Hawaii lawmakers are proposing to shift the state’s invasive species response to the state Department of Agriculture.
Roughly a dozen invasive species-related measures have been introduced during the 2025 legislative session, with impacts ranging from new import restrictions on various items, to a restructuring of the state’s biosecurity response agencies.
The most extensive of the bills is Senate Bill 1100, which would rename the state Department of Agriculture the “Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity” and authorize it to impose restrictions and penalties for imported flora and fauna.
Those restrictions have been fleshed out — the bill lays out a series of requirements and processes by which biosecurity inspectors would operate — and the penalties enhanced. Current law sets the financial penalties for violating biosecurity transport restrictions from $50 to $15,000; SB 1100 increases that to a range between $100 and $25,000.
The new DOAB also would establish a biosecurity emergency response program that could rapidly intervene in the event of an invasive outbreak event — such as an invasive species on one island breaking quarantine and arriving on another — as well as a volunteer emergency biosecurity response unit.
An unspecified amount of funds would be appropriated for DOAB if SB 1100 passes.
One of the bill’s co-introducers, Sen. Tim Richards of North Kohala and Waimea, said it makes sense for the DOA to take up responsibility for biosecurity control, instead of the Department of Land and Natural Resources, which currently manages it.
“Overall, if we want to have successful agriculture here, we need better biosecurity,” Richards said. He added that the bill is modeled after the biosecurity policies of New Zealand, which he said have impressed a sense of collective responsibility into the New Zealand public: “People there view it as ‘our job too’ to not spread invasives.”
Richards was ambivalent about the bill, acknowledging that it might not be perfect as written, but he added that leaving the system as it currently is is not the answer either.
He added that recent conversations with the DOA — in particular, a meeting with DOA Director Sharon Hurd earlier this month where lawmakers were critical of the department’s ability to effectively disburse invasive species funds — have left him concerned about placing more responsibility upon the department, but he said further discussion among his colleagues throughout the legislative session will help hone the bill into its most effective form.
Franny Brewer, manager of the Big Island Invasive Species Committee, said she does not support the proposal.
“I’m not sure why they’d want to do this, (the Hawaii Invasive Species Council) is very functional where it is now, (under the DLNR),” Brewer said.
Brewer said BIISC has received amplesupport from the DLNR over the years, and added that its Division of Forestry and Wildlife already constantly engages with invasive plants — which, she said, are the bulk of BIISC’s targeted invasive species.
Brewer said she also is unsure of the DOA’s ability to step up its biosecurity programs following the meeting with Hurd earlier this month. She said the department is “in transition, but isn’t there yet.”
Instead, Brewer said BIISC is watching other bills with great interest, including House Bill 299, which would nearly double the amount of funds available to the Hawaii Invasive Species Council, which could, by extension, improve funding to BIISC and other invasive species programs.
“I tell you, I have to sit through these meetings every year, and watch people talk to lawmakers about all these invasive species projects, and it’s heartbreaking to watch so many of these great projects not get funding or get so little funding they can’t do it,” Brewer said.
Other bills Brewer highlighted included measures targeting the Coconut Rhinoceros Beetle. One of those, Senate Bill 746, would set bounties on the invasive beetle and its larvae, allowing people to receive compensation for collecting and submitting them to the DLNR.
Other measures of note include one providing funds to the Big Island-based Hawaii Ant Lab, which Brewer said provides nearly all of BIISC’s data about little fire ants, and bills establishing a spay and neuter special fund to help control stray cat overpopulation.
Email Michael Brestovansky at mbrestovansky@hawaiitribune-herald.com.