OPPOSE SB1074 + SB22: Uphold Environmental Review Laws
/February 10 update
SB1074, similar to HB661, would allow a vast range of illegally authorized activities to continue, potentially indefinitely, without a consideration of their environmental, cultural, and social impacts to our islands and our present and future generations. This measure is scheduled to be heard in the Senate Committees on Water and Land and Agriculture and Environment on Wednesday, February 12 at 1:05pm in room 229 (watch online here).
Please take a moment to submit testimony in OPPOSITION to SB1074, in order to uphold Hawaiʻi’s critical environmental review process. Sample testimony and instructions below.
Sample testimony for SB1074
Aloha Chairs Inouye and Gabbard, Vice Chairs Elefante and Richards, and members of the Water and Land and Agriculture and Environment Committees,
My name is [Your name] and I strongly oppose SB1074, which would allow a vast range of illegally authorized activities to continue, potentially indefinitely, without a required consideration of their environmental, cultural, and social impacts to our islands and our present and future generations.
Our environmental review law allows decisionmakers and the public to make more fully-informed decisions that can balance and mitigate potential long-term impacts to the public interest from certain proposed activities, before those activities and their impacts are allowed to proceed. This ensures prudent planning while reducing conflict, minimizing adverse outcomes, and safeguarding the health and well-being of present and future generations.
Unfortunately, the failure of certain departments to comply with this law before authorizing certain actions - such as permitting the take of an unlimited number of of ecologically critical marine specimens for the aquarium trade, or the decades-long dewatering of streams in East Maui - has resulted in severe and in some cases irreparable ecological, cultural, social, and economic harms that could and should have been avoided through the prudent planning embodied in our environmental review law.
By allowing illegally authorized activities to continue while environmental review challenges are resolved - something that has taken literal decades in the dewatering of East Maui’s streams - this bill would turn our environmental review process into an afterthought, legitimizing unlawful and irresponsible agency practices that have inflicted and that will continue to inflict tremendous generational harms and injustices upon our islands and communities.
I urge you to HOLD SB1074.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
SB22, similar to HB123, would allow the Department of Land and Natural Resources to evade any assessment of the environmental impacts of its fishery management decisions - including decisions that may open up our ocean resources to unmitigated commercial exploitation. This measure is also scheduled to be heard in the Senate Committees on Water and Land and Agriculture and Environment on Wednesday, February 12 at 1:05pm in room 229 (watch online here).
Please take a moment to submit testimony in OPPOSITION to SB22 to protect Hawaiʻi’s fisheries and by extension, the ocean environment that is a foundation of our way of life. Sample testimony and instructions below.
Sample testimony for SB22
Aloha Chairs Inouye and Gabbard, Vice Chairs Elefante and Richards, and members of the Water and Land and Agriculture and Environment Committees,
My name is [Your name] and I strongly oppose SB22, which would allow the Department of Land and Natural Resources to evade any assessment of the environmental impacts of its fishery management decisions - including decisions that may open up our ocean resources to unmitigated commercial exploitation.
Our environmental review law allows decisionmakers and the public to make more fully-informed decisions that can balance and mitigate potential long-term impacts to the public interest from certain proposed activities, before those activities and their impacts are allowed to proceed. This ensures prudent planning while reducing conflict, minimizing adverse outcomes, and safeguarding the health and well-being of present and future generations.
Unfortunately, the Department of Land and Natural Resources has a long and notorious history of turning a blind eye to its critical statutory and public trust responsibilities, such as by authorizing a fishery program that permits the take of an unlimited amount of marine life for aquarium purposes, without any environmental review. This measure would not only legitimize this longstanding practice that has been affirmed as illegal by the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court, but excuse the department from its environmental review responsibilities for similar fisheries-related actions with potentially deleterious ecological, cultural, recreational, climate resilience, and economic impacts.
This bill would turn our environmental review process into an afterthought, legitimizing illegal agency practices that have inflicted and that will continue to inflict potentially irreparable harms to our marine life and the vast public interest in our ocean environment.
I urge you to HOLD SB22.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
Testimony instructions
Register for a capitol website account if you haven’t yet (youʻll need to confirm your registration by responding to an automated email)
Sign in to capitol.hawaii.gov with your registration information and click the "Submit Testimony" button.
Enter "SB1074/SB22" where it says "Enter Bill or Measure."
Input your information and your written testimony, select your testimony option(s)—in-person + written, remotely + written, written only. Please consider providing verbal testimony (in-person or remotely) if you are able!
*Note: Virtual testimony option may be disabled 24 hours before the hearing.If you are testifying via Zoom, be sure to review these instructions (page 4)
HB661, HB123, and HB658 Bill Background
Our environmental review laws help to safeguard our native ecosystems, cultural sites, public health, economy, and quality of life from unintended and avoidable impacts, by ensuring that government decisionmakers consider impacts to these and other vital public interests in actions involving state or county lands or funds (among other specified circumstances), as well as ways these impacts might be mitigated. These reviews enable informed decisions that balance and mitigate long-term impacts on our environment, culture, and society - saving the state from immeasurable social, ecological, economic, and other impacts.
