Kapalua Resort, the Hawaii course where the PGA Tour has started every year since 1999, is shutting down for two months as it tries to save its water-starved courses during a dispute over the handling of a century-old water system on Maui.
The 60-day closure, which starts Sept. 2 for the Plantation and Bay courses at Kapalua, has raised concerns it might not be able to host The Sentry to start the tour's 2026 season.
“The golf course has been damaged with no water for months,” Alex Nakajima, the general manager of Kapalua Golf and Tennis, said Tuesday. “I proposed to the owner that we need to shut the golf course to increase our chances to save the golf course and the tournament.”
He feels the best hope is to use what little water Kapalua gets for a slow-releasing fertilizer and to keep customers off the course while the staff removes dead grass.
Kapalua, known for the contrast of lush green fairways and the Pacific blue horizon, is more a blend of yellow and brown these days as the grass dies. Nakajima said the course has not had water since July 25.
Tadashi Yanai, the Japanese billionaire who owns Kapalua and who founded the apparel brand Uniqlo, Kapalua homeowners and Hua Momona Farms filed a lawsuit last week against Maui Land & Pineapple, alleging it has not maintained the water delivery system.
At the center of the dispute is the 11-mile Honokohau Stream and Ditch System that runs from the West Maui mountains and supplies irrigation water to the Kapalua area.
“MLP has knowingly ... allowed the Ditch System to fall into a state of demonstrable disrepair. That disrepair, not any act of God, or force of nature, or other thing, is why users who need it are currently without water,” the lawsuit says.
Maui Land & Pineapple said it has made “certain repairs and improvements to the ditch system” as directed by the Commission on Water Resource Management and that all its actions are “consistent with the agreements between MLP and the golf courses.”
It said the problem was low flows, not inefficiency in the system.
“During this time of record low stream levels, it is in the best interest of the community that all parties remain focused on facts and solutions,” CEP Race Randle said in a statement to The Associated Press. “Collaboration, not litigation, is the best path forward to addressing West Maui’s water needs.”
The lawsuit claims Yanai entered into “water delivery agreements” when he bought the Kapalua properties that would allow the courses to be kept in good condition. The filing says these agreements stipulated Maui Land “will at all times exercise commercially reasonable efforts to manage, repair and maintain” the ditch system for a reliable delivery of irrigation water.
The PGA Tour said only that it was monitoring “the ongoing water conservation requirements affecting Kapalua Resort.”
The tour said it has been in touch with the title sponsor, Wisconsin-based Sentry Insurance, along with Kapalua Resort, Maui County and Hawaii's state government to assess any potential impact in staging the $20 million signature event. The tournament is scheduled for Jan. 8-11.
TY Management — Yanai's company — said The Sentry brings in some $50 million in economic benefits, plus the tour and Sentry's charitable component.
The lawsuit, filed in state court on Maui, asks that Maui Land & Pineapple honor agreements and take reasonable steps to repair and maintain the ditch system so that water can be reliably delivered.
The lawsuit claims the current drought has no bearing on the problem and cites U.S. Geological Survey data showing the watershed in the West Maui mountains gets more annual rainfall than Portland and Seattle.
“Water is scarce not because rain is falling in significantly smaller quantities. Rather, water is scarce because MLP has failed to honor its promises to maintain the infrastructure used to collect, carry, and store it properly," the suit claims.
Meanwhile, Troon-managed Kapalua Resort had been offering discounts to customers because of the deteriorating conditions of its golf courses.
Nakajima said the course will have to be closed to have any hope of staging The Sentry.
“We have to do this immediately," he said. "Every day the golf course is dying."
Associated Press writer Jennifer Sinco Kelleher in Honolulu contributed to this report.
AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
FILE - A Kapalua Ridge Villas sign is viewed on Oct. 3, 2023, in Lahaina, Hawaii. (AP Photo/Mengshin Lin, File)
FILE - Hideki Matsuyama, of Japan, hits on the 13th hole during the final round of The Sentry golf event, Jan. 5, 2025, at Kapalua Plantation Course in Kapalua, Hawaii. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A South Korean court sentenced former President Yoon Suk Yeol to five years in prison Friday in the first verdict from eight criminal trials over the martial law debacle that forced him out of office and other allegations.
