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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-12-15 Game Management Advisory Commission Minutes Game Management Advisory Commission County of Hawai’i Minutes Meeting Date: Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Time: 6:30p Place: Hawai’i County Building – Aupuni Center Conference Room Via WebEx 1. CALL TO ORDER/ROLL CALL: Meeting was called to order at 6:30pm Stanley Mendes, District 1 – present Kean Umeda, District 2 - present Vacant, District 3 Naniloa Pogline, District 4 – present Abraham Antonio, District 5 – present Grayson Hashida, District 6 - excused Vacant, District 7 Vacant, District 8 George Donev, District 9 – present Quorum established 2. ALSO PRESENT: GUESTS: Jackson Bauer, Na Ala Hele Trails & Access Specialist Troy Sakihara, Aquatic Biologist Division of Aquatic Resources, DLNR Edwin Shishido, Conservation & Resources Enforcement Officer, DLNR Ian Cole, East Hawai’i Wildlife Biologist, DOFAW Godfrey Akaka, President, Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights Association STAFF: Mitch Roth, Mayor, Hawai’i County Bobby Command, Deputy Managing Director J. Yoshimoto, Corporation Counsel Attorney Barett Otani, Executive Assistant Barbara Kossow, Admin Spec. 1 3. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Action: A motion was made by G. Donev to accept the September 22, 2020 minutes as circulated. Seconded by K. Umeda. Motion carried unanimously. 4. FINANCIAL REPORT: Action: A motion was made by S. Mendes to accept the Financial Report. Seconded by A. Antonio. Motion carried unanimously. 5. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: NP: Statements from the public on the agenda items. So if there’s anyone out there in the public wishing to comment on our agenda items – please state your name for the record… Don’t know who is out there in the sky. OK, well, I guess no one so we’ll just move right on ahead to our presentation. Do we have Jackson Bauer out there? 6. PRESENTATION: a. Jackson Bauer, Na Ala Hele Trails and Access specialist will share on the Palila Forest Discover Trail in the Ka’ohe Game Management Area, and safety concerns. NP: Just to give him a dissertation, Jackson Bauer is from Na Ala Hele Trails and Access. He’s a specialist who will share on the Palila Forest Discovery Trail in the Ka’ohe Game Management Area and safety concerns that they’ve been addressing. JB: Thanks for inviting me. Hello everybody. Yeah, so I’m Jackson Bauer with the Na Ala Hele Trails and Access Program – we’re part of DOFAW Division of Forestry and Wildlife Program that you will be hearing from later tonight. We are in charge of several mandates. One is the public recreation trails that many of you are familiar with – those are the trail heads that have those brown petroglyph signs – those are our trails that we maintain for public recreational use to a safe standard, we also conduct advisory council meetings – we have 2 our own Na Ala Hele Trail Advisory Council meetings – there’s one on each island and then there’s a statewide as well, so for this Island I help assist with the Hawai’i Island Advisory Council meetings – those happen about every couple of months or so. We used to meet in person – we would alternate locations between Hilo and Waimea. Now with the COVID restrictions we’ve been doing our meetings remotely and it’s been working well – Nani and some others have attended those and that’s really good to hear feedback from your constituency. Those are public meetings and it’s a great way for the public to interact with our agency to provide feedback, input, your two cents and at first asking the questions that you guys might have – that’s a great thing that’s built into the law that we provide and then kind of the other thing that we do – kind of reading between the lines of our mandate – is basically, just in a nutshell, keeping tabs on ancient trails and that does two things, you know, of course, the State Historic Preservation Division handles archaeological stuff, but we’re kind of the trail resource when it comes to that so we work in partner with them but we obviously focus on ancient trails and trying to kind of keep tabs on those – as you know the landscape is changing, lots of land use changes and so you want to make sure that these heritage sites and the associated features aren’t disappearing forever and also kind of the other side to that coin – not only from a heritage standpoint but also from an access standpoint – a lot of these trails still do belong to the government through and old law called The Highway’s Act of 1892 – and so that’s something that we assert and research as well so that we don’t abolish any potential access over these ancient trails – so even if the trail doesn’t exist archaeologically the alignment can still provide a benefit to the public. So that’s a lot of things that we do. I love Hawai’i. There’s just myself and I have one technician and when we’re lucky we can – right now we’re fortunate to have an intern with us as well. OK. That’s the program in a nutshell. th The updates that Nani wanted me to cover – back on October 9 Board of Natural Resources Meeting – the Board approved the transfer of five already existing trails that are within forest reserves – so already in DOFAW management – five trails were transferred over to the Na Ala Hele Program. The idea was, you know, we’re the trails program so it made sense, management wise, the trails would fall under our program. There’s several other trails out there, of course, but we can only take on so much – there’s again just myself and my technician. So these are the five that were doable. 3 There’s existing partnerships with other groups to help maintain it so that \[unclear\]. So those five trails were: the Puuwaawaa Cone Trail, The Ohia Trail, which is the trail you can hike from Puuwaawaa from the hiker check-in station to the base of the puu. The old Makaula Trail which is in the Makaula unit of Honua’ula Forest Reserve – if you go up Kaloko Drive in Kona off Makahi Street – so that’s that area; what’s been called the Kulamekahui – mountain biking park – some people call that - by Quarry Road off steam baths and bicycle park – and then the Palila Forest Restoration Trail. So those were added on the th October 9 Board of Land and Natural Resources meeting. And so those are under now – nothing has changed as far as, you know, the trails were already under DOFAW management it’s just within DOFAW they’re not specifically administered under the Na Ala Hele Program and therefore follow the Na Ala Hele rules – the benefits of which, of course, we have a little bit more control over the users as it relates to the use of those trails specifically as opposed to a general forest reserve for game management and \[unclear\]. Anyway, it just adds that extra layer of ruling... NP: Yeah. JB: ….to the users of those areas. NP: Right, and we wanted to thank Na Ala Hele for writing to the AG requesting that the rules could be made that hikers wear a glaze orange just as a safety thing so hunters would be able to see them now that the – with the forest… JB: Nani – let me clarify on that… NP: Yes, please, that’s exactly right… JB: Yeah, so, what Nani is alluding to is some of the background of the process of our making these trails Na Ala Hele Program Trails. So, again, we have an advisory council and so I always go to our advisory council seeking advice – I bring up our proposals for projects we’re working on – including something like this – even though it’s just administrative we want to make sure they’re well aware and get their advice and seek their approval, even though the true formal comes from the Board of Land and Natural Resources and so all those trails were brought up to our advisory council. The Palila Forest Discovery Trail 4 – we had four meetings – well five if you count the November one – but it was on their agenda for four meetings – I know many of you folks testified and gave us really good input for that and so the biggest kind of concern – the biggest idea that came out of these meetings was because \[unclear\] safety and, of course, we take safety very seriously and it’s good that we have the ability to see people, you know, and the hunter rules already have provisions where hunters have to wear – bird hunters have to wear bright orange vests and so there was a lot of discussion about how to apply that to non-hunters in the area because they only have jurisdiction over the trail itself – it wouldn’t really – our rules don’t allow us to require people – the general public – to wear orange, plus, more importantly, it wouldn’t solve the issue of people wandering in the area not wearing orange because, again, I only had jurisdiction of the trail itself – the actual… So they step foot off the trail and my rule wouldn’t apply, but I don’t have that authority anyway to dictate what people wear, so there were some really good discussions about hunting rules and how that would apply and so what came out of that was our advisory council voted at the August meeting to write a letter to the Chair of DLNR, Chair Case, the head of DOCARE, Chief Redulla and the Attorney General Connors for clarification on the blaze orange rule – does that apply just to hunters – does it apply to everybody in your GMA, we’d interpret that it applied only to hunters and so if there’s to be a change, then, you know, I suggest our game management rules would have to be changed to reflect that or the hunting rules would have to reflect that. So, anyway, the advisory council sent a letter for clarification from the higher ups on Oahu and where we’ll present it to our advisory council, of course. NP: Yeah, OK, so you haven’t heard back, but we appreciate your effort because… thank you, I was hoping there would be an answer with that by now but we appreciate your efforts because, it’s liability for the hunters when there’s hikers and bird watchers in the middle of a game management area where hunters are hunting so, ah, it would be great if they could be sure to see people easy enough. So thank you. JB: I would add to – in the interim or mitigation for all those concerned we do post on our website which is HawaiiTrails.Hawaii.gov – that we encourage people to wear bright colors and we have – many of our trails are in game management areas – I should point out - across the state. 