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Home My WebLink About2019 01-29 Game Management Advisory Commission Minutes Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 Game Management Advisory Commission County of Hawaii Minutes Meeting Date: Tuesday, January 29, 2019 Time: 6:30 p.m. Place: Hawaii County Building – Council Chambers I. CALL TO ORDER/ROLL CALL: Meeting was called to order at 6:30 pm. Stanley Mendes, District 1 – here Kean Umeda, District 2 – here James O’Keefe - District 3 – absent Naniloa Poglen, District 4 - here Vacant Seat, District 5 - vacant Grayson Hashinda - District 6 - here Bronsten-Glenn “Kalei” Kossow, District 7 - here Teresa Nakama, District 8 – here George Donev, District 9 - here Quorum established ALSO PRESENT: Malia Hall, Corporation Counsel Donna Urban-Higuchi, Executive Assistant to Mayor Kim GUESTS: Don Fujimoto – Bird Hunting Ryan Kohatsu, State GMAC CALL TO ORDER: BKK: The Game Management Advisory Commission meeting for Tuesday, January 29, 2019, has been called to order at 6:30p. DUH: One vacant seat. APPROVAL OF THE MINUTES: November 13, 2018 BKK: George Donev moved for approval of the November 13, 2018 meeting minutes as submitted. Seconded by Teresa Nakama and carried unanimously. 1 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 FINANCIAL REPORT: BKK: Teresa Nakama moved for approval of the Finance report as submitted. Seconded by George Donev and carried unanimously by voice vote. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS – Statements from the public will be taken throughout the meeting BKK: And now we’re gonna move to the statements from the public. Is there anybody in the public that wants to discuss anything on our agenda? And, of course, if we bring up any topics – you’re more than welcome to come up and discuss and ask questions as well. Proceeding to our presentations we have Mr. Don Fujimoto. PRESENTATION Don Fujimoto – Bird Hunting DF: My name’s Don Fujimoto – I live in Waikoloa. What I want to talk to you about tonight is a State program that has been going on for many, many, many years and that’s the eradication of sheep on Mauna Kea. And that’s to protect the mamani tree to bring back the palila population. It’s not working – but a more serious issue is the fire fuel load that’s on Mauna Kea. It’s huge, but, OK, you know, last year we had a fire in Waikoloa – it started on Mamalahoa Highway – and thanks to the wind direction it didn’t hit Waikoloa Village – but the winds were blowing but they weren’t especially strong – and the fire kind of moved – casually – down toward Puuanahulu. Took out 18,000 acres of land. Overall in the State 34,000 acres burned so the Waikoloa fire was 53% of the State total. That represented .6 percent of the total land in the State and that’s a really important number – I’ll get back to that later and explain why – attachment one of the handout – if you’ve got it – is an article that was published in the Honolulu Star Advertiser in December and the reason I’m bringing it up is because it’s an article about research on the fire danger on the Big Island done by a researcher at the University of Hawaii – the reason most people don’t know about it – is the papers here did not publish that article. And the article basically says that we are looking in the coming years a 375% increase in fire danger. OK, so, we’ve had a lot of fires recently – we’ve been lucky in that they haven’t taken lives but we’re looking at a lot more danger in the future. Back in October I helped the DLNR do a bird count on Mauna Kea – we ran a bunch of transects – I worked a number of days with those people – but what I experienced really shocked me and that’s the amount of grass that’s growing on the mountain. If you look at attachment 2 in my handout – you’ll see some of the pictures. Now, the first picture is of the Kaohe Restoration Area and the grasses there are really thick – they’re pasture grasses and they’re three to four feet tall, OK. Now the Kaohe 2 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 Restoration Area is an area that DLNR is trying to restore as native forest – but because they’re keeping all the grazers out – the grasses are growing and that was in December. I’ve not been up there recently – but I suspect that a lot of that is brown and that’s a very large area. The second picture is on fire break five and that’s probably three miles up the road from Kilohana check-in station and that’s four to five feet tall and very difficult to walk through. When my dog and I were doing this bird survey, I mean, she got burned out. I got burned out just trying to get through a lot of this grass and, as I said, it’s probably a lot browner now. The next page is the Puunana area out by the Parker cabin and you can see we were up there hunting – Brian back here was in the picture but, again, four to five feet tall – we’re on the road and it’s not like just on the road, you know, like you drive on the public highways – paved highways and you see a lot of grass next to the road and then it shortens out... That’s not what’s happening here – this is what it looks like throughout a lot of the area – so there’s a lot of fire load up there. The reason this is important and it hasn’t hit us yet, OK, I’m gonna switch topics – I lived in Santa Rosa, California in the early 2000s – now in October 2017 Santa Rosa burned and it’s a city of 172,000 people – Sonoma County – the similarity is that like a lot of West Hawaii there’s a lot of grasslands backed by – in California those are hills, but, you know, could be mountains that are pretty much inaccessible. The started back in the mountains – very difficult to fight and so it grew large, intense – then you had strong winds that blew it into the inhabited areas and it couldn’t be stopped – it was so wide and it wasn’t just that a lot of homes burned – 32 people died and in analyzing why that happened – part of it was the speed of the fire – it was getting blown by forty to fifty mile-an-hour winds. And fortunately, our fires haven’t seen that yet – but we get 40 to 50 an hour winds, you know, where we are. Secondly, the fire spread – it branched out – and it was very fast. They were saying that the fire was jumping 150 yards at a time because of burning embers that were being blown by the wind and Santa Rosa did not have a very good alert system so a lot of people A) didn’t know the fire was coming, B) when they knew it they didn’t realize how fast it was coming. A lot of people who died were trying to get their stuff together to get out but ended up being trapped. If you think about the communities here like Waikii Ranch – just below the Kaohe area – has two exits – both of them on the mauka side of the subdivision on Old Saddle Road. Waikoloa has one road in and out. We do have an emergency exit down to the coast but it’s a locked gate. Puuanahulu, you know, if the fire branches out and surrounds Puuanahulu – they’re trapped. So these are issues dealing with West Hawaii but, you know, they’re issues of life and death potentially and the shame of it is that it’s being caused in large part by the efforts on the part of the State – they’re spending money to do that. Now attachment three is last year’s study that is just a summary of last year’s study on the palila population done by the U.S.G.S. and the University of Hawaii – Hilo. And, as you can see, the chart – the last twenty years there’s been an intense effort to eradicate the sheep on Mauna Kea and in spite of that effort you see the palila population going down – in fact – 3 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 the report speculates that there’s possibly about 1,000 birds now and in 20 years or so – they’re likely to become extinct, so, you know, it’s kind of the definition of an insanity – you do the same thing over and over again and expect a different result and the problem, you know, the unattended consequences