Three measures, HB661, HB123, and HB658, would seek to end-run recent Hawai‘i court rulings on the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ failure to abide by our environmental review laws, and in the process, open the door to the continued rubber-stamping of commercial and other activities, without considering their environmental impacts. These bills all have hearings on Tuesday, February 11, with HB661 and HB123 scheduled for 9:15am before the Energy & Environmental Protection and Water and Land Committees in room 325 (viewable online here) and HB658 scheduled for 10:15am before the Energy & Environmental Protection Committee in room 325 (viewable online here). Please take a moment to OPPOSE these measures - sample testimony below.
Sample testimony for HB661 (see below for testimony submission instructions):
Aloha Chair Lowen, Chair Chair Hashem, Vice Chair Perruso, Vice Chair Lamosao, and Members of the Committees,
My name is [Your name] and I strongly oppose HB661, which would allow a vast range of illegally authorized activities to continue, potentially indefinitely, without a required consideration of their environmental, cultural, and social impacts to our islands and our present and future generations.
Our environmental review law allows decisionmakers and the public to make more fully-informed decisions that can balance and mitigate potential long-term impacts to the public interest from certain proposed activities, before those activities and their impacts are allowed to proceed. This ensures prudent planning while reducing conflict, minimizing adverse outcomes, and safeguarding the health and well-being of present and future generations.
Unfortunately, the failure of certain departments to comply with this law before authorizing certain actions - such as in the take of an unlimited number of of ecologically critical marine specimens for the aquarium trade, or the decades-long dewatering of streams in East Maui - has resulted in severe and in some cases irreparable ecological, cultural, social, and economic harms that could and should have been avoided through the prudent planning embodied in our environmental review law.
By allowing illegally authorized activities to continue while environmental review challenges are resolved - something that has taken literal decades in the dewatering of East Maui’s streams - this bill would turn our environmental review process into an afterthought, legitimizing unlawful and irresponsible agency practices that have inflicted and that will continue to inflict tremendous generational harms and injustices upon our islands and communities.
I urge you to HOLD HB661.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
Sample testimony for HB123 (see below for testimony submission instructions):
Aloha Chair Lowen, Chair Hashem, Vice Chair Perruso, Vice Chair Lamosao, and Members of the Committees,
My name is [Your name] and I strongly oppose HB123, which would allow the Department of Land and Natural Resources to evade any assessment of the environmental impacts of its fishery management decisions - including decisions that may open up our ocean resources to unmitigated commercial exploitation.
Our environmental review law allows decisionmakers and the public to make more fully-informed decisions that can balance and mitigate potential long-term impacts to the public interest from certain proposed activities, before those activities and their impacts are allowed to proceed. This ensures prudent planning while reducing conflict, minimizing adverse outcomes, and safeguarding the health and well-being of present and future generations.
Unfortunately, the Department of Land and Natural Resources has a long and notorious history of turning a blind eye to its critical statutory and public trust responsibilities, such as by authorizing a fishery program that permits the take of an unlimited amount of marine life for aquarium purposes, without any environmental review. This measure would not only legitimize this longstanding practice that has been affirmed as illegal by the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court, but excuse the department from its environmental review responsibilities for similar fisheries-related actions with potentially deleterious ecological, cultural, recreational, climate resilience, and economic impacts.
This bill would turn our environmental review process into an afterthought, legitimizing illegal agency practices that have inflicted and that will continue to inflict potentially irreparable harms to our marine life and the vast public interest in our ocean environment.
I urge you to HOLD HB123.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
Sample testimony for HB658 (see below for testimony submission instructions):
Aloha Chair Lowen, Vice Chair Perruso, and Members of the Energy & Environmental Protection Committee,
My name is [Your name] and I strongly oppose HB658, which would allow the Department of Land and Natural Resources to evade any assessment of the environmental impacts of its ocean use and management decisions.
Our environmental review law allows decisionmakers and the public to make more fully-informed decisions that can balance and mitigate potential long-term impacts to the public interest from certain proposed activities, before those activities and their impacts are allowed to proceed. This ensures prudent planning while reducing conflict, minimizing adverse outcomes, and safeguarding the health and well-being of present and future generations.
Unfortunately, the Department of Land and Natural Resources has a long and notorious history of turning a blind eye to its critical statutory and public trust responsibilities, such as by operating a commercial boating permitting regime without any environmental review and without due regard for the environmental, cultural, recreational, and broader economic concerns of the public. This measure would not only legitimize this longstanding practice that has been affirmed as illegal by our court system, but also excuse the department from its environmental review responsibilities for similar ocean use authorizations with potentially deleterious ecological, cultural, recreational, climate resilience, and economic impacts.
This bill would turn our environmental review process into an afterthought, legitimizing illegal agency practices that have inflicted and that will continue to inflict potentially irreparable harms to the vast and varied public interests in our ocean environment.
I urge you to HOLD HB658.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
Testimony instructions
Register for a capitol website account if you haven’t yet (youʻll need to confirm your registration by responding to an automated email)
Sign in to capitol.hawaii.gov with your registration information and click the "Submit Testimony" button.
Enter "HB661/HB123/HB658" where it says "Enter Bill or Measure."
Input your information and your written testimony, select your testimony option(s)—in-person + written, remotely + written, written only. Please consider providing verbal testimony (in-person or remotely) if you are able!
*Note: Virtual testimony option may be disabled 24 hours before the hearing.If you are testifying via Zoom, be sure to review these instructions (page 4)