Island Watch

posted in: December 1993, Fisheries, Marine | 0

Are Opakapaka, Onaga Overfished? Council Says Yes, State Says Maybe

Two of the choicest catches in Hawaiian waters are in danger of being overfished, according to the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council. And, WesPac claims, the state, which has responsibility for regulating size and season, is doing nothing about it.

Last April, the council voted to give the state “lead responsibility” for managing bottomfish stocks around the main Hawaiian islands. According to a letter formally notifying the state of this (May 11, 1993), “Primary reasons for this action were that the vast majority of bottomfish habitat and bottomfish fishing in the MHI [Main Hawaiian Islands] occurs within state waters. Thus, management efforts by the council require consistent state regulations to be effective. Without consistent state regulations, enforcement difficulties and noncompliance greatly increase, the biological effectiveness of measures is reduced, and time and money spent by the council developing monitoring programs and federal fishing regulations may be wasted.”

The letter, from Rufo Lujan, council chairman, goes on to note that “some bottomfish stocks in the MHI have reached the condition of being seriously overfished.” The council strongly recommends that the state move quickly to implement appropriate management measures… “A three-month closed season was recommended by the council’s advisory groups for onaga and (possibly) opakapaka.”

By late October, the state had yet to respond to WesPac’s letter.

In a telephone interview, Henry Sakuda, head of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Aquatic Resources, said the DLNR had made a “preliminary answer – that the amount of work required to continue what WesPac had been doing is too large” for the state to take on. The state did not have the means to conduct the type of fisheries management plan that WesPac was asking it to do.

Could the state not at least impose the closed season WesPac suggested? Environment Hawai`i asked Sakuda.

“Yes,” he said, “however, we don’t have the information we need to tell us what a closed season will do.” In addition, he said, “Many bottomfish fishermen think the WesPac action is not appropriate. They don’t want either a three-month closed season or a size limit.”

But wouldn’t prudent management practices justify imposing limits pending such a study?

In theory, Sakuda agreed. In practice, he said it was difficult to get fishermen to go along with a closed-season, intended to enhance spawning, unless you were able to show them the need. “WesPac doesn’t work with fishermen enough,” he said – although fishermen are represented on the 16-member council.

A more effective means of management would be to increase the legal minimum size of fish caught, Sakuda said. For opakapaka, the minimum is one pound, as set by the Legislature. “We have tried to increase this to three pounds, but have failed,” he said. The one-pound size is popular with restaurants, and so fishermen get premium prices for these.

Opakapaka are found in relatively shallow waters and catching them is fairly predictable, Sakuda said, but, as for onaga, “It’s hard to say anything about them. They stay in deeper water – two fathoms or more. They’re difficult to catch, and the catch is sporadic. They’re very desirable – and very expensive.

“You see nothing in the market for months, then suddenly it’s everywhere.”

Groundwater Rules Ignored In DHHL Subdivision Plans

The Department of Hawaiian Home Lands has recently petitioned the state Department of Health for variances from rules designed to protect groundwater. If the variances are granted, a 200-acre, 195-unit subdivision above Kawaihae and a 735-acre, 177-lot subdivision in Pahoa would be served not by sewers, not even by septic tanks, but by cesspools.

According to legal notices of the variances published in The Honolulu Advertiser the Kawaihae lots lie within a designated critical wastewater disposal area where the use of cesspools is prohibited. When such areas are not served by sewage treatment plants, the rules call for installation of dry sewers (anticipating the time when sewer service will be available) and for the use, in the interim, of septic tanks. In its request for variances, DHHL asks that it be allowed to build the subdivision without the dry sewers and without the septic tanks.

In support of the request for variances, DHHL claims that “The proposed use of cesspools is consistent with the existing sewage system in the location” of the project. To the extent that this is true, it actually argues against the granting of a variance. The point of the rules is to enhance protection of groundwater jeopardized by improper disposal of human waste. Any increase in nonconformity with the rules – and especially an increase as dramatic as that proposed by DHHL – works against achievement of the very purpose of the rules.