that we’re getting this huge fuel load up on Mauna Kea – a lot of people, I think, would say, oh, so, you know, the mountain burns – so what? The problem is when you add wind to that and suddenly it’s a huge danger to the communities so we’re spending tax dollars that it’s not getting the job done and we’re risking the lives of people who live around the mountain. It’s not a problem that’s gonna be solved in the short term. My suggestion is let’s stop eradicating the sheep – let them start to come back – but it’s gonna be years before there are any kind of population to control the fire load – at that point we can start controlling the population of sheep so it doesn’t get out-of-hand. As far as the palila? The State is working on the Kaohe area, you know, my opinion is that they’re not doing a good enough job in Kaohe because I don’t think the native forest ever had that load of grass and it’s not just in spots – it’s through the whole restoration area that you’ve got that thick heavy pasture grass. They’re also starting to work on the Puu Mali Restoration Area and I’ve not been there but if they could focus their palila restoration efforts on those two areas and spend the money – instead of fencing the whole mountain and trying to shoot all the sheep – if they could focus on those areas – allow a controlled population of sheep to be back on the mountain to help control the fuel load, you know, we might get to a situation which is doable – right now I know that they don’t have the resources to do what they’re doing now – plus really do a good job in those restoration areas. They need to be mowed – they need to have the grasses cut. When you walk through those areas with heavy grass – you will not see any mamani seedlings. The seeds that are dropped off the trees can’t take hold because the grasses are so thick, so, you know, it’s defeating the purpose of eradicating the sheep because you’re really not helping the mamani. The only place you find mamani growing is small mamani is where the ground has been cleared by volunteers and then planted seedlings, so, anyway, I just wanted to present this information to say, hey, you know, as a State we’re spending money – making an effort that is not succeeding and as a by-product we’re creating a situation that is a danger to the community and don’t take this as criticism of the people working in DLNR here – I’ve worked with a lot of ‘em and they’re first class people – it’s an issue of the policy and the court decision and I think it’s gonna take the Governor saying, hey, we’ll go back to court or we’re gonna ignore those decisions because they’re not working, so, but anyway, thank you for your time. I appreciate it. NP: Thank you, so much, for coming, really appreciate you sharing that information. We had a meeting with Deputy Bob Matsuda in December and he told us that DOFAW plans to increase their efforts to maintain palila population with translocation and study but they don’t mention dealing with the fire fuel problem but they are gonna go full on ahead in increasing their 4 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 efforts and translocation, you know, study – but they don’t have any plans to deal with the grass except for probably fire breaks which are like a four-lane highway dead zones of heavy herbicidal dousing, so that seems to be the solution... DF: Basically one-lane road with grasses overhanging a lot of the road bed. NP: This was at Puuwaawaa... DF: By the way, which you have in your hand is – I sent to all of the Big Island legislators, OK, senators and representatives. I did hear back from one – and that was David Tarnas – but David – I talked to David before about this issue – so he’s aware of it and he said he did talk to DLNR about it and proposed a solution that I proposed which is to stop eradicating them and focus on the restoration areas for their restoration, um, you know, he didn’t get a – he didn’t tell me that they responded in any way but at least he’s on board – but he’s a new guy – I don’t know how much influence he really has but, yeah, the fire breaks can work, I guess, if, you know, they’re wide enough and maintained but if a fire is throwing embers a hundred to a hundred and fifty yards into dried grass that’s like tinder I don’t know how effective they’re gonna be because... NP: If it’s as windy as it has been lately... DF: If you think about it – what I’m seeing is on the west side of the mountain. I don’t know what the other conditions are but that’s where the palila live, you know, a big fire on the west side of the mountain is gonna take them all out, so... SM: Stanley – District 1 – they gonna tell you that we cannot do anything because it’s a federal mandate by the court so they just gonna follow what – that’s what they tell us all the time. DF: My plan is to focus on the life and death issue and submit an article to the Honolulu Star Advertiser. I’ve had luck in getting them to publish articles before and the reason for doing that is to get the Governor’s attention on it – because I think it’s gonna take the Governor saying, hey, you know, it’s too risky and we’re wasting money because I don’t think – and they gotta go to court and I can’t see that it won’t be over-turned. I know that twenty years ago the hunters tried to argue that eradicating the sheep would create this problem, well, and you guys lost and the problem’s here today, so... I think if you go to court and say – you ordered us to do this – it’s not working – and we’re creating a public safety problem – that it might change – but it would take the Governor telling the Attorney General to do that. 5 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 SM: I think us suing the wrong people. We suing the federal government – we should sue the State because the State is the one that is not doing the work. DF: Yeah and not recognizing that, I mean, they’re thrashing around for solutions to the palila and none of it’s working. GD: George here from District 9. It is my understanding – I’ve spoken to some people that are knowledgeable in fire prevention and that have worked in that area and as I understand it that the proposition that sheep could control the fuel loads over there is generally like the answer that I received from them is that sheep are not a consistent form to prevent fuel loads building on the mountainside. Basically, I’ve understood that sheep are not a good way to control fuel loads on the mountain – they seem to be – as I’ve been told inconsistent with where they graze and I’ve also been told that there’s other problems if you introduce animals like that and if their population rise we could see the same thing happening with the mamani saplings as we have with cows entering certain areas in the past – I’m not sure if you have any insight into that? DF: No, my issue is, we have the potential for a deadly wild fire up there and I’ve talked to biologists and heard arguments like that and it’s like – hey, you know, we got a bigger problem – we have a public safety problem, you know, and I think somebody like at the Governor’s level could understand that but if you work inside the DLNR administration you’re gonna run into the biologists who feel that way and maybe they’re right – but I’m sorry if it comes to mamani trees or my family, you know my choices... GD: Right, of course... It seems just like from the fire safety standpoint having sheep not be a consistent control – that’s an interesting consideration to be had. DF: Well, I look at the Saddle Road in Hawaiian Homelands, you know, where every so often you see these giant herds of sheep and I’m not suggesting we turn Mauna Kea into that but you can see what they do in that area and so I would argue with that scientific premise but... Oh... NP: Nani, District 4, I have a question for George. Have you ever seen an area where sheep are inhabiting – how well they clear the underbrush and a balance is the perfect answer – but they’re – they eat grass – they’re better than nothing. DF: If it was only the palila issue with the State spending money on a program that isn’t even working, I mean, they need to change that, but, again, it gets back to the fuel loads and doing nothing is to me is not an answer. 