are to blame for much of the problem.

But the homeless say don't look at them.

"Automatically they don't even ask people questions over there; they point fingers straight over here. That's the first thing they do," said Diane Ha'o, a 40-year-old homeless woman who has been living with her family near the harbor. "We're homeless but we're not criminals."

A cover letter attached to the petition contends that enforcement officers from state DLNR and Honolulu police officers "turn the other way" when they see vehicles filled with homeless squatters, and that some of them have become long-term residents of the harbor even though they do not have boats there.

"Many are on drugs and deal drugs openly," the cover letter asserts. "It is not uncommon to find small 'ice' (crystal methamphetamine) baggies in the parking lot, sometimes with drugs still in them," the letter said.

"We've got a couple of challenges in particular at the Wai'anae harbor," Young said. "Some portion of what was state land between the harbor and the highway was turned over by executive order to the city many years ago and the city, in turn, turned it over to a nonprofit entity."

Dozens of homeless people have set up camp on that property and use the harbor restrooms, showers and other facilities, Young said.

DLNR enforcement officers have forced homeless people off state-owned land elsewhere but have not tried to force them from the area in front of the harbor because the land is under city jurisdiction, he said.

"The harbor is a public facility and homeless people have a right to use public facilities, too," he said.

Some harbor parking stalls allow vehicles to remain unmoved for up to 72 hours, Young said, which compounds the problem.

"The intent was to allow fishermen to come, go out on an extended fishing trip and come back to find their car or truck where they left it," he said. "Clearly, there are some people parking there who aren't following the intent of the long-term spaces."

He said he hopes the crackdown on drinking and drug use will immediately address concerns by harbor users about late-night disturbances at the harbor. And, the DLNR is also looking at longer-term solutions to the vexing homeless problem.

"It's not limited just to Wai'anae or to O'ahu; it is a statewide problem," he said.

Young said consuming alcohol in a public park is a petty misdemeanor, with violators subject to a fine of up to $1,000 or a six-month jail term or both.