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Q uestion : Auwe! What is going on with that big white truck in the Maunalua Bay parking lot? It’s been there for weeks if not months. Read more

Question: Auwe! What is going on with that big white truck in the Maunalua Bay parking lot? It’s been there for weeks if not months. It’s full of junk and now its windows are broken and it is covered with graffiti too. I know plenty of people have complained “to the authorities” and yet there it sits 24/7, at the start of the Ka Iwi Coast scenic route no less!

Answer: “Certified letters were sent to the last registered owner of the van telling her she needs to remove it by Dec 5. Letters were sent to two different addresses on record and so far no response. If that’s the case after Dec. 5, the DLNR Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation will solicit bids from private contractors to remove the van and all of the materials in it. The cost will be at state expense,” Dan Dennison, a spokesman for the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, told Kokua Line in an email Tuesday.

DOBOR has jurisdiction over the Maunalua Bay Boat Launching Ramp parking lot, which is makai of Kalanianaole Highway near the intersection of Keahole Street. That stretch of Kalanianaole is within the 6.8-mile Maunalua-Makapuu State Scenic Byway, as you noted.

The abandoned white Ford E350 panel van, a former food truck whose vehicle registration expired five years ago, has been sitting there since at least Sept. 27, according to the letter from DOBOR taped to the windshield; several soggy parking tickets also were affixed.

When we checked Wednesday morning, the truck’s driver and passenger doors were open; the cab was strewn with rubbish. In the cargo area, side windows were broken and the back door was ajar, revealing a mound of construction debris. Old tile, drywall, wood and other material filled the interior and jutted out the door.

Greg Knudsen, a member of the Hawaii Kai Neighborhood Board who was instrumental in achieving the scenic byway designation, said the state should not wait until Dec. 5 to begin even soliciting bids for removal. DLNR should remove “this hazardous eyesore from its property immediately” and store the debris-filled vehicle if necessary to meet any legal requirement, he said.

“We have been trying to get rid of it for months. It’s not even a vehicle, really. It’s a pile of junk,” he said Wednesday. The board was told at its Oct. 30 meeting that enforcement was stymied by a lack of signs prohibiting long-term parking, he said. “So they put up the signs but it’s still there.”

The vehicle has generated numerous complaints on a neighborhood social media network, with residents complaining about, among other things, visual blight and the environmental hazards of shoreline dumping.

In addition to posting signs limiting parking to 24 hours, DOBOR in October sent letters to the vehicle’s last registered owner, Dennison said. On Nov. 5, DOBOR staff followed up by taping a notification letter to the vehicle, as allowed by law.

That letter cited Hawaii Revised Statutes 171-31.5 (https://808ne.ws/hrs171315), which requires the government to give an owner 30 days notice before disposing of abandoned property. In this case, the letter says “disposition will take place no sooner than Dec. 5, 2018.”

Knudsen and others prevailed upon state officials to act more swiftly.

“They don’t have to leave it sitting there. They could take it away now and keep it at the impound lot if that’s what the law requires,” Knudsen said

Mahalo

Aloha is alive and well in Kailua as busy pedestrians stopped and helped an old lady stanch the bleeding on her knee after a fall on the pavement. I unfortunately don’t know your names but a special mahalo to each of you for your kindness. The wound is healing well. — B.W., Kaneohe

Write to “Kokua Line” at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.