6 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 NP: There are numerous places around the world where they use sheep and goat herds to control grass fire fuels. It’s a common method known and proven all over the world. DF: My community, Waikoloa Village, uses goat herds around the perimeter to create a fire break. I’m not suggesting we load up the mountain with goats because they tend to be browsers, you know, you can see them reaching up and trying to eat the leaves of the trees. Sheep, I know, tend more to be grazers than browsers but I understand they will eat some of the mamani – the low hanging mamani leaves and the seedlings. SM: Stanley from District 1. The reason they do eat the trees is because they don’t have a water source. If they had water then they’ll eat the grasses and not the trees. DF: I think, in terms on consistency, cause I’ve heard that argument also – if you set-up their water source in the areas where you’d like to have them operating they will tend to hang in those areas because a lot of that mountain is dry. GD: George, District 9. What can the Commission do in this regard, really? DF: I don’t know. The one thing that I do want to say is – I’m gonna push this issue forward but I don’t want to push it forward as a hunting issue, OK, I know that hunters have a lot of history and are angry about what’s been going on. The problem is if we push it forward as a “hunting issue” it’s gonna alienate other people who might become allies if we keep it as a public safety issue. So I’m not sure what the commission can do except be aware and maybe spread knowledge of the problem, you know, that there is a potential public safety issue here. NP: Before you go, Don, could you tell us about your experience of bird hunting? DF: I only started hunting four years ago and it was a fabulous year and I have to credit that to probably just natural population growth. It’s been kind of going downhill since then – I have notice the grass is growing – this year was a fairly disappointing year. I did talk to Kanalu about his comment and Kanalu said, well, the statistics show that last year, you know, was like a little over one person per bird – per hunter per trip – now it’s a little less than one person per hunter per trip so it’s not bad but the birds aren’t where we used to find them and they – it’s just been disappointing trying to push through the grass – trying to find them – as things have dried out – things have gotten a little bit better and I’m not sure if it’s because the birds can get through the grasses but, yeah, it’s been slow. You know who has a lot more experience is Brian Ley has hunted a lot more than I have and I’ve hunted with him – maybe he can comment also because I’ve taken a lot of days off this season. 7 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 BL: Brian Ley. I’m a horrible public speaker. Back to the about as far as the sheep go – if you’d like – Don was mentioning up on Saddle Road if you go – like I use that for a classic example – that you look on the right side of the road Hawaiian Homelands – overgrazed, no management on the sheep and where it goes, where it bumps up Hawaiian Homelands to the military base – six years ago was a beautiful hill, lots of brush – did a lot of bow hunting for sheep up there, I mean, there was just – it was just crazy. Turkeys – all sorts of birds and now cause no management on the sheep – it’s overgrazed, the brush is gone, there’s very little vegetation left so the sheep are obviously are way good on clearing everything out if there’s no food – it’s like everything else – they’ve got their preference but not – and as far as the water goes – these waters that we got all over the mountains for the game birds – if it’s not a critical habitat remove the fence and the sheep got access cause I’ve talked with some people and they said they’re only supposed to have the fence to keep the ungulates out of the critical habitat area. If it’s not a critical habitat why do we need a fence around the waters – we’ve got waters over on the Kona side for the goats – there’s no reason why we can’t do it on Mauna Kea when it’s not, you know, a critical high-density palila bird population. And as far as the \[unclear\] this year was dismal, I mean, it was just... And, you know, I’ve gone back, I’ve got – I was noticing going back through Go-Pro videos for the years you could see it, you know, when Don and I first hunted the last day of the season 25 birds and you can look at the video – open ground everywhere – this year same area same dog – two birds – that was it. The grass was so thick the only place you found birds was next to the road. If you go twenty, thirty feet off the road the grass is so thick they can’t get anywhere so if you get off the road you’re just trying to break a leg or kill your dog so, you know, it’s just basic 101 management, you know, where you’ve got the borderline – there is no borderline. It’s solid grass – whole Mauna Kea – last year where I would – Christmas and Thanksgiving limited out an urkel by 8:30 in the morning. Went back to the same place this year – all day long not one urkel – saw two turkeys – that was it, I mean, it was just – where places that were just historically for me have been hunting holes for birds – nothing. I’m acting like a newbie running around all over the mountain trying to find new spots where the birds are and the one place you can find birds – if you can see the dirt you’d find birds and I found a small herd of – I call them Mauna Kea unicorns cause you don’t see ‘em anymore anymore – but mouflon sheep in a little area – nice little trails – everything else - breaking the grass down, laying down eating it up – birds. That’s what we want \[unclear\] you find sheep you find the birds so, you know, they like the trails, they like the thing – same thing with the pigs – we’re getting rid of pigs – the pigs are the only thing that actually get in there root up the ground so there’s some dirt so some new growth and vegetation can happen, so, in my opinion – we need something. We got the dairy closing down – get all those dairy cows and turn ‘em lose up there and we can hunt ‘em in two years. You know – knock ‘em down. You know, we got, like you said, we’ve got it – there’s got to be a middle ground, you know, we can’t have Hawaiian Homelands where it’s just 8 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 \[unclear\] of nubs and everything is just destroyed versus the other side of the road where you got six foot grass and everything that’s native is being choked out and like I’m saying if you drive down farther down Saddle Road – I don’t know what it is – there’s this new invasive vines – has anybody noticed those? You know, those are just covering everything. You can see the humps where the native bushes were – and that’s all it is just green humps. ?: It’s the spot where Daniel K. Inouye Highway meets Mamalahoa Highway that whole area is just inundated with those kinds of weeds. BL: It’s just sad, I mean, you drive down there and it’s just thousands and thousands of acres just taken over by invasive and we’ve got the environmentalists crying about the invasive ungulates nibbling on a few things – we’re losing 100% of – Hawaii is taken over by fountain grass and these vines that nothing can support, you know, there used to be herds of goats with some big billies – I’d see ‘em all the time – I don’t what happened to ‘em but where the goats are gone the vines are taking over, I mean, it’s, it’s sad to see that – and everyone’s complaining about invasive species but the grasses and the vines