Black Pot expansion in works

LIHUE — Consultants hired by the county to assist with the development of a master plan for Hanalei’s Black Pot Beach Park are forming a community advisory board to help guide the process.

County Parks and Recreation Director Lenny Rapozo said in a prepared response to questions from a reporter that the Oahu-based HHF Planners has invited several community members to join the advisory board, which is expected to hold its first meeting later this month.

HHF Planners referred questions about the community advisory board to the Parks and Recreation Department.

The county hired the consultant group in January to assist in developing a master plan for the park. The target completion date for the master plan is the middle of next year, Rapozo said.

In addition to giving board members a voice in the process, HHR Planners will host community meetings, according to Rapozo.

Black Pot is a 5.46-acre park on the eastern end of Hanalei Bay with restrooms and outdoor showers, pavilions, portapottys, picnic tables and weekend camping access. It is one of 67 parks owned by the county.

Black Pot as well as other parks in the Hanalei district are in “high need” of expansion, according to the Parks and Recreation Department’s Master Plan for Kauai County.

Land was added to the park in 2012 following the county’s acquisition of 2.63 acres from Michael Guard Sheehan, owner of Hanalei River Enterprises, Inc., a company that ran a former commercial boat landing adjacent to the park. In 2010, less than an acre was added through a separate land acquisition.

Last summer the county completed a $61,000 expansion of wastewater facilities at the park.

The work included installing additional leach field absorption beds and new pumps and re-routing pipe lines to improve treatment of wastewater prior to getting to the leach fields.