DHHL notes also that the costs of complying with the rules would be burdensome – in the neighborhood of $13 million ($10 million of which would be for construction of wastewater treatment facilities). But if this were amortized over the life of the DHHL leases (between 99 and 199 years), the cost of installing the sewer mains and other wastewater infrastructure is certainly bearable.

Even if the wastewater infrastructure is not built, the DHHL should at least consider installation of septic tanks. At roughly $5,000 apiece, the total cost comes in at under $1 million.

The Pahoa subdivision requires a variance since it exceeds the requirement that wastewater systems be installed for developments larger than 50 dwelling units. Again, DHHL claims that the “proposed use of cesspools is consistent with the existing sewage system in the location of the project.” Again, it claims that compliance with DOH rules would “produce serious hardship” – although no estimate of the additional cost for compliance is provided.

Few people would want to see Hawaiians kept off their land an instant longer than necessary. However, this should not be used by the DHHL as a justification for failing to supply Hawaiians with the type of infrastructure required to protect the vital interests of Hawaiians and all others over the long term.

(The Department of Health is accepting public comment on the variance requests until December 16, for the Kawaihae lots, and until December 21 for the Pahoa lots. For additional information, call the Wastewater Branch in Honolulu at 586-4294.)

NEXRAD Searches For New Waimea Site

The Next Generation Radar installation that had been planned for Pu’u Lapalapa, north of Waimea, has had to be relocated after the site was determined to be of great value to native Hawaiian healers. According to staff at the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Historic Sites Division, healers hold Pu’u Lapalapa in high regard as an area for gathering medicinal plants and as a sacred religious site, while the spring in the center is used for healing.

The Joint System Program Office, which is supervising the installation of the NEXRAD system nationwide, will be preparing another environmental assessment for the new site, when it is selected. A spokesperson for NEXRAD said the JSPO hoped to have sites chosen for Waimea and also for Ka’u by the end of the year in order to keep on their schedule.

As reported in our October article [url=/members_archives/archives_more.php?id=1216_0_31_0_C]”Controversial New Radar System To Be Installed at 4 Hawai’i Sites”[/url], Hawai’i is to receive a total of four NEXRAD installations. The first one to arrive in the islands was originally bound for one of three American military bases in South Korea and Okinawa. However, in the Defense Appropriations bill for fiscal year 1993 (starting October 1, 1992), the agencies with overall responsibility for installing NEXRAD (the Department of Defense, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the National Weather Service) were informed that they could spend no money on any NEXRAD systems outside the United States, while the three radars destined for the Far East were to be diverted to Moloka’i, Hawai’i and two sites in Alaska.

Although the Department of Defense had already entered into contracts and had begun site preparation work at the sites in Okinawa and Korea, the contractors were pulled off the jobs and the Joint System Program Office began accelerated work on the Hawai’i and Alaska sites.

According to language in the Appropriations bill, the NEXRAD systems in Alaska and Hawai’i are “support key Pacific Command operating locations at Hickam [Air Force Base], Elmendorf [Alaska] AFB and Eielson [Alaska] AFB.”

The radars diverted from the Far East are of a different design than the ones that ultimately will be installed in Alaska and Hawai’i. According to a report to the Appropriations Committee by the Air Force (required by terms in the appropriations bill), the radar systems designed for military bases (where full-time maintenance support is available) do not meet the requirements for FAA operations (in remote areas far removed from support personnel). Not until 1995 or later will the FAA-configured systems be available for Alaska and Hawai’i. At that time, the Defense radars will be taken out and at last be forwarded to the Far East.

All this might seem to make little sense until one remembers that the chairman of the Senate Defense Appropriations subcommittee is, of course, Hawai’i’s Daniel Inouye. The ranking Republican on the subcommittee is Ted Stevens of Alaska.

Volume 4, Number 6 December 1993