that are actually destroying the Island are allowed to propagate and nobody has any plans to do with anything about it – you know, fountain grass, these vines – everything else – it’s sad, you know, and nobody knows that these are invasive. All the grasses on the Island are invasive – they were brought in by the cattle ranches, so, all these grasses – invasive – might as well have an invasive animal eating them than their invasive thing. All right – I’ve rambled on long enough, sorry, thank you. NP: Thank you – that was great. BKK: Does anybody have any other questions? Thank you, Don. Appreciate it. DF: Thank you. BKK: Next up we have Mr. Kohatsu. b. Ryan Kohatsu – Mauna Kea Grass Fire, State GMAC RK: Good evening Commission. I was invited here by Nani to speak on a couple of topics so I don’t particularly have a presentation or a speech to give like the previous testifiers but I guess what I can do is – I know you guys talked a lot about the Mauna Kea grass fire but the State Game Management Commission – I can talk about some of the current things that are going on there and I guess maybe for – as it concerns the Big Island more – I’ve kind of personally taken a prioritization in getting a long time project done – the Puuwaawaa Habitat Conservation Plan – it was for the existence of sheep within the presence of endangered species so a big convoluted environmental assessment type of thing that’s now 18 years or so in the making and I think 9 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 it’s hit a point where all the work has been done – it’s just hitting political stonewalls along the way so trying to get that done and in the general sense of the term that would be for lack of a better word some progress toward game management so to speak. There’s been some current events with the 16-Mile Rifle Range – I just got an email forward about some dumping again that is happened – I know a lot of outstanding citizens have taken charge in picking up the trash but it continues and I believe they’re looking for information as to who did that – it’s a bunch of garden trash and lawn trash and stuff like that. As far as the other islands – there’s some – one of the bigger things was that the hunter survey came out from 2018 – they published the results and I guess the results kind of – the top five things hunters wanted was access/acquisition, more hunting days, more hunting land, increased bag limits, stuff like that. I don’t know how the county commission feels about those things but that was a survey that hunters took and that was the results. I didn’t see the raw data so I don’t know, you know, DLNR writes these things it is what it is but that was that. I don’t know if you guys want to know about the other islands what’s going on but, oh, and then bills in the legislature – so I didn’t attend the last GMAC but I was aware that they had created some letters of support for the bills that this county had also submitted. I’m unsure of what they voted but they typically all agree with each other so, yeah, if the letters are good for it than I’m sure they were all in support, but that’s about all I got for the State GMAC – I know Nani’s question was about fire and stuff like that... NP: Thanks, Ryan, Nani here…There was some sort of a rumor maybe, maybe it is, but I wanted to ask you, if you had heard anything from U.S.G.S. suggesting that hunting/hunters should be prohibited or for a period time because hunters, in fact, may increase fire hazards. RK: That came in the context of the Puuwaawaa Habitat Conservation Plan so just to – I don’t know how well people understand HCP but I’ll use and example – take a windmill, for an example, everybody knows a windmill is otherwise legal to make in Hawaii – it produces clean energy – yada, yada, yada, but it sometimes chops up and kills endangered sea birds or endangered wildlife – which is otherwise against the law – so how do you do something that is otherwise legal yet it sometimes has illegal consequences. So one of the ways around that is a habitat conservation plan – so take that analogy and put it to sheep – with the sheep in Puuwaawaa there’s endangered species across Puuwaawaa – endangered plants and they incidentally happen to eat some of these endangered plants – well, how do you keep sheep for public hunting, which is one of the Hawaii Revised Statutes – 183D – one of the State laws to promote, protect, and preserve hunting – how do you do that but, yet, still keep these animals around that might incidentally eat an endangered plant, again, habitat conservation plan was proposed, um, somewhere around 2002 or 2003 or something like that – federal monies were allocated to do it and it progressed along the way a lot of 10 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 time and it’s hit some roadblocks but along those roadblocks – getting back to Nani’s question was – you guys can look it up – the Habitat Conservations Plan Approval would typically sit with the Endangered Species Recovery Committee – similar to like the State GMAC – they’re appointed individuals but they’re tasked with approving and recommending the habitat conservation plans (HCPs). The Board approves them but I believe the ESRC – the Endangered Species Recovery Committee are the ones that try to vet it and then recommend its approval. So the Puuwaawaa HCP sat in the ESRC’s lap and there’s minutes from those meetings just like any other commission has ‘em – you guys can read up on ‘em and one of those minutes came from one specific commission member there that – they’ve done a lot of work to try to mitigate the take of endangered plants there and some of them are still not all mitigated, of course, they’re out in the open and they will be incidentally eaten. Yet, the expanse of what the State is required to do based on this Commission – on that committee – is also to mitigate for fire risks – so they create all these fenced units where they put all endangered plants that are supposed to be theoretically restored or protected in there – hopefully – to offset the take of sheep eating them elsewhere kind of thing. Well, they’re saying that – well, if you’re going to do that we need a good fire protection plan and part of that fire protection plan was large fire breaks, was perhaps maybe dip tanks – people who hunt Mauna Kea see some of the dip tanks on the Unit G and Unit A areas and maintain those things. So, there was a comment from a commissioner that more hunting increases fire under the guise that perhaps your vehicles or ATVs or whatever drying through tall grass – catalytic converter perhaps causing a brush fire. Personally, I’m not sure there’s a whole lot of data for how often that has happened in the past – I don’t think it happens quite often – but, none the less, these are politically appointed people and they can ask for specific things and that was one of them – so – I don’t know – as fast as it relates to like Kaohe and how the previous testifier was talking – they have dip tanks as well on Kaohe, um, this is the thing that the helicopter will come – dip their bucket in and then dump it over the fire if you ever were to get one. How effective? I don’t know – I’m not a fire fighter but, yeah, they have a conscious idea that the fire is a risk – in some places they take more effort to care about that and then others – maybe not so much – so it’s political always in some fashion. I don’t know – there’s a bunch of other things that I could have answered but I know your previous topic was – the previous testifier was complaining about wasting a lot of money for aerial shooting and that kind of thing. I would like to – if the Commission members don’t know – it’s not – it’s considered wasting a lot of money if it’s not your money cause a lot of the aerial shooting that is done in the State of Hawaii is not paid for by State funds – so they’re paid for by federal funds typically under the