The beachside bar of the Hyatt Regency Saipan sits behind a white fence that marks the area where Hyatt’s private property ends and public land begins.
Sand bags in the foreground were placed at the beach in order to prevent Marine Sports Club from facing further shore erosion.
MARINE Sports Club and Hyatt Regency Saipan are calling on the community’s attention as they face shoreline erosion that is encroaching on their properties.
Harumitsu Ono owns Marine Sports Club, which provides windsurfing and other marine sports activities in Garapan. He has been a marine sports vendor since 1996.
On Monday, April 8, he spoke to Variety from his beachside business. Steps away from his Marine Sports Club lanai is a white fence that prevents passersby from falling onto rocks and other marine debris.
Ono said the fence also marks where Hyatt’s private land ends and CNMI public land begins.
Nearby, on public land, a large steel marine structure lies exposed. Hyatt’s Marketing and Communications Manager Bea O’Malley said the Historic Preservation Office has identified it as World War II debris.
Ono worries that with the rate of erosion, his shack will collapse.
“Five or six years [ago] the beach started getting smaller and smaller, but [erosion is] happening very quickly the last three or four months,” Ono said. “We talked to [the Division of Coastal Resources Management, the Department of Public Lands, and the Saipan Mayor’s Office]. All of them have come to the location to see what’s happening, but no action yet.”
Ono is not sure what has caused the intensity of the shore erosion. He knows that seasonally, beach sand shifts from one side of Garapan and returns with changes in the current and weather.
He speculates that the Sea Touch platform south of Hyatt could be preventing sand from returning. Ono noted that there is “a lot” of sand in front of the Grandvrio Resort.
Ono offered a temporary solution. “Just bring the sand from another beach, like Smiling Cove, or in front of IPI and Grandvrio,” he said. “Afterward they need a project to make a seawall. Or else pretty soon Hyatt’s chapel will be under water.”
Ono said even with the erosion, he does not wish to relocate his business, as Garapan is a premier windsurfing venue on Saipan.
“We’re a windsurfing service shop — this is the best place,” he added.
In the meantime, sandbags placed beneath his beach shack are all that stand between his business and the ocean.
“We need help to protect our beautiful beach,” he reiterated.
For her part, O’Malley said they have to go through a permitting process to remove the WWII debris on the beach.
“Because it’s on public land it means Hyatt can’t do anything to move it or do anything on public land. Everything has to be permitted first,” she said.
As for the erosion, O’Malley said marine scientists need to be called in by the appropriate agencies to study the erosion’s precise source and then make recommendations as to what to do about it.
She said she has been told that permitting agencies lack funding to fix the erosion.
O’Malley hopes that island leaders can include Hyatt’s erosion issues among their priorities.
“What needs to be done is for all the concerned departments to come together to make the beach in Garapan a part of their daily briefing and part of their focus,” she added.
She reminds leaders that Garapan is the tourism industry’s primary area.
“I think we’re at the point that we need to be creative. Maybe they can knock on doors on the local and federal levels,” O’Malley said. “The beach here is for tourists. Tourists come here because of the beach and the location is just perfect, but if you see the beach floating away like this it’s not good for the image of the hotels, and most definitely the image of the whole island.”
Hyatt Regency Saipan has experienced intense shoreline erosion in the past few months, Marine Sports Club owner Harumitsu Ono said.
Hyatt Regency Saipan hopes that island leaders can include the hotel’s erosion issues among their priorities.
World War II debris has been exposed at Hyatt Beach after the ocean has eroded much of the sand.
