Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 22, Number 3, 1 March 2005 — Protecting Hawaiian water rights [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Protecting Hawaiian water rights

Aloha kākou! With the legislative session in full swing, the Beneficiary Advocacy and Empowerment Committee has reviewed and taken position on over three hundred bills that affect Hawaiians. Recently, trustees discussed Senate Bill 503 titled "Relating to Water Resources." The bill seeks to amend the Constitution of the State of Hawai'i by "transferring responsibility for protecting, conserving, establishing use priorities for, and regulating the water resources" from the state Water Commission to the individual eounties. The rationale behind the bill is the idea that eliminating duplicate water services would provide a more streamlined, cost effective government. The state's water code took more than eight years to establish and was finally enacted in 1987. Many hours were spent in community meetings throughout the state to assure the code

addressed concerns of stakeholders at every level. Section five of chapter 174C states that administration of the code rests with the commission on water resource management. It's difficult to imagine that a single legislative measure could jeopardize all the thoughtful work that developed into the final draft of the code. During the time when the code was being established, there were those who were in favor of the counties managing their own water resources. Many people had concerns that the counties were the biggest users of water to begin with. In essence, the counties would set priorities, conservation, and use policies accordingly to the will of their administration. Would eaeh county adopt priorities that include the protection of traditional and customary Hawaiian rights? Would the counties provide a means for public input? Would water quality still fall under the state's Health Department? Who would regulate the counties? Who

would make sure the counties were fulfilling the provisions of the water code? In a very public display, the former deputy director of the Department of Land and Natural Resource's (DLNR) Water Commission resigned in protest after being required to provide testimony in support of the bill. This action poses an overall eoneem for the condition of the DLNR as stewards of Hawai'i's environmental resources, cultural resources and the ceded land tmst. This latest act follows a string of questionable decisions taken by the department, starting from the mismanagement of the State Historic Preservation Division to what seems to be a mass exodus of key personnel over intemal conflicts. Additionally, OHA has been staunch critics of the department's valuation of lands leased to private entities. In recent years we've tried to eall attention to the department's policy of

accepting water use and conservation district land use permit applications that fail to account for environmental impacts and Hawaiian rights. State laws provide that OHA be notified and allowed to comment when anyone files one of these applications. In accordance with Chapter 10 HRS, OHA is charged with reviewing applications for areas that conflict with or inhibit the protection of traditional and customary Hawaiian rights. Too often these applications are accepted even though the section referring to the impact on Native Hawaiians is left blank. There seems to be a glimmer of hope at the Legislature this year though, as some house and senate members are beginning to eall for a performance audit of the department. While no formal dates have been confirmed, a performance review may be a critical step to clarifying policies, duties and the general stabilization of this very department. ■i

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Colette Maehaelo Trustee , Moloka'i and Lāna'i