5 NP: Yeah… JB: So… NP: So, right, this would… JB: So we do tell people to wear bright colors and you know our \[unclear\] already as a Na Ala Hele Trail so those \[unclear\] right adjacent to that so we do apply the same recommendations to folks to wear the brightly colored clothing. Now we will be putting up signs specifically at the foot of the trail to notify them that they are in a hunting area and to wear bright and colored clothes. NP: Well, thank you, Jackson, that’s really great… JB: Of course, yeah… NP: Avert future problems between the two interest groups – the two stakeholders. Well, thank you – that was a really good summary and does anyone have any questions for Jackson? AA: Yeah, Abraham, District 5 – believe me Jackson, I just recently was on your guys website after the Na Ala Hele meeting that I was with back in November and I see you guys kinda updated you guys system a little bit – just letting the public know to wear orange in all those areas – so that’s kinda good on your guys part but in the game management rule book the mammal one – section G – paragraph 1 – no person shall hunt as a guide or assist hunter in any hunting area where firearms are permitted without wearing exterior garment, a shirt, vest, jacket or coat – made or commercially manufactured solid blaze – so it should pretty much cover everybody – not just hunters but also tourists – you know just the general public itself – so anybody in those areas should be already use orange so I no see why you guys going make new laws when there’s pretty much one already there. JB: Yeah, I think the tricky part with that – it’s been interpreted that that applies to the hunting party itself, not necessarily to the general public but that’s why our advisory council sent the letter to the Chair, Chief Redulla and the 6 Attorney General to get clarification on exactly that. So hopefully we can get a letter back and that will determine whether – what the next steps are – if it’s status quo then OK, great, then everybody should be following that rule. If it doesn’t apply to the general public then there needs to be a rule change from there and that really needs to come down on Game Management Area or the hunting rules need to be cleared about that… AA: Yeah, maybe be more clear about it. JB: Unfortunately, I’m not the Wildlife program so I don’t have that authority to make those changes in the rules, we can only speak for Trails and Access, which is what our advisory council is for, right? It represents Trails and Access, which is pretty much everybody including hunters, right? AA: Right… JB: So we definitely have put that out there, but, yeah, I’m at a point where I can’t do much more else, under my purview. NP: All right, thank you. Anybody else have a question for Jackson? All right, well, thank you so much Jackson for joining us tonight, I really appreciate the information… JB: Sure, thank you Nani… One more thought… NP: Sure… JB: ….there’s been some confusion in the past at our meetings \[advisory council\] that I just want to clarify. So, Na Ala Hele Trails rules doesn’t exclude hunters at all, these are overlapping rules and stuff like that so it doesn’t hunting activities. NP: Yes, great. We appreciate Na Ala Hele also representing the hunters and their trail access. JB: Of course… 7 NP: And, of course, we encourage that and cheer it on, thank you so much. JB: Yeah, and my contact information is on our website so please – anytime feel free to reach out to us if you’ve got any other additional ideas, comments, \[unclear\] to look out for, please let us know. AA: Hey, Jackson. Abraham again. How else can we find out about your guys’ meetings for the public, you know, in case anybody else in the public wants to know when the next meeting… JB: Yeah, we put a mailing list together and it’s also on the State’s meetings calendar. Right now we don’t have a firm date for our next meeting, ah, likely it will be sometime in January or February but I don’t know what’s happening in the world as far as how it’ll play out with everything going on. So we haven’t made a permanent, final date yet, otherwise I’d be able to spout one off to you but likely in January, February 2021 and posted on the State’s meetings calendar – all board meetings – it’s usually on there, um, so like I said on our website you have my contact information and you can send me an email and I can add you to our list as well. AA: OK. Thank you, Jackson. JB: Thank you. NP: I can see for myself, Jackson, you make yourself very available to the public and that’s really great. Thank you. BO: Can I interrupt in a short \[unclear\]. NP: Yeah. BO: OK. Sorry… NP: One more thing… BO: Mayor Mitch Roth has a presentation to make right now. Sorry to interrupt the meeting. 8 NP: OK. So can we just dismiss Jackson? BO: Yes, please. NP: Thank you, Jackson. Stick around we’ve got the Mayor here with us tonight and he’s gonna give us a presentation Mayor Mitch Roth. MR: I’m actually gonna give you a presentation… NP: Thank you. MR: So actually I have a certificate of appreciation for you Nani, um, and it’s Naniloa Pogline, for your distinguished service as a member of the Game Management Advisory Commission upon completion of your term of service st on December 31 2020, but this is the last time you guys are meeting this year. So we’re gonna give it to you here at this time. NP: Oh, wow… MR: Thank you… NP: I did not expect this. It’s a total surprise. MR: I want to thank you on behalf of the people of the County of Hawai’i for everything that you’re doing and as you can see, we have a lot of people from the Mayor’s Office who are now kind of listening in so Barbara Kossow and Bobby Command, who’s now our Deputy Managing Director, both of whom were instrumental in putting together the GMAC in the beginning years. NP: Yes, they were… MR: So, um, and then Barrett… BO: Nice to see you, Nani… NP: Yes, I remember you well… 9 MR: And Barrett is an executive assistant here so he’ll be here and one of the things I hope for the GMAC is that when you guys have ideas, advice either for the Mayor – get something to me – but even when there’s letters going to the State – if we can add on to those letters on behalf of the County because technically this is an advisory commission, you know, hopefully we’re actually doing something together and we’re listening to you and so, I know that J. is onboard there from Corp Counsel, so I want to let you know that you do have the support of the County and of this office in what you guys do in this room, so… I have to get going pretty soon but I have to listen to my friend Ed Shishido and Troy talked about what’s happening to our prawns, but I wanted to get that in just in case I have to leave a little bit early. But thank you so much, Nani. And I thank all of you. NP: Thank you, again, for all the help the County’s given GMAC all these years. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. MR: All right. b. Troy Sakihara, Aquatic Biologist, Division of Aquatic Resources, DLNR and Edwin Shishido, Conservation and Resources Enforcement Officer, will provide an update on the prawn, Stream poisoning investigation report. NP: Wow, that’s making me want to have tears… OK. We’ll just move on then. We can all agree that prawn stream poisoning is a horrendous, horrible thing. Nobody’s gonna disagree with that. And so we really appreciate we have DLNR – Troy Sakihara – Aquatic Biologist Division of Aquatic Resources and Edwin Shishido, Conservation and Resources Enforcement Officer. They’re gonna give us an update on the prawn stream poisoning investigation report. Are you both there? TS: Yes. ES: Yes. NP: Thank you. OK. Well I’ll let you just take it off from here. 10 TS: So over the past four months or so we’ve having a state of incidents where people have been allegedly using ant pesticide to collect \[unclear\] prawns in the northern parts of South Hilo and in North Hilo. And it’s been spanning across these two districts, so, the unfortunate thing and \[unclear\] thing is that, you know, these pesticides that they’re allegedly using are highly toxic to aquatic life so when they actually use this in the stream it actually kills everything, and it’s a highly illegal activity. Unfortunately, we haven’t really been able to \[unclear\] cause it’s been several incidents but we do have one case where a suspect was identified and we are pursuing civil enforcement action through our court – land board. So that’s pending right now, so we’ve been working – Aquatic Resources Division – our DOCARE Division – Department of Ag – we’ve all been working together to try to collect as much information as we can for all of these incidents that have been \[unclear\], you know, doing surveys, follow-ups \[unclear\] stream to do bio assessments, Department of Ag has been collecting soil samples to see if they can detect the pesticides in these soils in these areas where the incidents have been reported. Our DOCARE officer Edwin has been leading the investigation and going out to the communities and residents to collect as much information as he can across all of these reports that we’ve been having. We’ve had two press releases that came out to let the public know about this. It’s been across the news, the media, newspapers, social media and everything to really get everyone to see and be as vigilant as they can, just because we only have so many eyes that, you know, \[unclear\] division – we need everyone in the community to help out because it’s really, really \[unclear\] to catch anyone doing this. But I’ll hand it over to Edwin to kinda give more details about the investigations that he’s been – Edwin if you have any further information to share… ES: Yeah. Hello everyone. Edwin Shishido, DLNR Enforcement. Over the past – like Troy said - four months – we had a total of eight reports of possible poisonings and of those eight, I believe three of ‘em came back positive for the poison and we also had the Department of Ag collect sediment samples from the bottom of the streams because it’s actually settled down to the bottom and prawn samples that we’ve collected from the people that live around there – luckily – they froze it right away – because it breaks down in the body really quickly, so luckily they froze it and it turned out positive, so, out of the eight, three came back positive and we’ve had other so called reports of it – but it’s 11 like two, three days later and so we really don’t have anything because it usually washes away or the samples break down pretty quickly, within a day or so. Troy and I worked on the one that we – Troy \[unclear\] we identified the suspect and we did what – several soil samples, several prawn samples, ah, Troy and I – actually Troy did an underwater survey of the whole stream of the area we suspected – I don’t know but about a half mile at least – we went and he did an underwater video – took out the prawns in the area and it was pretty significant because it showed where possibly the poison was introduced. So, when Troy was doing that I interviewed all the residents along the stream on both sides of the stream – all the way up the river and above and below and I got the information and wrote it up and sent it in to the Prosecutor’s cause we identified the people and the witnesses did identify the people and by the time they actually saw some prawns floating down the river was less than an hour after they saw the suspects walking up. But, we still cannot prove that they actually did pour it in the water. We have a lot of circumstantial evidence but we were told that it’s not enough. So a lot of people that we do contact along the rivers – we had suspects – we have about 8 suspects total, maybe, nine and we cannot – we know they’re all connected – and that we know everyone in that suspect group knows each other. Somebody knows something but they don’t want to come forward – so our issue is – when we contact these people and we find poison in their car or vehicle – do we wait till we let them go down in the river and poison the river so we can get an arrest? Or do we contact them and tell ‘em not to do that and save the river. That’s our dilemma. So I chose to save the river. I chose to save the water – save the marine life in that stream so that it doesn’t get damaged even though we don’t have arrest so… That is the problem. Somebody got to come forward because you have hundreds of streams, hundreds of miles of streams – where do you station to watch for these things – thousands of access points – we need more eyes out there. So, that’s pretty much what we have. So I know Troy was working hard on this… NP: So, I have a question. ES: Yes… NP: So when these people are poisoning these prawns it’s so they can gather them and sell them is what they’re doing? I’m assuming? 