Special Local Regulation; Kailua Bay, Ironman World Championship, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY <SUBAGY>Coast Guard</SUBAGY> <CFR>33 CFR Part 100</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket Number USCG-2024-0771]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1625-AA08</RIN> <SUBJECT>Special Local Regulation; Kailua Bay, Ironman World Championship, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Coast Guard, DHS. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Temporary final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Coast Guard is establishing a temporary special local regulation for certain waters of Kailua Bay, Hawaii, from Kailua Pier to about 3 miles southeast in Kahului Bay. This action is necessary to protect persons on these navigable waters located at Kailua-Kona, HI, during the swim portion of the Ironman World Championship Triathlon and practice swim held on October 20 and 26, 2024. Entry of persons and vessels into the regulated area is prohibited unless specifically authorized by the Sector Honolulu Captain of the Port. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This rule is effective from 3:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., on October 20 and 26, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> To view documents mentioned in this preamble as being available in the docket, go to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> type USCG-2024-0771 in the search box and click “Search.” Next, in the Document Type column, select “Supporting & Related Material.” <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> If you have questions about this rule, call or email Petty Officer Vivian S. Gonzalez, Waterways Management Division, U.S. Coast Guard Sector Honolulu; telephone (808) 522-8264, email <E T="03">Vivian.S.Gonzalez@uscg.mil.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Table of Abbreviations</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">CFR Code of Federal Regulations</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">COTP Captain of the Port</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">DHS Department of Homeland Security</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">FR Federal Register</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">NPRM Notice of proposed rulemaking</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">§ Section </FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">SLR Special Local Regulation</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">U.S.C. United States Code</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Background Information and Regulatory History</HD> The Coast Guard is issuing this temporary rule under authority in 5 U.S.C. 553(b)(B). This statutory provision authorizes an agency to issue a rule without prior notice and opportunity to comment when the agency for good cause finds that those procedures are “impracticable, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest.” This annually reoccurring event has a permanent special local regulation, 33 CFR 100.1402, with enforcement dates on the first two weekends in October. This year, however, the event is occurring on October 20 and 26, 2024 due to conflicts of schedules. The Coast Guard finds that good cause exists for not publishing a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) with respect to this rule because prompt action is necessary to respond to the potential safety hazards associated with the swim event. It is impracticable to publish an NPRM because we must establish this special local regulation by October 20, 2024. <HD SOURCE="HD1">III. Legal Authority and Need for Rule</HD> The Coast Guard is issuing this rule under authority in 46 U.S.C. 70041. The Captain of the Port Sector Honolulu (COTP) has determined that potential safety hazards exist necessitating the movement restriction of all vessels and persons, including event participants, in the regulated area. The purpose of this rule is to ensure safety of persons and navigable waters in the regulated area before, during, and after the events. <HD SOURCE="HD1">IV. Discussion of the Rule</HD> This rule establishes a special local regulation from 3:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., on October 20 and 26, 2024. The regulated area will cover all navigable waters of Kailua Bay within 100 yards adjacent to the 2.4 mile (4,224 yards) swim course, starting at the shoreline northeast of Kailua Pier at 19°38.341′ N, 155°59.782′ W; thence southeast to 19°37.416′ N, 155°59.444′ W; thence southwest to 19°37.397′ N, 155°59.500′ W; thence northwest to 19°38.150′ N, 155°59.760′ W, thence north and back to Kailua Pier at 19°38.398′ N, 155°59.816′ W, and returning along the pier to the originating point on the shoreline at 19°38.341′ N, 155°59.782′ W. The duration of the rule and size of the regulated area is intended to protect personnel, vessels, and the marine environment in these navigable waters before, during, and after the event scheduled from 3:45 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on October 20 and 26, 2024. The COTP and Coast Guard Patrol Commander (PATCOM) will have authority to forbid and control the