The City Council Parks Committee has shelved bills to require skateboard riders to wear helmets after concerns were raised about the difficulty of enforcing the laws and that enforcement would drive skateboarders to ride in less visible and illegal venues.
Parks Chairman Joey Manahan said the Council will convene a task force of stakeholders to look at ways to make skateboarding safer.
"I don’t want there to be unintended consequences where, if we move forward with the bills, we kill the sport," Manahan told colleagues at Tuesday’s meeting. "But I do feel the issue needs to be addressed."
One of the bills deferred on Tuesday would require skateboarders to wear helmets at skateboard parks. The other bill mandates helmets for skateboarders on all other city property such as streets, sidewalks and parks.
Maj. Ray Ancheta, head of the Honolulu Police Department’s East Honolulu Patrol Division, said the bills call for citations to be issued to violators who are juveniles, although the state Judiciary does not have a system in place in Family Court to process criminal citations issued to juveniles.
"So the only recourse would be an arrest," he said.
Meanwhile, the founder of the nonprofit Association of Skateboarders in Hawaii testified that a helmet requirement would only push skateboarders toward more dangerous activities.
Chuck Mitsui, also the owner of Kailua skateboard shop 808 Skate, said he is not against the use of helmets by skateboarders. But he said requiring youths to wear helmets will deter them from riding at skate parks and encourage them to go where it is illegal — and likely more dangerous.
The city’s skate parks system "keeps them out of trouble (and) gives them a safe place to go if their home lives aren’t good," said Mitsui, who served as a consultant to city officials who developed the skate parks.
Julia Price, whose son sustained a traumatic brain injury in a skateboard accident, said she agreed with Mitsui.
"I am certainly a proponent of safety and I would love to see all kids and adults who are skateboarding wear the proper type of helmet," Price said. But there are better ways to increase skateboard safety for youths than to have them "running away from their skate parks because the police are showing up."
Paula Kurashige testified in favor of the bills. Her grandson, Kameron Steinhoff, died after he crashed while riding down a hill in Kaneohe in May 2011, as did nephew Mark Kurashige after crashing in Kona about five years ago.
Legislation should be enacted now "before we have a lot more kids that are damaged," she said.
Kari Benes, the state Health Department’s injury prevention coordinator, said there have been 20 skateboard-related fatalities statewide in the past 22 years, all of which occurred on streets, parking lots or thoroughfares and not skateboard parks.
From 2006 through 2012, there was an average of 819 skateboarding injuries in Hawaii that were treated in emergency rooms or that required hospitalization per year, said written testimony by the state Health Department.
After Tuesday’s Parks Committee meeting, stakeholders on both sides of the issue agreed to work together to make the sport safer.
Cora Speck, coordinator of injury prevention and research at the Queen’s Medical Center, spoke to Mitsui about setting up a booth to give away helmets at an upcoming series of ASH events.
Queen’s has handed out thousands of helmets for skateboarders and bicyclists over the past four years to people who can’t afford to buy them, Speck said. The helmets are free to youths and offered to adults for a small donation.
"We are available to give helmets to anyone in need," Speck said. For information, call 691-7089.
Also on Tuesday, the Council Public Safety Committee advanced bills to ban smoking at city-operated parks, beaches and bus stops.
City Transportation Services Director Michael Formby said if the bill passes, the city would put up no-smoking signs at each of an estimated 4,000 city bus stops at a cost of about $100,000.
Formby said the administration does not believe the signs need to be up for a smoking ban to be enforced.
Those bills now go to the full Council for final votes.