12 ES: Both. They actually eat too. NP: And so… ES: And it’s expensive… NP: So don’t these people worry about getting poisoned or eating them – can it have harm to your body to eat poisoned shrimp. ES: I’m not a physician that would know this kind of stuff but we know they eat it too because they told – when we interviewed some of the people – they said, oh, yeah, we eat ‘em. Nothing wrong. NP: Maybe it would be a good idea to get a physician on board to – if, in case it does harm you to eat poisoned shrimp which it seems like it would – then put that on the media that if you eat these poisoned shrimp this could affect your body in some negative way – that make people scared to eat them – then maybe that would improve the problem somewhat, perhaps? ES: Would it? My question is – wouldn’t it be common sense not to eat poisoned shrimp? NP: Yeah, but, you know, maybe you’ve got to really have a doctor saying it. I don’t know… MR: Eddie – this is Mitch. ES: Yes. MR: You know, this is something – maybe we should talk to the Department of Health – have them put out a statement. ES: Ah, we can… MR: I’ll be talking to Eric Honda tomorrow so I’ll bring it up to him. 13 ES: OK. I know Eric very well too… MR: OK. All right. ?: Yeah, and I know \[unclear\] I’m not an expert in this field either but I know at high enough concentrations it does cause nausea, vomiting, um, but, I know for cats - it gets affected pretty bad because you don’t have a particular enzyme that can break down the poison so it stays in their system longer and if I’m correct one of the residents had some cats that were affected because that person saw their cat going down to the stream and bringing back dead prawns and then soon after the cats were really sick. So it can affect cats in particular – not so much other mammals – but for some reason cats, in particular, and the fact they attribute it to a certain enzyme that they lack, but, of course, if you eat anything that’s poisonous it’s not a good idea but it definitely is something of importance that we contact the Department of Health and have them involved with this. We’ve been trying to keep in contact with them because they have a Clean Water Branch and it’s kind of… \[Buffering\] ?: Oh, and can I say something? ?: Yeah, Troy, we’re having a problem with this… TS: Yeah, just to ah… NP: Sorry we’re having a little bit of communication problem with the equipment… TS: Where did I cut off? I’m not sure… NP: I’m not sure either…. MR: Cats being poisoned. NP: Yes, yes, and so you said that there’s cats that have ill effect. And so I suspect that some people buying prawns off the roadside, I guess, is where they’re selling ‘em – wouldn’t even know or even suspect they’re poisoned unless the media really got it out there and… 14 ?: We did… NP: Yeah, I know you did, yeah, and I do appreciate that but, um, further from the Department of Health to let people know that it’s not healthy for them. ?: Also, Nani, I do regular patrols all along the Hamakua Coast looking for people selling prawns… NP: Oh, good… That would be… ES: Everybody sees me out there going through all these little communities, checking the rivers, checking the streams. I talk to all the residents all along the streams and I gave them my number to call me if anything – so they all know – and to go on top of what Troy said – I actually interviewed the people with the cats and they said a total of nine cats got really sick and I believe one of them may not make it yet – it’s still sick and it’s been since the general elections – the day before the general elections, yeah, it occurred at that time. NP: The cats ate the prawns? Is that what happened? ?: Yeah. ES: Correct. NP: I see. I see… Well, that would be enough warning for me. ES: I mean, it’s on the label. It’s on the MSD label \[unclear\]. NP: Yeah. ES: You know, you have the warning on there to not have it – to call the poison control if you do consume it or accidentally goes in your eyes and stuff so – it’s there. NP: Right. 15 TS: And I also saw at Home Depot they have these signs up by the fence that explicitly says like any use of these pesticides other than \[unclear\] is illegal. So people should know that what they’re doing is highly illegal – completely unethical. NP: Well, if there’s anything that GMAC can do to help, of course, we’ll brainstorm as well and spread the word as best we can…. Excuse me, somebody else? Go ahead, Abraham. AA: Abraham – District 5. When was your guys’ last media release? Because I just punched it up and it was back in 2018 your guys’ last media release. ES: Ah, we had two this year – so the last one was in November. AA: OK. ES: We had one media release, I believe, was ending of July and another one in November or ending of October. ?: That would be good and maybe like Mayor Mitch said we get Department of Health involved and maybe we can move this thing more forward. MR: We may be able to put something out as well, yeah, Bobby? ?: Yeah, I think that would be great. BC: Definitely… I’ll make a note of that. MR: Thanks, I got to get going you guys. NP: Thank you so much. SM: Stanley – District 1. Without giving us names and stuff like that – where these – it’s local people or foreigners or what you guys find. ?: The suspect local people. 16 ?: Yeah, locals. ?: Yeah, see… BL: Brian Ley – I got a question. Hey, I’m not sure on this – I’m speaking out of ignorance. I know like commercial fishermen you need a license to sell fish. Do you need a license to sell prawns, I mean, can we just make a basic law that says it’s illegal to sell prawns on the side… ?: It’s not regulated. BL: It’s not regulated? Maybe we need to regulate it or something just so we get past this. I’m just throwing out an idea, cause I’ve seen people selling prawns out of Facebook and people years ago talking about getting sick eating these prawns they get on Facebook – so I wasn’t sure if there was any legality on selling prawns, you know, legally. ?: Yeah, so the Tahitian prawn \[unclear – people talking over the speaker\] regulate it but any of the native Hawaiian stream animals like the ‘o’opu, hihiwai, ‘opae, kala’ole – the native prawn – all those are illegal to sell commercially, you know, can take it for home consumption. But the Tahitian prawn is not native and actually we encourage people to take them, you know, in a pono way, of course, though – but we want people to just go out and take as many as they can because they are invasive. ?: That’s the big grey ones… ?: Yeah. ?: Like I’m saying, if they’re poisoning the streams to make a buck – that’s kind of detrimental to everybody involved in the stream. ES: \[Unclear – people talking over speaker\] we’ve identified pretty much all of them… NP: Great. 17 ES: ….that are doing it. NP: Well, we really appreciate your effort and support you 100% there. Thank you so much. All right, does anyone else have any more questions out there? ?: Thank you Brian, Troy and Edwin… NP: Yes, thank you so much. OK. We’ll move on then to the next thing on the agenda and Ian Cole are you there? c. Ian Cole, East Hawai’i Wildlife Biologist for DOFAW will discuss and take questions for potential proposed rule changes, and remind hunters to check in and fill out forms at check in stations for DOFAW data. IC: Sorry. I was trying to figure out how to unmute this. NP: Oh, good, thank you, you’re there. Ian Cole, East Hawai’i Wildlife Biologist for DOFAW, um, he’s gonna discuss with us some potential rule changes and he wants to remind all hunters to use the check-in stations and fill out the forms for their data, which is important, so, thank you, Ian, for being here and we got the rules changes ahead of time and did you get some questions from people? IC: I didn’t get any emails but I talked to Stanley on the phone – I talked to some other individuals on the phone – and I got some comments back from Mr. Hoeflinger, but I just wanted to give you guys a little bit of background on this, it’s not something we have to do – it was more – they’re talking about doing a larger rules change for the State and if you guys, if anyone was involved with that first one – eight or nine years ago – it took seven years to do the statewide one – so one of the suggestions was if we – to try to do it on a district level, so these are just a few of a low hanging fruit that I saw that kind of may be working in line with the rest of some of the rules that I – I just picked these out of the hat – just so you guys know – there’s no agenda… NP: So you’re the one who’s requesting these rules changes? 