Section 6 of the Endangered Species Act sometimes rolled into the State Wildlife Grant Program – they’re just legislatively apportioned to the states – so these funds keep people employed and I don’t know – maybe they have no interest in losing those funds so you just continue to do the same work that you’ve always been doing cause 11 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 you’re getting paid to do it so to speak so... I think maybe, yeah, I see you guys down here I guess you guys probably don’t know that but just for a record, you know, if the public or anybody reads that – and wondering, wow, we’re wasting all this money- well, it’s not always theoretically the State’s money so maybe they don’t care so much. I don’t know. NP: Very educational. You covered all of my questions. RK: Also – the Puuwaawaa HCP – that plan since it’s been so long – Deputy Bob Matsuda had and with Kanalu – the West Hawaii Biologist – had – because it stalled with the specific committee to get the endangered species side done – you could maybe say endangered species folk don’t want to see your animals there in general so they don’t want to see the plan move forward but there was an alternative pose that maybe the DOFAW – Division of Forestry and Wildlife – can go to the Board the BLNR that approves plans for the State and suggest an alternative – the alternative being a management plan for the animals under the idea that the State has the prerogative to manage endangered plants and game species on State land instead of always having to ask somebody else for permission so that is current in the process, I guess they’re trying to figure out how that’s gonna be structured and told to the Board and then maybe getting – I believe they’re gonna get Board direction on it and also Attorney General direction as well, so this is something that they had talked about for a few meeting now and who knows – maybe around March or so we’ll see something come forward. NP: Nani here... Have you heard anything more about the fencing of the Hinahina area in Puuwaawwa? RK: The Henahena unit? NP: Henahena, yeah. RK: It’s like 900 acres – something like that – I don’t know – that – is there something specific you wanted to know cause as far as I know that unit – there’s probably some endangered individual species plants but it’s particularly was built for the cave system that is under it – how a fence protects a cave under it I don’t know but it is what it is. NP: My understanding is that they were preparing to fence that area? RK: I already saw the fence posts up. NP: So I was fortunate enough to take a tour up there and the only sheep we saw were in that area. 12 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 And it certainly was the most prime habitat so when they fence it they go out or they’re slaughtered but it seemed like that’s the only place we saw them. RK: Like past surveys of the Puuwaawaa area, you know, back in the day the whole area used to have a pretty wide distribution issue – over years there’s been eradication efforts, not particularly staff eradication efforts but kind of liberal, open, hunting seasons and things like that that cut down the numbers mostly due to the Blackburn Sphinx Moth – an endangered moth – so it’s a history with how numbers got cut down around area but the recent studies were recent flights and surveys had typically put the largest population that was left in the old safety zone area which is anywhere from the cinder cone down to the highway and then encompassing the residential area – that’s there as well. NP: Right. I take that back – that’s the other place we saw lots of sheep. RK: That’s the other place, right... Yeah, so I think the Henahena one they’ll push ‘em out – after they fence it they’ll push ‘em out if they can or whatever but I guess the thing to take away from that is the Henahena fence is part of the mitigative actions for the HCP plan - a plan that is not yet approved, so I want the public or commission members to understand that hunters are holding their breath hoping for this plan that’s gonna happen but yet you have to do all these measures for the environmental and endangered species stuff first or kinda, I guess. So you get ‘em all done- you building all the fences – then what? Then they still tell you you still cannot have your plan, you cannot have your sheep, I mean, it’s not enough. So this is what has been happening over the years is that the target of what is acceptable and OK is continuing to move so it’s like you’ll never hit it kind of thing, meanwhile, that’s one of the larger – I think that’s the largest fence in the mitigative measure is Henahena. There are smaller fences as well going up – I think you folks may have seen the cinder cone – the fences on the cinder cone is going up as well- the areas that weren’t fenced in the cinder cone are now are going to be fenced – if not they’re already – last year I saw the posts already going up – there’s no endangered plants in those areas so, you guys can think about that – like we’re supposed to be mitigating for these endangered plants – we’re building fences that don’t have endangered plants in ‘em because they want to get the community in there to plant plants so, um, you know, I think the hunters have been patient enough to waiting and to getting this done, but, it’s at a point where I think everyone that’s watched it evolve over time sees that it was never meant for the hunters to get it so we got to think of – that’s why the alternative was posed and maybe even just getting public support for what is already there – I have no idea where it’s going – all I know is that as far as game management of game mammal species go in this State I don’t think any plan has had as much money, man hours, or attention given to it as this one and it seems the State is stalling it within themselves – so... That’s my priority 13 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 right now on the State GMAC is to just get one done – get one road paved – get one wall built, I don’t know but... It is what it is so... SM: Stanley Mendes, You know what I’m afraid of is Puuwaawaa going mimic Mauna Kea pretty soon. What they did to Mauna Kea they’re doing to Puuwaawaa – cause if you look in the bird sanctuary – it’s like Mauna Kea, right? Everything is overgrown and everything so now when they plant – when they take the animals out from Henahena going look the same way – now next to the bird sanctuary on the Waimea side – and nice forest over there and they not fencing that place but the forest is way nicer than what’s in the sanctuary, you know what I mean, because the animals are there taking care of the, you know, the under growth... RK: You hit a key point. You know Mauna Kea became a federal court order because of an endangered species, because the State maybe was negligent in their endangered species duties. Now with Puuwaawaa having sheep present in the area there’s been some suggestions by key influential people that is if you don’t have a plan to mitigate or protect endangered species there in the presence of keeping the sheep for public hunting you are theoretically in violation of the endangered species act... So they try to promote this idea that you can’t have seasons, you can’t have bag limits, you can’t have all these things because all those things can be construed as game management and be construed as contrary to the Endangered Species Act – that you’re not following the law – however, I kind of said this earlier – the State – I feel and I think others along the commission – on the State Commission feel as well – that the State has prerogative to manage these things for the State of Hawaii for the public trust of the people – they’re just kinda not taking that prerogative – they’re letting the feds and whoever else tell them what to do – so it’s very political – it’s very difficult but I think there’s been little progress here – seeing the reality of the hunting community has taken the proper steps to get to this point and then getting a stonewall – so there is legislative attention on some of these things that plans aren’t moving forward that have been in the works forever so hopefully there’s some hope there. I don’t know... SM: Because they’ve been opening just the buffer zone all these years... They haven’t been opening all around. 