Honolulu, Hawaii Opens First Ocean Safety Facility Built for Lifeguards in Kailua

The City and County of Honolulu held a blessing and dedication ceremony on Wednesday for the Kailua Operations Annex, the first facility designed and built for the Honolulu Ocean Safety Department. Hawaii News Now reported the annex is now operational. The 1,680-square-foot building sits at 592 Kaneapu Place in Kailua, near Kailua Beach Park, and gives ocean lifeguards a permanent base on the Windward side of Oahu for the first time in the department's 107-year history.

A permanent base for Windward lifeguards

The annex will support lifeguard operations along the Windward coast. When the city broke ground on the project in May 2024, officials described the site as a hub for Windward operations, covering the coast between the Mokapu Peninsula and Waimanalo Bay. The parcel sits along the Lanikai hillside, overlooking Kailua Bay and Kailua Beach Park.

The single-story building holds two offices, a bathroom and a kitchenette. A board storage room holds rescue boards, and two roll-up garages store the trucks and rescue skis crews use on the water. The city put the total cost of the Windward facility at $2.5 million when the project was announced. Bowers and Kubota Consulting and CC Engineering and Construction held the project contracts.

A project years in the making

Ocean Safety crews have watched Oahu beaches for more than a century without a building designed for the work. City leaders said at the 2024 groundbreaking that the new base station was a commitment to the team that watches over beachgoers. The project did not run on its first schedule. A redesign of the retaining wall at the hillside site pushed the expected completion date to July 2026, the city's construction department said. The annex opened this week, a few months after that revised date.

The opening gives Windward lifeguards a fixed home for equipment, vehicles and daily operations instead of working from temporary arrangements near the beach park. Crews based at the annex cover some of the busiest swimming and paddling water on the island, where Kailua Beach Park draws residents and visitors through the year.

The annex also lands two years after Ocean Safety became a department of its own. Mayor Rick Blangiardi signed Resolution 24-103 on May 29, 2024, creating a standalone Ocean Safety Department. At that signing the city counted 271 water safety officers, eight rescue ski teams and 42 lifeguard towers watching 227 miles of Oahu coastline. The Kailua base is the first building finished for the department since that change, and city leaders have said more first responder facilities are planned for other parts of the island.