18 IC: Yeah, we are going to try to do this on district. We want to see if we can do it faster and mostly because the statewide rules change that happened 8 or 9 years ago… ?: It took so long… IC: ….it took almost a decade. So if I want to see change on the Island in any way, shape or form, I want to see if we can do this on a district level. I’ve been told it’s easier – it’s almost a little bit of an experiment – but when I asked \[unclear\] a little bit – these were some of things that seemed like non-controversial, To try the process out… NP: Well, actually, there is some controversy about these proposed rules changes and as far as GMAC’s concerned we always have pushed for game management not just 24/7 open season \[unclear\] it seems a little – to suggest moving in that direction away from game management actually. But I’m going to turn this over to Stanley and Abraham because they’re the experts in this subject so I’m gonna let them take over from here. SM: Yeah, Stanley – District 1. You know we go along with some extra hunting but not seven days a week. We more or less can give maybe – like they do a bird season on Mauna Kea they give Wednesday, Thursdays. We can go along with that type of rule change but not for 24/7. It’s – you open up one whole can of worms if you get 24/7. NP: Well, the animals don’t get rest. SM: And in those areas – already the dogs have depleted ‘em so we don’t think dogs in that area is the right, you know, especially in Laupahoehoe-Piha. Leave that only for rifles. I mean, I think it’s the only – besides Mauna Kea – is the only place and Manuka that you can go and hunt rifle only so – we need someplace like that for the hunters and – like I said – we more than willing to give on 2 days but not 7 days a week. IC: OK. Well, that’s good feedback, I definitely appreciate that feedback. I guess, what I’m – and I’m not gonna try and argue one way or the other but the data from Piha-Laupahoehoe is not showing a lot of use. There’s not a lot of hunters 19 checking in. So I’ve heard the same argument that it’s viable and I appreciate that but I’m not seeing it reflected in hunter check data. SM: Yeah, because… IC: And you and Stanley talked about the fact that the Waimea side via Mana is not being captured cause there’s no longer a check station there – I told you I’m putting some new ones in – but I like the idea – I’m glad they opened it up – what is hard to do is catch everybody’s day off, right? It’s not, um, not everybody has Saturday, Sunday off anymore. SM: Yeah, that’s why you do Wednesday, Thursday… ?: They no more compromise – two days add ‘em in the middle of the week… SM: Yeah, that’s why you do couple days in a week not all week… IC: Yeah, that’s fine. That’s the kind of feedback I want… SM: Yeah. IC: ….I’m just looking to see if they would allow more people to go, um, which days it is, I don’t know. We probably will just have to throw it out there and see what happens, you know, some guy’s gonna say, oh, I want Thursday but you’re only open Tuesday, Wednesday, you know, but we can’t make everybody happy. I would say just strictly from the data – there’s not a lot of guys going up now and I don’t know if it’s not productive or what, but, we don’t have a lot of check-ins from Piha-Laupahoehoe. SM: Yeah, the dogs is the one racking havoc up there – you get guys – like I said they hunt – they drop off from the top road and they walk all the way down to the \[unclear\] you know you can’t, you know, outlaw so… ?: Abraham? ?: ….tried calling you earlier this week and left a message – but anyway… So I talked to a few people myself – a bunch of people and I put the word out on 20 social media also – and a lot of people – I got some people that is in support of like the 7-day a week and pretty much the same reasoning – they work weekends or they not more time for go on the weekends, you know, so I kinda support that and kinda go along with what Stanley’s saying about opening them like whenever like two days during the week. But you’ve got to think kind of too with the 7 – I know you just said that you just kind of made this up and, um, gotta kind of think back to when our game management kind of first started, ah, I read something that it started back in like ’84 or something when game management plan was just starting or just people talking and then it just started back in 2003 when actually got more vocal and with looking being open 7-days a – the way it is right now – that’s kind of our only game management that we have – so opening it up 7-days a week – that’s kinda gonna take away that game management for those areas. And you know where I hunt so – up in that area – we had this discussion before – I don’t think opening it up especially that area – if get or even if any of the other public areas – if there’s actually enough game to support a 7-day a week hunting period, you know. ?: That’s like total eradication… ?: Yeah, that’s almost and, you know, it goes back to like when I first started with this and listening to everybody speak that \[tape gap\]. But, yeah, it basically along those lines and then as far as the other areas that’s, um, the \[unclear\] Unit A do archery – I think it pretty much everybody supports that and then also G & E – that’s more one safety concern to change that into get ‘em out of rifle and change ‘em to archery. ?: Yeah, and that one is a little bit undetermined because at one point we had some pressure from Pohakuloa in the training area and we met with DOCARE and they wanted to make it a safety zone just in the proximity to Gilbert Kahele Recreation Area Pohakuloa then Daniel K. Inouye Highway and I don’t know if you guys drive by there very often but that’s kind of like a new found spot, right, a lot of people park there… AA: Right, right… 21 ?: ….and they just high power rifle and the whole area is maybe a couple hundred acres so – I want to kind of address that somehow – it could be a safety zone with special hunts or it could be arbitrated but I’m \[unclear\] people on board with that – that was just kind of a no brainer – more of a safety thing and, I lumped some of West Hawai’i’s stuffs in Kanalu’s stuff and I talked to him about that and he’s game for either or, but even if it was special hunts in a safety zone it would probably still be archery for safety concerns. AA: Right. ?: But that’s another way, like you said to let it rest, right? Cause right now, I would guess there’s probably a truck parcened there every day and five on the weekends. ? Right. ?: But this is a dialogue I was hoping for, I mean, a couple extra days a week would be great – if that’s amendable – try to catch a few more people who are off weekdays, you know, I mean, I hear a lot back from a lot of fire fighters, of course, they have flexible schedules – their schedules are always changing so they liked it cause for Area D and stuff, which is Hilo Restrictive Watershed, you know, not everybody’s off on the weekend \[unclear\] in there. I mean there’s other means too, we can discuss it further – we can’t do a… If you look at the regs there’s a – this is not pushing this but seven days a week and a weekly – you can have a weekly bag limit? You know what I mean and just go – so \[unclear\] go once and you’re pau for the week. But it’s harder to enforce then basically having specific dates. NP: OK. We have another question. RC: My name is Ricky Carvalho. I’m just a guest over here. Ah, you’re talking about fire fighters – they get three schedules, three shifts so that it’ll rotate in even though they can say they that they don’t get weekends off. It’ll rotate in – I get two brothers that are firemen. They get – their dates are staggered so it goes – they get weekends sometimes and sometimes they get weekdays off so – it’ll work in, you know, as opposed to be with 7 days a week and wipe out the whole place. You give ‘em a couple days – the animals a couple days rest – at 22 least that’s some form of game management – not just total kill ‘em all and no going get nothing for nobody get any recreation up there or hunting or anything. I know that’s what the big aim is – to kill everything but, you know, we gotta live over here too. NP: Course, yeah, Ian Cole – that is a concern is distrust among the hunters that really the goal is to use the hunters to eradicate their own resources so you must be also aware of that and of could reassure the public that that isn’t so it would be great. IC: No, that plan is – it was an objective to get the non-typical Monday thru Friday peoples out there hunting. I just used fire fighters as an example. There was other people who have Wednesday off, you know, so it’s fine. I mean, I completely understand – I know where you guys are coming from and that’s even a starting point, you know, give it a couple more days a week and see what happens. I mean, that’s why Nani mentioned it is, you know, it’s hard for people to fill out the hunter check station but I – the only thing can base these decisions on a lot of times is how many people check in and out, yeah, so if I not getting the data from certain areas it’s shooting in the dark as far as trying to figure out what’s going on. During the pandemic, for example, I didn’t have a lot of – I had very few – far fewer hunters checking in in Hilo Restrictive Watershed Unit D – than I would have thought so I thought to myself, either they don’t know where they’re going and they’re checked in for B – or there’s not that many that’s going so – Johnny Tex and all those trails are there so I was really surprised how little data I had and it was during the pandemic when I would have figured more people had more time and that’s only weekends but, you know, that’s all I can base it off so I was trying to figure out are people not sure where they’re going – do we have a – or is it really this few people or people hesitating to turn in their data sheets. I know there are many theories on data sheets, but, all we do is write down the numbers. Mostly people don’t want other people to see it, but it’s really hard for us to make informed decisions about usage or back-up the hunters on how much an area is getting used if people don’t sign in or check in… NP: You have enough hunters here just sitting in who can pass the word. So, let’s see we have… What was your name? 23 S: Aloha, Ian. This is Shane Veriatos – “Slim.” IC: Hey, Slim, howzit? S: You know, I was invited by Mr. Mendes. This area that you’re talking about – across the state park – is an area that I have been frequently going. I just wanted to put my two cents in, if it’s possible. I would like to see it converted even to an archery area than lose it to a safety zone. And one of the reasons why – it’s a very pristine area – a high yield area – and it’s very accessible to elderly and semi-handicapped people at this time. I use there because I am semi-handicapped, as you know, I have a double hip replacement – I can’t go into rough areas. So I’m using the old military roads that is in that area and it makes it very safe for me to hunt, capture and bring out my animal. That’s all I wanted to say – if it’s possible to at least keep it as an archery area and I believe it will be well used by the elderly, handicapped and also the youth. I see a lot of people bringing youth into the area to hunt there also. Thank you. NP: Thank you. BL: Thank you. Brian Ley. You hear me? I was just thinking we could do like the 24/7 but we have enough areas that we can rotate it year round. You know what I’m saying – where we’ve got – we figure out – we’re gonna take so many animals out of this section from January/February. March-April we’re opening this section – taking this many animals. You know, where everyone can hunt year round – but we’re spreading it out over the whole Island section by section, you know, where it gives the animals a chance to rest, reproduce and maybe cull in some of these hunting areas during the prime lambing season – cause it’s sad when I’m ewes and does being taken when they’ve got babies next to them. I know the state wants to get rid of all of ‘em but from a hunter’s point of view I want to be able to see animals the next time I go out. It’s just an idea that I was kicking around, you know, we can get more hunters out seven days a week and just spread it out over different areas and do some game management – figure out how much animals we got in there and how many we want to take – put a low cost permits – tags – and close the season once we’ve eliminated out that area. Just a suggestion. Thank you. 24 IC: Yeah, no, these are