14 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 RK: There’s a lot of unsaid things in that one but there’s not – as far as the surveys go – there’s not a whole lot of animals that were in the outside areas – the mauka areas – as compared to the safety zone area... SM: On the Waimea side – last year – had plenty on the Waimea side…but this year I don’t see anything. RK: Right and wild dogs is a very huge thing there – not so much – I mean they do take adult ones – we’ve studied that quite a bit but they do take a lot of the young, so, you know, we see a degradation in the – you see only old animals left and you don’t see any young and the keiki and stuff like that and so there’s been predator control efforts and they’ve taken out quite a bit of ‘em and it has – I say this with caution – it has rebounded the population but understand when you rebound that population and you don’t have a plan that puts endangered species in context with it – together with it – that’s technically illegal – this is how our State – our high up in the State might view that – they might view that as a violation of the law – so this is why, I mean, this is why this Commission or even the State on was formed – to create game management plans and that plan is supposed to take into content all of the applicable laws and try to meet them and balance that out – and that’s what we’re trying to do. But, you know, that’s politics right there – that’s policy making so... But, yeah, I’d just like to stress that – the importance and priority of those things because if we continue down the status quo of not creating a structured way of how we deal with these things – how we meet all of the laws and this and that – the endangered species wins, I mean, that’s just the way it is – you’re gonna get more eradication if we don’t do something like that is mutually agreed upon so... I don’t know, I mean, that has implications with the previous testifiers – things about Mauna Kea – that’s the end, right, when you hit a court order now you’re kinda done, you know, it’s a lot of work to reverse something like that, so, before those things happen – is the reason why you need these management plans, so, I don’t know, that’s what – that’s all I’m working on State side – a lot of the other commission members other islands have – they have a bunch of other things they kind of get in the weeds with – like rules and what kind gun they can hunt with and all this other stuff but my priority focus is getting that plan done and it may come, I’ll admit it – it may come at the negligence of me not looking at the rule changes and all these other things that I kinda think are not as important but if that’s wrong than please let me know – but it’s just what I am doing. SM: Thank you for all you’re doing... NP: Thank you so much. It was very informative. BKK: Thank you Ryan, is there any other questions from the commissioners? 15 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 KU: This Kean, correct me if I’m wrong – for every money that State uses for eradication – does the federal government match that? RK: How do you look at that – when I said Section 6 \[unclear\] of Endangered Species – that’s legislatively apportioned to the States – I’m not entirely sure how whether or not that is matched – I don’t know about that – but you might be referring to something similar as like Pittman-Robertson funds, which the State will fund the full cost of a project – get an approval to do the project and then the Feds – after the project is done – the Feds will basically reimburse them 75% of the project. Pittman-Robertson funds – as far as I know and this has been asked in the past too – I can’t prove it though but as far as I know are not used toward any eradication-type actions or rather would be prohibited from eradication-type actions – there is one thing, thought, about Pittman-Robertson and federal dollars is that – I mentioned Section 6 – there’s another section of the Endangered Species Act – I’m getting in the weeds here – it’s called Section 7 – Section 7 is basically says that no federal dollars can be used toward anything that is deemed detrimental to the endangered species. This is determined by maybe the Pacific Office of the Fish & Wildlife Service. So when we take State dollars to do a project – say build a water unit on Mauna Kea like the previous testifiers have explained – it’s – those water units are fenced – I can explain why they’re fenced – they’re fenced because that money was matched with federal dollars – the Feds said OK we’re matching you to build this water unit – Section 7 says we cannot use any of the money to anything that would be detrimental to the endangered species – detrimental maybe to the palila. The presence of sheep on that mountain would be deemed detrimental to palila from them so therefore they have to fence that water unit so no sheep can use it but birds can because maybe birds aren’t deemed detrimental yet – so that’s the balance between when someone – the State uses federal funds to do something and when, you know, I mean, there’s been talk to try and say, oh, how come we don’t just use State dollars all by itself, right? Don’t match it – so it just comes with the rules – there’s talk about that too – but you know that takes some influence to get done, so... I don’t know – just trying to be as educational or as layman as I can about it. OLD BUSINESS: Papaikou Community Association – Fishing Community BKK: Thank you, Ryan. Any other questions? Moving on to the Old Business - the Papaikou Community Association – is there anybody from that association here? Teresa, do you know? BKK: We’ll skip over that unless anybody has any comments to make on that because we don’t know too much information as far as what they wanted to share. 16 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: What they wanted to share was the chemical spill that went into the shoreline... BKK: We’ll move forward to the committee assignments and one of the – in the binders that you folks received there is a sheet on committee assignments – I realize that there is committees but there is no leaders to those committees and I was hoping that the Commission would select leaders to represent those committees. TN: You’re saying they should volunteer? BKK: Volunteer, yeah. And the example would be – there’s a Legislative Committee and I understand there’s four people in it – but who do I go over and talk to? Do I talk to all of them? MH: This is Malia. It would be good to have a chair of the committees so, basically, yeah, like you said – people could volunteer to be that chair and then they could be the main communication point to kind of get the information out to everybody – it would probably be easier for you guys than having to chase everybody down... BKK: I was hoping that we’d have everybody here and I understand that Teresa is already the chairperson for one of those committees – the Traditional and Customary Practices. So, if possible, I would like to move forward on it – I just don’t know who would want to say I want to do it. MH: Maybe you could just list each committee and then see if anybody volunteers, yeah? BKK: We have the Government Affairs Rules and Legislative Committee; the Traditional and Customary Practices; Public Outreach Shooting Range Work Group; and the Communications Committee. TN: If there’s no volunteer – can they be assigned? MH: I mean, there’s no rule against it but it would be better to have a volunteer, yeah? NP: Perhaps we need time to think about it. BKK: I agree... NP: Maybe you should make a motion to postpone it to next meeting? BKK: OK. Is there a motion on the floor? 