Hawaii County’s Water Board is in unanimous opposition to a move by the National Park Service asking the state Commission on Water Resource Management to give the area served by the Keauhou aquifer a state water management area designation.
Water Board members spent more than three hours in executive session Thursday working out the details to the argument that they and the county Department of Water Supply should remain the stewards of the water resources on the island.
The designation would require state permission for projects to draw water from an area including the Kaloko-Honokohau National Historical Park and all of West Hawaii from Makalawena to Kealakekua.
The Park Service asked for the designation because it sees a trend of declining recharge to and increasing withdrawals from the aquifer. Updated data has been hard to come by for both sides, and is generally refuted by the opposing party.
The county Water Department and the Planning Department are scheduled to make presentations at a commission meeting Wednesday in Honolulu. While public testimony will not be allowed at that meeting, it will be allowed at a Dec. 10 meeting in Kailua-Kona when the commission will decide whether to pursue the designation process. After the December meeting, the commission is required to make a final decision within 90 days.
If the board moves ahead with the designation process, an additional public hearing will be held in Keauhou sometime in early 2015. There will be yet another opportunity for testimony when the commission makes its final decision.
County water officials worry the designation would require the county not only to apply for new water permits, but also to reapply for the existing permits, a move that could leave existing users fighting for their previously permitted share. In addition, the growing West Hawaii region is currently planning a new community college, a new judiciary complex, a new park and other projects that would need to tap into the aquifer.
The Water Board had voted unanimously in March to draft a letter in opposition to the designation. The board hopes to complete the letter and vote on it at its Nov. 25 regular meeting in Kona.
Board member David Greenwell, who represents a district including Kohala and Waimea, said Thursday that stance hasn’t changed.
“The department is not there to abuse the land and to rape it,” Greenwell said. “The department is there for the future; they’ve got a lifetime of caring for it.”