all good ideas, I like it, I mean, I’m open to anything, you know, we’ll find the logistical challenges in each and every aspect, but I’m open to all kinds. We do have some of those – a powerline is one example which is up at Waiakea which is a dog rested for six months out of the year and I think that makes people pretty excited when July 1 rolls around cause they know there hasn’t been anything but a few outlaws in there during the previous 6 months. I haven’t had a lot of reports back this year about how it is but it’s definitely based on \[unclear\] there’s opportunity for that and it’s a great idea where we can maybe even decide some places – maybe it doesn’t have to be year-round seven days a week, maybe, I don’t know, some, or winter is when you want to do it – but this is just the discussion I want to incite, I guess. NP: Well, hopefully, they can have a continuation with the next meeting and as new information comes up. Thank you so much. Is there anybody else? Go ahead. SM: So, Ian, Stanley, you happened to talk with Kanalu about Puuanahulu? IC: Yeah, I just, I mean he had no problem with it. I actually talked to him a day or two after we spoke and that was the extension from one more month of \[unclear\] right? SM: Yes. IC: And he was fine so it’s something that when we make a bigger, more - a package to present to get comments on and you guys can take it back to your district constituents to kind of get feedback, then we – we’ll just add it in. And I was trying to pick some low-hanging fruit to get this done but \[unclear\] ones that you can think of just add ‘em in and – cause I’m not familiar with each district’s situation, you know… SM: Right… IC: ….I get a lot of calls about pigs in Puna but like whether or not that’s gonna change if we change the rules over there – I don’t know. There’s just a lot of subdivision next to the small forest reserves. 25 SM: Yeah, I think most hunters they – archery especially they like the idea because they run from March and it goes all the way until September, ah? IC: Yes. SM: \[Unclear\] and everything so… AA: Yeah, Abraham. Maybe Edmund can answer this question. You wanted to switch and bring in cross-bows into the rifle zones – you can legally carry own a cross-bow if this becomes a rule change. IC: Anyone, if it’s a rule change. You can own a cross-bow in this state – you can even hunt on private land with a cross-bow in this state you just… SM: Right, yeah, right now it’s private land. IC: Let’s you know where you hunt in state lands with a cross-bow. SM: Right, right, right… IC: It’s not in the rules… SM: OK. And then, ah, as far as the sign-in sheets – I think it’s just, you know, a different generation that they don’t really understand about, you know, the efforts of the check \[interference open mic\] sign-in, sign-out sheets. Maybe even with that - maybe we can – I seen you put up some new signage up on the board up on state maps so that’s great. I not sure about any of the hunter check-in stations but maybe we can, you can put up some kind of media – all that too – for the… IC: Yeah, for sure… SM: And bring out more info for it, you know and break it down… IC: Yeah… 26 SM: ….how important it is for us. IC: Yeah, I can’t stress it enough. I know it can be – like I said I’ve heard all kinds of theories on it but I remember when the Ookala thing was happening – they were talking about gating it and I had one of my techs go grab the sheets and it turned out like for six months there was only ten sheets and I was like – I know this place gets used more – it’s really hard for me to say this place is so popular if I only have ten hunters who signed in. You know what I mean? So I’m trying to get – I’m trying to relay that message and I don’t know if you saw our newer signs that say be \[unclear\] be proud. We’re trying a few different – a couple different messages to just get people to do – and we’re working on a remote app – you can do it from your phone… SM: Right, right… IC: So we’ve aimed for the younger, more technologically savvy folks – we may not even have to have paper – we’ll always have paper but ‘cause I like to have check stations there cause people put you know dog \[unclear\] and stuff but I think if people can – if privately they don’t feel like it’s being shared – we might get an uptake in, you know, all the younger guys they all have I-phone, I mean, I have an I-phone, everyone’s got an I-phone now right? So if you can do it on your I-Phone I’m hoping it’ll improve our data. SM: Right. Yeah, because \[unclear\] the Hilo Forest Reserve and Tree Path and you know there’s a lot more people using that whole Stainback Areas then what actually gets written up and also 15 tree quarters there’s a lot more people that actually sign in and out so… Yeah, if you try some way to promote more of the signage so we can get better info. ES: Can I say something? This is Edwin Shishida. ?: Yeah. ES: It is mandatory to sign in and out. It’s in the rules and sometimes if you, like Ian said, if you have ‘em on your phone – like we was doing inspections in the forest – we don’t know if they’ve checked in – we don’t even know if they 27 even have a hunting license. So we run into this every week. That’s what happens. IC: Yeah, we’re trying to add check stations because the rules say where feasible, right? So it’s very vague. Like if I don’t want to drive up to Volcano Transfer Station I can hunt about ten different spots, you know, if I decide not to drive the extra half mile so… I’m sure you guys have a – bet you probably have a pretty hard to enforce situation, so I’m trying to add more check stations but, it’s hard. SM: Yeah, Ian, the Volcano Check-in Station never got replaced yet – unless you guys just did it recently after the improvements that you guys did in that area… IC: So we moved the rocks back out front… SM: Yeah. IC: I think it’s Waste Management. So now we have to have a conversation with them and then basically find out if that road is ours. They’re, still having intensive vandalism but we moved – I had stuck the check station back behind the transfer station and then somebody said, oh, it’s really inconvenient to check in for the other spots at Lone Pine and 25 Mile Marker if I got to walk all the way in there – so we just put it back by the highway. So it’s back by the highway. SM: Right… IC: But there’s rocks are moved up again so I need to talk with Waste Management and got to remedy this. SM: OK. Yeah. IC: But the rocks are back but the check station’s also closer to the highway now. So you can catch two or three spots now versus just when it was in the back you only were catching transfer station… 28 SM: Again, you kinda right because I met you up in, ah, right by Stainback, um, location and the cell phone service wasn’t that good where you check information. As for me and, you know, \[unclear\] I don’t know what your guys take is – I take my sign-in sheet with me and I leave it on dashboard on my truck so, and I then I think Large Tree says check-in and check-out is only for game animals, right, just for your take – not necessarily to say that you’re in the forest anyway, right? Right around… ?: When you go to hunt you have to sign in and out and that’s what Ian did because if you don’t turn that form in even though you don’t catch anything how is he gonna know how many people are going in there. ?: Yeah, so you can take ‘em with you but on your way back out you can drop ‘em off at the check-in station. ?: Yeah, yeah. That I understand, yes. But sometimes people just grab one whole bunch, go in the forest, throw ‘em on the dashboard and never turn anything in. ?: Right, right, right… ?: And, I’ve seen it happen. So I tell people, if you gonna do that – at least put one date on top there so \[unclear open mic\] ?: Some guys no can write… ES: But you know what – people are going to try to get around it no matter what and we – when we do contact people and test the people – I want to say half – I would say about a quarter of them – either doesn’t have a license – they have an expired license or they forgot it at home and it’s pretty much almost every week we run into something NP: Yeah, you know, that’s just the real world, right, partly, but also I think maybe hunters got to win more trust… ES: You know what – we want them to go hunting – we want them to go because anytime hunters ask me or any of my other co-workers where to go hunt, 29 where we see the \[unclear\] we’d gladly tell them – eh, you can go inside here – you cannot pass this area but you can hunt there on the right or whatever. And, like even Slim knows… Abraham knows… We help them out. We always tell them where for go and what to look for when they see us in there. ?: I really strongly feel that some of these guys over here – is we pretty much strongly feel and then somewhere, somehow we need to get more enforcement just to go around – but I understand that you guys budget and this and that but... ES: \[Unclear – open mic interference\] we go to Ka’u, South Point. ?: Oh, you guys still just still hiring too, ah? ES: Yeah, we get \[open mic interference\] ?: Actually, just to chime in, ah, Shayne \[unclear\], I do see a lot more enforcement on the mountain doing bird season, especially now this year – compared to previous years and also in the back of Mauna Kea I’ve also seen enforcement officers in the mountain walking. I was hunting rifle one time and they actually approached me – I didn’t know who they were – they came up to me – and then I noticed their uniform – so they’re actually doing a lot more, yeah, Edwin? ES: Well, I wouldn’t say a lot more. It’s the same amount of officers – it’s just that we’re using a different approach to be seen more. SV: Yeah, no, thank you, thank you. I’d like to see that. ES: And also in more actually is what I’m saying. SV: Yeah. ES: And, you know, hunting is not the only thing we do. We do a lot of fishing stuff – for me I did a lot of prawn stuff – in the last couple months I gave three citations for lobster out of season – unregistered lay net – illegal lay nets… 30 ?: Cannot be single nets, ah? \[Open mic\] ES: ….and throw net and this is all within like a couple months. NP: All right. Anybody else have a question? ?: Thanks Edwin and Ian… NP: Yeah, thank you very much. Good conversation. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Ian. Thank you for always being there and so I guess if there’s no other questions, comments? You guys all good? d. Godfrey Akaka, President of The Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights Association, hunter, fisherman, gatherer from Molokai will speak on the importance of the cultural gathering way of life, from the Hawaiian point of view. NP: We’re very fortunate tonight to have Godfrey Akaka, from Molokai, and he’s the President of the Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights Association, hunters, fishermen – a gatherer from Molokai and he’ll share with us a few things about his association and speak on the importance on the cultural-gathering way of life from the Hawaiian point of view and the issues that they’re facing on Molokai for hunters, fishermen and gatherers. Thank you so much Godfrey for being with us tonight. GA: Aloha everybody. You guys can hear me OK? Group: Yes. GA: OK. Awesome. Thank you guys. I pretty much feel honored to be able to speak to all of you in this setting. It’s the first time that I’ve sat in one meeting like this with the inter-action including the community and the DLNR and I think it’s awesome to see Troy, Edwin, you know, the jobs that these guys are doing working with the community and for the community – I think it’s awesome. Ian, you too… I hope you was taking notes – you had plenty good suggestions and recommendations from the hunters over there and even the support from the County – the Mayor and his staff – that is impressive for me that they do actually care about \[unclear\] and also the people that are hunting and fishing. 31 But, anyway, without further ado maybe just see if I can – I put in my phone number over here – before I start talking – I don’t know how \[unclear\] put in this chat thing over here. Information in case anybody want to get in touch with me later. If you guys disagree with anything that I have to say – \[unclear\] on something or if you want to work together – whatever it is – give me a call even if you like give me one of your piece of your mind – whatever – it’s all good. I just don’t do marriage counseling. \[Laughter\] Anyway, I’m the President for the Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights Association on Molokai and I just want to introduce myself a little bit more. So I was born in Arizona, the mainland, yeah, the United States. My father was in the military. My family Daniel Akaka – that’s my ohana – my grandfather’s brother – so that’s my family line that deals in politics, you know, whatever he was doing at that time I wasn’t into that but I kinda into my own thing – he did his thing – I’m doing my own thing – well, basically, I grew up on the island of Oahu – moved to Molokai – married a Molokai girl back in 1988. So basically, I walked two worlds – and really it is two totally different worlds – when you coming from Oahu and then living on Molokai and this is where I began to learn the true nature of gathering and Hawaiian culture. And, basically, in a nutshell, it just comes down to families taking care of families. And that’s all it is. And the families have inserted themselves into the ecosystem and they become one – and it’s just a simple balance – and that’s all it is. It’s a balance that these things have been taught from generation to generation on managing their own resources and so, um, \[unclear\] disconnect that we have with the DLNR I would like to see more interaction like how you guys having with your DLNR. For us – because for us it was a little bit of a negative impact and maybe I look at it in a positive light that’s how our organization became formed – because as individual families, for example, the issue of the CBSFA, \[Community Based Subsistence Fishing Area\] yeah, trying to be in pursuit in Mo’omomi Beach area – there was a group from our community – small handful of a group – that wanted to propose a co-manage through DLNR and then it came back to our community with rules already in place that they came up with and so, we kinda went back and forth and we decided no, we not going participate in this because we have been managing our resources for 32 centuries and passed down from generation to generation and no need to enter into an agreement to co-manage with the state that has not been managing our resources – it’s been us. And so, that was our decision as well as understanding that we could not come up with one single rule to be imposed on any family that wasn’t abusing area and because we’ve been having this balance over a period of years and so basically that’s how we formed the association because the DLNR tried to pursue it and push it forward \[unclear\] with additional rules that was placed on that – and so till today we’re still battling that with DLNR – the last public testimony had – there was more on Molokai and more in Ho’olehua the particular area of coastline that was in opposition of the CBSFA than there were in support and their report just came out from DLNR and that kind of proved our point and so right now we’re at a standstill – but we’re still pressing forward but right now our organization and association – we have developed into two committees that we have. One is a hunting committee and one is a fishing committee. And what we’re doing is – we’ve already extended to the different islands where we have met with the different islands and so hunting community is basically just hunters – got to be a hunter – because when we have these conversations, we don’t want this Ph.D. from UH or something doesn’t know anything about hunting in these conversations which is the problem \[unclear\] with DLNR. And they wasn’t listening to us, you know, so… Fishing – same thing – when we have our meetings it’s just about fishing issues and as we have these conversations we continue our education amongst each other – what is good – what is not good – what is the practice – across the state. So I’ll just share with you what is native Hawaiian Gathering Rights. So you guys might know already – might be a little bit redundant – but I’ll just base it off of Article 12, Section 7… NP: So let me just clarify. So your association got started because the community on Molokai had had a historical, cultural practices that have actually managed their own resource and they would like to continue having a say from their expert point of view and respect for the management they have already been doing historically and culturally. I just wanted to get that clear – that’s what you’re saying, yeah, and that makes perfect sense that you should have the respect of the DLNR and you should be consulted as a resource and a guide in the matters of the management of the resources. I – GMAC – me – myself 100% support that. But, anyway, go on… 33 GA: Yes, that is correct. Thank you for clarifying that and just to be fair within our own community there has been a division, yeah? So there have been \[unclear\] that have decided that they wanted to make rules – our community – and then there was another large portion of our community that \[unclear\] it’s not OK. But it happened and so currently, that’s the situation right now – a division of our community. Now, the DLNR has had a lot to do with that by trying to push the CBSFA rather than step back and say, hey, you know what, when your community can come together then come talk story with us, you know, and so rather the DLNR come out and trying to push it forward, yeah, as \[unclear\] that’s what we do \[unclear\]. Get out there and make ourselves recognized, yeah, the silent majority basically I guess you could say. Article 12, Section 7 – this is from the haole State Constitution. The State reaffirms it shall protect all \[unclear\] sites customarily, individually, exercise for subsistence, cultural and religious purposes and possessed by ahupua’a tenants for descendants of native Hawaiians who inhabited the Hawaiian Island prior to 1778 subject to the right of the state to regulate such rights – so we have an issue with the cultural disconnect \[the people are connected to the land\] and the role that the State plays – you need to understand the history – and so what is the history of the Hawai’i State Constitution? Well, we all know it’s not a secret, you know, it’s part of our unhappy reality of the past – that the Hawaiian Kingdom was illegally occupied by the United States and then there came the overthrow. So when the overthrow came the Hawaiian Kingdom Constitution was just crossed out – \[unclear\] the Hawaiian Kingdom and they went put the State of Hawai’i. OK. So at that time we know, yeah, that what took place to our people culturally – no one was allowed to speak Hawaiian – so when that takes place, you know, you become – it’s almost genocide – trying to take away – wipe away a culture when you do things like that. Huna was not allowed to be practiced. Things of that nature so historically native Hawaiian gathering rights was created and established as a right to the people by the Hawaiian Kingdom - not the State of Hawai’i. So there’s a disconnect – but we have a disconnect because the State has a disconnect from the culture. If we were under the Hawaiian Kingdom – there would be a direct link to the people – the purpose – this right was given to the people was for their sustenance on the land – so the people were viewed as caretakers of the land, ocean, mountain – the people needed to gain access to the mountain for water, farming – they needed to get access to the ocean – and so these were the real managers of the land and the ocean and till today – we are still those resource 34 managers and that we practice those gathering rights \[unclear\]. I just want to share that understanding the rights that we have as native Hawaiians it’s possible for us to give it up and I’ll give you an example – if a policeman stop you, yeah, if a policeman stop me or Mr. Akaka – you know why I went stop you? No. Can we search your car? Go, go… I no more nothing for hide. I just gave up my rights – I just gave up my rights and the policeman is not going to tell me that I just gave up my rights – and so herein lies the issue that we have with the CBSFA – the fishing proposed rules that when we enter into this agreement to have the State co-manage which we are already managing then we giving up our rights. And so that’s my perspective and then our perspective regarding that, how we gather over here on Molokai is totally different from any place – many, many places – I don’t say any place – but many places within the State of Hawai’i – they no more COSTCO on Molokai – we don’t have COSTCO here but our COSTCO is the ocean. We have a vegetable department which we do our own farming – we have our meat department with the game mammals that we hunt - so we literally live off the land and we really enjoy this life – it’s a blessing for us to be able to live like this and we just want to continue co-existing in this setting so Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights mission statement – the Native Hawaiian Gathering Rights Association’s Mission is to maintain, perpetuate, educate, protect and advocate all the Native Hawaiian cultural customary and gathering practices – gathering rights – so we have a board – we have a kupuna council that consists of nine kupuna – we set it up like that – because we’ve seen past associations/organizations – they start with the intent of doing good things and then it kind of goes south – well, with this we have the kupuna set-up to put us in check if we do something that is not pono or even say something that is not pono and you can bet with the kupuna if they see something that is not right they will say something and they not afraid to hurt our feelings so we need to be sure that we do things pono or transparent. Other