17 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 NP: Nani Pogline moved to postpone this decision or this election or suggestion to next meeting. Seconded by George Donev and carried unanimously be voice vote. b. Committee Assignments TN: I’ve looked over the committees and I was wondering if we would consider the Government Affairs Rule and Legislative Committee to just the Government Affairs instead of having two separate titles. BKK: So that – was that a motion? TN: Well, I want them to consider that because if I put in a motion than I would need a vote. So, I don’t see why not – we shouldn’t have too many committees then doing the same job – so all right – I would like to move that the Government Affairs Rules and Legislative Committee just be under the title Government Affairs. I need a second... NP: Second... BKK: Teresa was the main motion, Nani was the second – is there any discussion? Not hearing or seeing none – motion on the table to change the name of the Government Affairs and Legislative Committee to just the Government Affairs – all in favor say aye. \[The ayes have it\] All opposed? Motion carries. TN: I’d like to make another suggestion being that we have a Public Outreach which I feel that it should be titled Public Relations not a Public Outreach. So, if it’s OK with the members that I move that we change the Public Outreach Committee to Public Relations Committee. BKK: There’s a motion on the table. Anybody second? GD: George Donev seconds... BKK: A motion was made by Teresa, seconded by George to change the Public Outreach Committee to Public Relations Committee. Is there any discussion? Let’s move forward to voting – all in favor say aye. \[The ayes have it\] All opposed? Motion carries. TN: I’d like to make a motion to remove the Communications Committee and combine it with the Public Relations Committee – so we don’t have too many committees. BKK: Is there any discussion? 18 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 NP: Sorry, Nani here. I actually oppose that because the Communications Committee has already been given powers to collect information and do things somewhat autonomously which I’m afraid changing the title might disrupt the pre-ordained authority of the Communication Committee. GD: George here. Can you give a quick summary of what those powers are and what the Communications Committee’s main objective is? NP: The Communications Committee can collect information without running it by all the commissioners beforehand. GD: George here, by information you mean from the public? From agencies? And to what extent? NP: Yes, it just depends – there’s just a lot of different situations but it just gives autonomy which is really nice and I’ve enjoyed that benefit kind of frees you up a little bit to move. GD: George here. So that would be to report back to the commission itself – that information. TN: Question here. Wouldn’t the Communication policies go – could go under the Public Relations? I mean, it doesn’t divide that – it doesn’t separate it – it’s the same thing – it’s just changing titles. The carryover of the duties of the Communication Committee would still be under Public Relations and you would not defer you from doing what you’re doing right now. It would just lessen how many committees we have because right now there’s no committee reports being done. NP: I like the way it was but I can be outvoted. TN: So I still stand on my motion to move the Communications Committee and combine it with the Public Relations. BKK: There’s a motion on the table – is there a second? Without hearing a second I don’t think the motion can go through. GD: George here – is there a specific reason or benefit to combining the two committees or is it more for the sake of simplicity... TN: It’s more for simplicity and not having reports from the committees. If we have too many committees then we don’t have members volunteering to chair that committee. Why we have committee titles that no one’s chairing? 19 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 GD: George here – I think that’s a good point. TN: So to lessen the burden of the members here – if we combine the committees it’s not taking away any powers from one title to the next – it’s just eliminating a committee so we have more efficiency on our board. Cause right now we don’t have efficiency. GD: George here – what’s the last time you’ve gotten a report from any committee? I guess this... TN: The only committee we received a report was from me and Bronsten. I haven’t received any other committee report from anybody else. GD: Was that committee report for the Traditional and Customary Practices? BKK: I recommend that we table this until the next meeting until - we can probably have a little bit more of a discussion. Stanley did you want to say something? SM: Yeah, I’m seeing here that the Public Outreach you have Nani and George and then the Communications you have Nani and Teresa. BKK: Right. SM: So who going chair – you know what I mean? BKK: That’s a good point... TN: Yeah, so this is why if we combine the committee we’re not so spread out, you know, we’ll be doing the same job – we can be in more than one committee – so if I’m already chairing one committee the next person can the chair the next committee. SM: Yeah, but you chairing... TN: Traditional and Customary Practice... SM: You chairing – no – Public Outreach, let’s say – you chairing Public Outreach... TN: So I wouldn’t be chairing the next committee... SM: No, that’s what I mean, but... 20 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: I can still be a member of it... We’re limited to nine commission members and we have all these committees and we’re not using it to the full extent that we should because no one takes... MH: Sorry \[unclear\] order – there’s a motion on the floor – the motion doesn’t have a second so either it fails or the Chair tabled it so... BKK: So the motion’s tabled for now. Moving on to New Business... NEW BUSINESS Shoreline Fishing Registry, Permit, and License (RPL) BKK: There was a meeting last year at the beginning of the end of last year regarding the RPL and there was various meetings that was held throughout the State by Conservation International. I believe, Teresa, you have a little bit more of report for that. TN: I was wondering if any of the Commission members attended the RPL Study Group Meeting on November 28 in Kona of 29 in Hilo. Ah, 27 and 28, excuse me... GH: This is Grayson – District 6 – I did attend the Kona meeting. TN: Could we have your take on it Grayson? GH: It was interesting – I didn’t quite understand the intent behind it and I wasn’t clear on who the group was and what their motivations were – so in my mind there seemed to be more questions than answers. BKK: This is Kalei – were you able to stay for the whole thing? GH: No, I wasn’t able to stay to the very end. TN: I went to both meetings in Kona and Hilo and my views recently on this study group – Conservation International – that was held in Kona and it seems that their goal was to have their specific outcome and they did not give the fishing communities the right of choice – not to support the issue of recreational fishing registry and permit and license. At both meetings – in Kona and Hilo – it was very apparent that their goal was to create invisible chaos and not have transparency in their strict control methodology to have a specific outcome and a take away the rights for audience to have the freedom of choice including their rights to say no, we do not agree. The presenters were smart and intelligent and enough to do their devious ploy and make their smart invisible attach to divide the audience into less smaller groups and make them argue amongst themselves. We needed to shift