Yoon was impeached, arrested and dismissed as president after his short-lived imposition of martial law in December 2024 triggered huge public protests calling for his ouster.
The most significant criminal charge against him alleges that his martial law enforcement amounted to a rebellion, and the independent counsel has requested the death sentence in the case that is to be decided in a ruling next month.
Yoon has maintained he didn’t intend to place the country under military rule for an extended period, saying his decree was only meant to inform the people about the danger of the liberal-controlled parliament obstructing his agenda. But investigators have viewed Yoon’s decree as an attempt to bolster and prolong his rule, charging him with rebellion, abuse of power and other criminal offenses.
In Friday’s case, the Seoul Central District Court sentenced Yoon for defying attempts to detain him, fabricating the martial law proclamation, and sidestepping a legally mandated full Cabinet meeting and thus depriving some Cabinet members who were not convened of their due rights to deliberate on his decree.
Judge Baek Dae-hyun said in the televised ruling that imposing “a grave punishment” was necessary because Yoon hasn’t shown remorse and has only repeated “hard-to-comprehend excuses.” The judge also restoring legal systems damaged by Yoon’s action was necessary.
Yoon’s defense team said they will appeal the ruling, which they believe was “politicized” and reflected “the unliberal arguments by the independent counsel.” Yoon’s defense team argued the ruling “oversimplified the boundary between the exercise of the president’s constitutional powers and criminal liability.”
Prison sentences in the multiple, smaller trials Yoon faces would matter if he is spared the death penalty or life imprisonment at the rebellion trial.
Park SungBae, a lawyer who specializes in criminal law, said there is little chance the court would decide Yoon should face the death penalty in the rebellion case. He said the court will likely issue a life sentence or a sentence of 30 years or more in prison.
South Korea has maintained a de facto moratorium on executions since 1997 and courts rarely hand down death sentences. Park said the court would take into account that Yoon’s decree didn’t cause casualties and didn’t last long, although Yoon hasn’t shown genuine remorse for his action.
South Korea has a history of pardoning former presidents who were jailed over diverse crimes in the name of promoting national unity. Those pardoned include strongman Chun Doo-hwan, who received the death penalty at a district court over his 1979 coup, the bloody 1980 crackdowns of pro-democracy protests that killed about 200 people, and other crimes.
Some observers say Yoon will likely retain a defiant attitude in the ongoing trials to maintain his support base in the belief that he cannot avoid a lengthy sentence but could be pardoned in the future.
On the night of Dec. 3, 2024, Yoon abruptly declared martial law in a televised speech, saying he would eliminate “anti-state forces” and protect “the constitutional democratic order.” Yoon sent troops and police officers to encircle the National Assembly, but many apparently didn’t aggressively cordon off the area, allowing enough lawmakers to get into an assembly hall to vote down Yoon’s decree.
No major violence occurred, but Yoon's stunt caused the biggest political crisis in South Korea and rattled its diplomacy and financial markets. For many, his decree, the first of its kind in more than four decades in South Korea, brought back harrowing memories of past dictatorships in the 1970s and 1980s, when military-backed leaders used martial law and emergency measures to deploy soldiers and tanks on the streets to suppress demonstrations.
After Yoon's ouster, his liberal rival Lee Jae Myung became president via a snap election last June. After taking office, Lee appointed three independent counsels to look into allegations involving Yoon, his wife and associates.
Yoon's other trials deal with charges like ordering drone flights over North Korea to deliberately inflame animosities to look for a pretext to declare martial law. Other charges accuse Yoon of manipulating the investigation into a marine’s drowning in 2023 and receiving free opinion surveys from an election broker in return for a political favor.
A supporter of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol shouts slogans outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold signs and flags outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A supporter of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol waits for a bus carrying former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold signs as police officers stand guard outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold signs and flags outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold signs outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
A picture of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol is placed on a board as supporters gather outside Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)
