emiller@westhawaiitoday.com
BY ERIN MILLER | WEST HAWAII TODAY
A bill that would require a permit to harvest sandalwood and any other native tree species deemed by the Department of Land and Natural Resources to be “of concern,” cleared the Senate Ways and Means Committee Tuesday morning.
Sen. Gilbert Kahele, in a voice message left with West Hawaii Today, said legislators passed the measure with the intention of making additional amendments, including addressing cultural rights relating to the use of the trees.
“The language needs to be tightened up more and looked at,” Kahele said.
He was unavailable for additional comment, including addressing concerns that requiring permits to remove sandalwood and other trees would constitute a legal taking of property.
Department of Agricultural Chairman Russell Kokubun said Tuesday afternoon he generally supported the idea of regulating the sale of sandalwood, but he also understood where tree growers’ concerns came from, particularly people who were planting koa, for example, specifically for commercial harvest. He said he did not intend to provide testimony on the measure, but that he expected tree growers already to have voiced those questions to legislators.
DLNR Chairman William Aila, in his testimony to the Water, Land and Housing and Judiciary and Labor committees earlier this month, talked about the need for regulation of sandalwood growing on private land.
“Rather than deal with regulating commercial exploitation on a case-by-case basis, the department recommends the expansion of this measure to apply to native forest resources in general that may at some point be subject to a similar decline as (sandalwood),” Aila said. “The department feels that the regulation of the commercial harvest of sandalwood is the appropriate level of regulation at this time.”
Most of the written testimony submitted prior to the Senate Ways and Means Committee hearing about Senate Bill 3028 was in opposition to the measure.
“If this legislation passes, they’ll allow you to grub and grade — as long as you leave them on the ground,” South Kona resident Larry Rose said. “They want to stop the sale of trees.”
Rose said he contacted the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Forestry and Wildlife officials, who said they were concerned about the decline in sandalwood tree numbers. Rose said the officials told him they could not afford to do a study or survey of sandalwood growth, but that “200 years of talk story” affirmed the population decrease.
“When was the last time, ‘everybody says something’ was scientific evidence,” Rose said he asked.
If the bill becomes law, he added, the end result could be considered a taking of property, particularly when land owners plant trees to harvest.
Much of Hawaii’s forestry industry agreed.
“By regulating the landowner management of sandalwood on one’s own land, the bill will actually create strong disincentives to plant or nurture sandalwood,” Hawaii Forest Industry Association Legislative Chair Lloyd Jones wrote. “Landowners will look to other species. This bill was created with sandalwood in mind, but the implications for people who manage a variety of species are unacceptable.”
Brandi Beaudet, Parker Ranch’s land manager, asked the committee to defer the bill.
“I am very concerned that SB 3028, if enacted, could be used to introduce a prohibitive permit system for koa wood,” Beaudet wrote. “This would endanger the jobs of local craftsmen, manufacturers and retailers in every facet of the koa industry. We estimate the koa industry employs over 1,000 people throughout Hawaii and generates millions of dollars in tax revenues for the state.”
But several biologists disagreed.
“The testimony opposing this bill in the previous committee hearing are self-serving and full of shibai, and those of their carpetbagging cohorts are just as shameless,” conservation biologist Rick Warshauer wrote. “Please do not be mislead. Clearly, our beleaguered sandalwoods, like so many other things distinctly Hawaiian, need the modest protections that this bill begins to describe.”
emiller@westhawaiitoday.com