movement of all vessels and persons, including event participants, in the regulated area. When hailed or signaled by an official patrol, a vessel or person in the regulated area will be required to immediately comply with the lawful directions given by the COTP or PATCOM. If a person or vessel fails to follow such directions, the Coast Guard may expel them from the area, issue them a citation for failure to comply, or both. Except for event participants and vessels already identified as part of the event safety or security, a vessel or person will be required to get permission from the COTP or PATCOM before entering the regulated area while the rule is enforced. Vessel operators can request permission to enter and transit through the regulated area by contacting the PATCOM on VHF-FM channel 16. Vessel traffic will be able to safely transit the regulated area once the PATCOM deems it safe to do so. A person or vessel not registered with the event sponsor as a participant or assigned as official patrols will be considered a spectator. Official Patrols are any vessel assigned or approved by the Commander, Coast Guard Sector Honolulu, with a commissioned, warrant, or petty officer on board. If permission is granted by the COTP or PATCOM, a person or vessel will be allowed to enter the regulated area or pass directly through the regulated area as instructed. Vessels will be required to operate at a safe speed while within the regulated area. Official patrol vessels will assist with the safety of the event and ensure spectator vessels remain outside the regulated area. The designated swim area will remain closed until the scheduled swim events have concluded and the regulated area is deemed safe for normal operations. <HD SOURCE="HD1">V. Regulatory Analyses</HD> We developed this rule after considering numerous statutes and Executive orders related to rulemaking. Below we summarize our analyses based on a number of these statutes and Executive orders, and we discuss First Amendment rights of protestors. <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Regulatory Planning and Review</HD> Executive Orders 12866 and 13563 direct agencies to assess the costs and benefits of available regulatory alternatives and, if regulation is necessary, to select regulatory approaches that maximize net benefits. This rule has not been designated a “significant regulatory action,” under section 3(f) of Executive Order 12866, as amended by Executive Order 14094 (Modernizing Regulatory Review). Accordingly, this rule has not been reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). This regulatory action determination is based on size, location, duration, and time-of-day of the rule. Vessel traffic will be able to safely transit around the regulated area which will impact a small, designated area of the Kailua-Kona Bay for less than 10 hours during two weekends when vessel traffic is normally low. Moreover, the Coast Guard will issue a Broadcast Notice to Mariners via VHF-FM marine channel 16 about the regulated area, and the rule will allow vessels to seek permission to enter the regulated area, as well as a Local Notice to Mariners to prepare all waterways users. <HD SOURCE="HD2">B. Impact on Small Entities</HD> The Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980, 5 U.S.C. 601-612, as amended, requires Federal agencies to consider the potential impact of regulations on small entities during rulemaking. The term “small entities” comprises small businesses, not-for-profit organizations that are independently owned and operated and are not dominant in their fields, and governmental jurisdictions with populations of less than 50,000. The Coast Guard certifies under 5 U.S.C. 605(b) that this rule will not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities. While some owners or operators of vessels intending to transit the regulated area may be small entities, for the reasons stated in section V.A above, this rule will not have a significant economic impact on any vessel owner or operator. Under section 213(a) of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996 (Pub. L. 104-121), we want to assist small entities in understanding this rule. If the rule will affect your small business, organization, or governmental jurisdiction and you have questions concerning its provisions or options for compliance, please call or email the person listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. Small businesses may send comments on the actions of Federal employees who enforce, or otherwise determine compliance with, Federal regulations to the Small Business and Agriculture Regulatory Enforcement Ombudsman and the Regional Small Business Regulatory Fairness Boards. The Ombudsman evaluates these actions annually and rates each agency's responsiveness to small business. If you wish to comment on actions by employees of the Coast Guard, call 1-888-REG-FAIR (1-888-734-3247). The Coast Guard will not retaliate against small entities that question or complain about this rule or any policy or action of the Coast Guard. <HD SOURCE="HD2">C. Collection of Information</HD> This rule w ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 19k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━