than that – I been – this is an awesome – you guys get your GMAC here, but we don’t have one yet on Molokai. NP: What is your county? I’m sorry – so you’re Molokai, Maui County Council and so maybe you can approach them. GA: Maui County… 35 NP: Maybe you could approach them for a county game management advisory commission. That… AA: Yeah, so, Abraham – District 5. GA: Yes… AA: Sound like you guys \[unclear\] arm already reaching out so you already doing a good job already – reaching out to more people – so maybe within the next couple years I think that’s the next voting session – maybe you guys can get something together like GMAC on Maui County – but, right now Hawai’i Island is the only place that has a county GMAC and to have Maui join aboard that would be great and we’ll support that too. NP: So Godfrey, so in reality though, you’re seeing on Molokai the loss of hunting area, game resources, fishing rights – can you talk a little bit about your battle there with what you’re losing. GA: Yes, for example with the CBSFA proposed fishing rules - so people who are not familiar with the fishing and the lifestyle - it’s a very tempting proposal for them cause – those who don’t rely on fishing – they can be very supportive of rules because they believe the rules will help to protect the resources – here’s a fear factor here – those who support the rules in the community can use fear over facts - like COVID - so information can be a bit distorted, yeah, you get truth mixed with speculation and propaganda - the information is being put out there as if it’s facts - that’s what we’re working on. The other issues that we have with the hunting – we just had witnessed in the newspaper that the DLNR received 1.8 million dollars to fence off and remove all game animals within that area and our State GMAC rep on Molokai was never informed or consulted - so we getting issues in that area – we called our state representative – we kinda gave her a piece of our mind and told her, eh, what’s happening is not pono – so this interaction that you guys are having with DLNR right here, I mean, that’s it – right there – this is what needs to happen so that DLNR can kind of understand the needs of the community and be sensitive to cultural practices - and then also keep in mind that one cultural practice Hawaiians going say, oh, you gotta put kapu on this and gotta put kapu on that because back in the day we kill you for breaking the kapu and 36 then you get the other Hawaiian perspective that, you know, we don’t know how for chant, we don’t know how for speak Hawaiian and we don’t walk around with malo - but we practice and we live culturally and interject ourselves and understand the ecosystem and the balance that we have lived. NP: Thank you. That was well put. So, wow, I’m really glad you guys are there and making people aware in this State aware and make the county aware – educating the public, so, hopefully, each island we can ban together and stand up for each other so hopefully we can keep a communication-sharing going on, so anytime you need anyone to come in and stand up with you let us know. Yeah. And it’s good to know what’s going on over there, thank you so much for sharing. Does anybody else have any questions for Godfrey? BL: Hey, Godfrey, Brian Ley. GA: Aloha… BL: I want to say thank you. I went over to Molokai and harvested an axis there a couple years ago and brought it back and shared it with lots of families and thank you for the blessings of having that animal for me – one thing I have issue with is I was born on the island but as you can tell by my skin tone I don’t get a lot of, you know, I get a lot of issues and flack. And, you know, I practice a lot of the cultural things – I hunt pigs like crazy – I give meat away like crazy – is there some way you guys can open it up for like people that are born on the island and have the pono and you know the cultural and the ethics and everything that goes along with it – maybe if you opened it up a little bit more and we can get a little bit bigger grouping, you know, so it’s not such an isolated, small group – just a suggestion – just an idea – just like I said I’ve had a lot of issues even though I was born on the island – I get a lot of flack, even though I try to do everything the right way and you know – take care of my community and the people in my area. GA: Yes, Brian – automatic. That is something that I failed to mention that our association is not limited to just those with the koko, yeah – with the blood – it’s open to those who don’t have Native Hawaiian blood but live in Hawai’i and you practice the culture because really Native Hawaiian gatherings is a cultural practice, and so it’s the same thing as speaking Hawaiian – or dancing 37 hula. But then again remember we live Hawai’i and we respect the culture, yeah? Give me a call – we can talk story…You’re more than welcome to join our thing… NP: Yes, we’ll keep in touch – definitely. Kean you got any questions? Anybody else? ?: Brian, you’re a Hawaiian National, do you know that? You know what the definition of a Hawaiian National? NP: You want to talk… ?: No, no, no. He probably know. NP: Yeah, Hawaiian National? ?: Well, you’re considered a Hawaiian National when your family was in the Hawaiian Islands – if you doing out of Hawaiian blood – but if you trace back more than 100 years – that you been here – that your called a Hawaiian National – before Statehood. Did you hear that – Hawai’i National? ?: 1893… I believe was the date that a got from Dr. Keanu Sai - if you trace your ancestors back to 1893 that were born in Hawai’i you are a naturalized citizen under the Hawaiian Kingdom. ?: Yeah… So even if they came to work for the plantation and any of your family was born here and more than 100 years you’re considered a Hawaiian National. NP: Could you state your name? RC: My name’s Ricky Carvalho. NP: Yeah, there you go… RC: I was a guest invited over here. 38 NP: That’s for the minutes… RC: Yeah. NP: Yeah, thank you. OK. Well, wow, good conversation. Thank you Godfrey so much for spending your time with us tonight. Anyone else have a question for Godfrey or comments? All right, then, thank you. That was very interesting. GA: Thanks everybody. Aloha… e. Nicolai Barca, the new State GMAC representative for Kauai, hunter, fisherman, and conservationist, will speak on the environmental benefits of scientific game management. NP: Aloha. OK. Well, next we were gonna gave Nicolai Barca the new State GMAC representative for Kauai, but he sent regrets that he couldn’t make it so we’ll move on to Old Business. 6. OLD BUSINESS: a. Report on the response of Chair Suzanne Case, DLNR to our advisory letters. NP: We wrote a letter to the DLNR to Chair Suzanne Case – two letters about our concerns and we actually did not hear back. Right now, because of COVID the State Public Records Law is suspended. That means that the State is allowed to ignore public requests for information and transparency so I suspect that that’s the reason why we haven’t heard back from the DLNR – Suzanne Case – but I do trust that our letters are hard to avoid – they are making a difference – we cc’d a lot of people on our letter - you also got the letter so, um, and we cc’d the Governor as well, so, ah, yeah, I think that we do make a difference and we will just trust that we do. And also some New Business… We’ll move on to New Business… 7. NEW BUSINESS a. Discuss legislative strategy for the 2021 legislative session. 39 NP: We wanted to discuss legislative strategy – our strategy for 2021. Unfortunately, Grayson was unable to come tonight. I’m hoping he is the chair of the Legislative Committee and I was hoping we could add Todd Yukataki – we’ll get ahold of him to be on our committee as a public member because he has so much legislative, yeah, so I’m hoping also George Donev? GD: Right, yeah… NP: I’m hoping that you’ll be on the Legislative Committee also, and help us to stop the \[unclear\] over there – I guess it’s gonna be virtual. That’s where we need you George, because you’re really good at stuff like that. What do you think? GD: Yeah, sure. I can take it up… NP: Yeah, the Legislative Committee and help Grayson. So what we need to do is resurrect our bills – they’ve been delayed because of COVID – our bills 2417 and SCR 62 – 2417 was to establish the value of our game resources and that’s a given – we heard from Todd Yukataki – that’s pretty much in the bag – cause it was almost to the home stretch last year so – that one I think GMAC won – we can say it safely. So, pat your guys on the back – we fought hard for that one last year. SCR 62 – that was to establish that on Mauna Kea they need to re-visit the eradication of the sheep because the eradication of the sheep has not solved the Palila decline so now we know it’s not the sheep on Mauna Kea that caused the decline of Palila – that needs to be revisited – that needs to be taken back to the courts and so that bill SCR 138 is to go back to Puuwaawaa to get a game management plan – it was started – what was it called? ?: HPC… NP: HPC – thank you. It began but never completed. So those are really good bills and there’s another bill that Stanley would like to get a legislator to introduce. Would you like to talk about that Stanley? SM: Yeah, um, Godfrey had talked some \[unclear\] about they stacking these organizations against us and I feel that we should have the maybe the state – the legislator – the one that choose the – our State GMAC commissioners because what is happening is now DLNR has the permission from the Governor 40 to choose our commissioners for the state and what they doing is they stacking environmentalists – this guy Nikolai Barca – he’s on big time environmentalist… ?: Eradicate ‘em… He no like pigs though… SM: So we need to get people that are hunters and fishermen there – so I think we need to get a bill together so that we can have our state representatives appoint the GMAC Commissioners not the Governor. NP: For history – it was the County GMAC that fought for the State GMAC and won and then we were immediately surprised to find that we had no say in the choices of the State GMAC commissioners so… SM: Yeah, if every county had a GMAC Commission then it would be simple – they would come from – but now it doesn’t – like Molokai like stuff – Maui County like stuff on them… NP: So Godfrey – since you’re still there – maybe you could ask the Molokai State GMAC representative – what was his name again? GA: Nelson Rapanot. NP: Rapanot, Maui, Molokai, right – if he would consider – we could call him too – be a speaker at our next GMAC meeting to talk about what his experience is on the state commission – that would be interesting. GA: Yes, yes, absolutely, I mean, you know, basically in a nutshell it’s he shows up at the meetings, he shares his concerns and then he gets ignored by DLNR. NP: So we would like to use that to get a legislator to introduce a bill this next year that the selection of the State GMAC commissioners be more of a community input thing. SM: And that they – the Commission has teeth… NP: Yeah… 41 SM: ….you know, they can go in and they can… NP: So it would be more of people who, yeah… ?: With more power… NP: For the actual purpose… GA: ….interject rather quickly about – from the environmentalist’s position, yeah, they list and label invasives - like I heard was mentioned tonight about the Tahitian prawns being invasives but one thing that the DLNR and the environmentalists need to understand – especially coming from a Native Hawaiian background – the animals they’re called game animals – they’re not invasive – they’re introduced game animals, so when you’re talking about goats, deer, the pigs – the puaa, these animals were brought over by the Hawaiians for a resource for the people – a game resource – so they’re not invasive – they’re introduced for a game resource otherwise you got to call the domestic pigs and the cows and the chickens invasive – and then you can go as far as humans and cars and all of this is invasive – so when you say invasive – I think more of like coqui frogs and clidemia, yeah? And those are the things that need to be eradicated but when it comes to the game animals – I just want to rectify and educate regarding that. These are game animals for resource. NP: No, hey, wait a minute – I like the coqui frogs. No, I agree with you 100%. Yeah, used to be a government that actually cared about the people and their food resources – that, that was a priority to the government which we are at a loss right now, yeah, good point, excellent point. Not invasive species – food resource. Thank you. All right so New Business so we got a - hopefully, GMAC can begin meeting with legislators cause the Legislative Session begins January 20. We have to get our – so even from the public if you have any suggestions of bills you’d like to pursue – this is the time we need to group together and even you, Godfrey, if your association has ideas of bills, I mean, you know, we can, that’s what we do. We meet with the legislators right now, as soon as possible, and find one that will represent our bills – sponsor them so, thank you. All right, so the next… 42 ?: Nani? NP: Yes… ?: \[Unclear\] I’m just curious – so just to be clear the Commission voted on Grayson and George to be doing certain actions like serving on the Legislative Committee? I just want to make sure whether it’s needing a motion or not. NP: Well, it was more like I hope they will be on the Legislative Committee. Since Grayson’s not here tonight cause – we can’t make a motion tonight. ?: OK. NP: I was asking George to consider it so we’re not establishing. Actually, we have our committees and I think actually Grayson is already on the Legislative Committee… ?: Yeah, it’s me, Grayson and George… NP: Yeah, I think actually. It’s a matter of getting people back up in their Legislative feet… ?: OK. Sounds good. b. Debate the GMAC position on the closure of Waipio to pedestrians. NP: Thank you so much – so moving on to the next subject matter – I wanted to throw it out there – what – among our commissioners here tonight would be your opinion, your position on the closure of the Waipio county access to pedestrians? I wanted to get your thoughts on that. What is our stand? What is GMAC’s stand on the closure and also from you guys what is opinion. I personally feel that it’s a terrible loss of right – that people wouldn’t be able to walk into Waipio, that’s my personal feeling but I wanted to see where GMAC and our Commissioners stand on that. George are you there? George do you have an opinion about Waipio? Have you hiked down in there? 43 GD: Yes, I have been – quite a while ago – I wish I was more informed on the current happenings. NP: Yeah, Grayson was going to present the bill to us tonight but, yeah, he couldn’t come last minute. But basically, that’s all it is. They are going to preserve rights for Hawaiian cultural rights to hike in or emergency – it’s Bill 217 – we have a very short amount of time. The final reading on it is gonna be possibly December 23 – as far as GMAC goes I would like to add – as our commission write a letter from our commission so I would like to get a vote, on how exactly we do stand on it – so that’s my opinion – what about you, Kean, what are your feelings about it? KU: Yeah, I believe people should have access – that’s part of – not just culture but, you know, people come from all over the world to look at that place… NP: Yeah. And for me – it is for me, my family a historical, cultural practice so… What about you Stanley, what is your opinion. SM: Yeah, I think we should have – let the people walk but then before they go down they have the rangers up on the top advise them of what is proper to do and then… NP: Have good signage… SM: Well signage or the rangers can explain to them, um, that we’ve discussed – a lot of people they block the road from upcoming traffic. I don’t think we should be intimidated by these people blocking the road – I think we should just keep on going, you know, and not give them the opportunity to block the road. NP: Yeah. I get… SM: But as far as stopping people from walking down – I think they should let everybody walk down – what I think they should do is stop the people with the rental cars from going down because that’s the bigger picture. 44 NP: That makes sense – we could write that up in a letter – that’s a good point – limit to local traffic…. SM: Yeah… ?: It was – that’s a county road – I don’t think they can close the road to… ?: \[Unclear\] NP: It’s a county road? ?: That’s a county road because the county takes care of the road – I work state highways so county take care of the road – they fix whatever landslides and everything – they should put more signage if they want, you know, then the enforcement part – it’s kind of hard to tell people where to walk, you know, there are no more guard rails going down or anything so… NP: Maybe a designated foot path… ?: Yeah… They probably could do that if they had enough room, so… NP: Um-hum. What about you Abraham? AA: I don’t have an opinion… NP: Well, so do we want to write a letter from GMAC to the County Council on our position – testimony? ?: Is the Mayor still on the line here with us? NP: Ah, no, he had to go… So I guess we could – just amongst us so Kean votes against the bill to prohibit foot traffic, Stanley votes with conditions… SM: Ah, yeah, they shouldn’t stop people from walking but they should also make sure that these people walking know what to do. NP: So, um… 45 SM: That’s the reason why you have that so called rangers on the top – for educate. ?: Get signs that say “four-wheel drive vehicles only,” not all-wheel drive. So they had conflict with that. If your car is an all-wheel drive they think it’s 4-wheel drive, you know, so that’s there the conflict with that – so now they put “must have 4-wheel drive,” so lot of the tourists get mad because they rent all-wheel drive car and want to go down. NP: Yeah, well, that’s common sense safety right there for sure. Well, then, so George – you say you would prefer to preserve foot access into Waipio? GD: Yeah, absolutely. NP: So then we have four of us and Abraham wants to stay neutral so I suppose that’s enough – we could go ahead and compose a letter and so I would like to ask someone to make a motion that we write a letter. Would anyone like to make a motion? SM: Stanley – make a motion – so we write a letter to the Council or the Mayor recommending the foot traffic with restrictions… ?: Regulations… ?: Why is the push happening? NP: OK. Well the reason why – is because it’s become a safety issue – cause people are walking all over the whole road and then the cars coming and going and so like especially in situations where it’s so steep and so you got to really gas it and you can’t stop when you’re coming up because you’ll get stuck and you can’t get traction to go again and then people have been in the way… c. ?: Let me give you some background – my family on my wife’s side have a farm down there – I used to go down there all the time. Their home was right Kukuihaele so I used to go all the time – I never had any issues with walkers being in the way going up or down. 46 NP: Well… ?: I don’t know maybe now the traffic has gotten bad or… NP: I have my suspicions that this bill might be getting pushed by the charter – by the shuttle operations… ?: So then… NP: The shuttle operations stand to make a windfall… ?: They get several pull off areas that are a little bit wider so we usually – cause I go over there too and the guy that’s in charge – the ranger – he informs the people that going down that the uphill traffic has the right of way and there are pull off areas – when you see traffic coming up on the pull off areas – you’re supposed to wait until that particular vehicle passes you – then you can go down. NP: Yeah. ?: But not everybody follows the, you know… NP: Yeah. OK. Sorry – we got to move on. Anybody want to second the motion? ?: Second… 8. COMMISSIONERS REPORT BY DISTRICT NP: All right, thank you Kean. All in favor say aye. \[The ayes have it\] OK. So we’re out of time – so we’re gonna have to move on – we can quickly – any commissioner’s report by district or committee report? We can carry this on to the next meeting… KU: I have a commission report – District 2 – Kean. Ah, a range report – December 18, this coming Friday the range will be closed from 7:30a – 12:00p for \[unclear\] treatment. Just a quick reminder to all the shooters that go up and use the range – I was up there this past Thursday – I found empty ammo boxes 47 – lot of empty shotgun shells – just trash. We were warned once if the range is kept up that way – it will shut down permanently and this is the same thing that’s gonna happen again. I’d just like to remind everyone who uses the range – please police the area and we should be good for the rest, you know, for our kids and their kids to come to use that range. NP: Yeah, thank you. And you’re on the Shooting Range Committee… KU: Correct. NP: Yeah, and a good time to re-approach the new mayor on getting a new shooting range… OK, so I guess we’re just gonna have to close this meeting for now to be continued – go ahead… JY: Nani? NP: Yes… JY: Just to be clear – who voted in favor because you need five members to vote in favor cause your total number is \[unclear\]. NP: Oh, I thought just the majority would rule. So, no, we don’t have enough to make the letter? JY: Who voted yes? NP: That would be George Donev, Kean Umeda, Stanley Mendes, and myself. Oh, Abraham says he’s gonna kick in… Action: Motion was made by S. Mendes to write a letter to the Council or the Mayor recommending the foot traffic with restrictions. Seconded by K. Umeda. Motion carried. JY: Ok. ADJOURNMENT: 48 NP: Thank you. OK, so if there isn’t anything else for this evening I would like to adjourn. Anyone want to make a motion to adjourn? Action: A. Antonio motioned to adjourn meeting. Seconded by K. Umeda. Motion carried unanimously by voice vote. th NP: Next meeting is January 19. Group: Thank you Nani for all your service… Adjournment at 8:32pm. 49