the perspective of this 21 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 study group function – pushing its personal agenda via a strict podding of recreational fishing communities and divide them into small groups and then with their combined method persuade each small group to have no alternative to say no. I was very disturbed and I didn’t know what was going on and what their whole intent was to give information that – through what has happened in Florida they wanted to apply here. Hawaii is a unique Island. I don’t feel they have the basis to register recreational fishing because how does a grandfather take a grandchild to just throw the pole in the water – it doesn’t matter what they catch or not – it’s the activity – that this group wants to put a registry and I need – what I’m asking for is to write a letter and I’m being pro- active – we draft a letter – present it to Mayor Kim – and say we oppose any registry permit and licensing of recreational fishing and that’s my motion for tonight. I’m not sure how everyone else feels about this but I was very disturbed that Conservation International did not allow the public to speak at both meetings and they only wanted to – it’s supposed to have – they wanted – their sign said exchange of information and every time anyone in Kona or Hilo wanted to ask a question they were shut down. So I’m very disturbed about that. BKK: This is Kalei. What was the motion? TN: The motion is to – for GMAC to write a communication letter to have the approval of our Mayor to put a letter together stating our constitutional right of Article 11, Section 6 and it states the word of the law shall be free to the public. It’s a constitutional law – I want to attach that law along with Article 12, Section 7 and our position. NP: Teresa would you write that letter? TN: I did... NP: And then can we have time to read it and next meeting agree and then you can put it in the mail... TN: Did we make copies for everybody? BKK: I don’t think so... TN: If you want to Nani, you can read it... NP: I fully support your stand Teresa. TN: It’s just a communication to have Mayor Kim to approve that we send these things – this is being pro-active – there’s no bills – there’s no legislative going through this legislative session asking for an RPL registry permit and license. But I want to be pro-active – I want to say that for this State of Hawaii – we’re 22 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 a unique situation – we live in the middle of the – and there’s no premise – there’s no foundation for them to do this. We don’t have a depletion of population \[unclear\] the aquarium collectors are on legislation right now and they said DAR Division has studies that fish populations abounds in Hawaii – it’s so funny but they tell us fishermen there’s a depletion of our resources – so there’s a conflict of who’s telling what at DAR Division. So it’s just a simple letter stating our rights and that we at GMAC opposed any RPLs. GD: George Donev here – a letter to who? The Mayor? TN: For the Mayor to approve the letter to the legislators. GD: Oh, OK, so the letter would be going to the legislators? TN: Yes. BKK: But the original intent is to write the letter to the Mayor because we go directly to him...this is a County commission and then if he approves or if he has the same philosophy behind it then we can progressively work with the legislature. GD: Thank you... BKK: Teresa Nakama moved to write a letter to Mayor Kim and from there move forward to work with legislature on this. Seconded by Nani Pogline. BKK: So the motion was made by Teresa, seconded by Nani. Is there any other discussion. KU: Hi, this is Kean. Teresa – I work with a lot of fishermen and I talk to them regarding this – I didn’t go to the meeting but the consensus from the fishermen – they some – the majority did support some kind of license – as long as that monies would go directly back into, you know, fishery, where and, and... TN: That violates our constitutional rights... KU: And that’s what another guy said. It was real interesting to see that but from what I understand that money would go into a general fund – is that correct? TN: I don’t know... KU: Yes, that’s what I was told. 23 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: And I’m not sure where the funds was gonna be – but back in 1995 – David Tarnas at the time was our representative and the AG office wrote to him – this is back in 1995 when they wanted to put registry license and permit - in the AG office – that’s how I found Article 11, Section 6 – because of the letter of the law shall be free to the public – that it did not pass back in 1995. KU: OK. In that case, yes, I agree what you. BKK: Is there any other discussion? AA: Abraham Antonio. Regarding the licensing thing – like there’s next month – and I see where you guys going with your with the grandparents and the grandchildren and stuff like that – next month out in District 6 there’s a event coming up with a lot children and families and so – I took my kids twice – I think this is their sixth year event – maybe Grayson know how many times about six years, I think... BKK: What’s the event? AA: Some kind of keiki fishing at Punaluu. It’s coming up next month on the – but if there was a licensing thing how could that effect that kind of event or even tournaments that – like Tokunaga’s Tournaments that people come from off-island and just Hawaii Fish Club and like how would that affect all those people. BKK: We had the same exact questions but we were shunned. It was like we don’t want you to ask any questions. TN: At both meetings – we were shunned from asking anything. BKK: And that was exactly the same exact question I had for them. TN: That’s why we’re writing a letter in opposition... AA: I would support you too... TN: Thank you very much. BKK: The motion still stands. Any further discussion? Without hearing or seeing none – the motion on the table is to write a letter to Harry Kim in opposition of the RPL and, if approved, to move forward with the legislative outreach. All in favor say aye. \[The ayes have it\] Any opposed? Motion carries. 24 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 b. Proposed GMAC Rules BKK: The next topic we have is under New Business – it’s in the white binder – it’s the proposed GMAC Rules. My apologies for not sending this out right away. I had lots of typos. TN: Bronson – Teresa – is this the one that’s a page a third? BKK: Correct. It says Game Management Advisory Commission Draft was created on November 8, 2018, and it basically talks about the organization and meetings – talks about the elections – transaction of business – the committees – one of the things I noticed when I started on this committee or on this Commission is there’s no structure and I was hoping that this could help as the structure for this Commission. TN: Would it be appropriate if I made a motion to accept the rules as submitted? MH: In order to do rules it has to be properly noticed – it has to be posted online so that basically you would have to do it next time, cause... BKK: I would actually recommend that people read through it first before we decided to even go for it? MH: Yeah, I think you have a couple things, – number one for under meetings it says each month at 6:00p, which I don’t mind if we move the meetings up to 6:00 but I don’t know if you meant to make 6:00p or you want to keep it at 6:30p – that’s totally up to the Commission and then – on number 5 – on the back side – it says a quorum is 2/3rds of the current – that’s actually a lot, um, I would just say a majority is probably a better term to say a quorum is a majority of the currently appointed. Cause that would be – right now you guys have 8 so 5 would be a quorum at this point but 2/3rds then you would need 6, I believe, which would, you know, this – you guys have really good attends – I have to say – much better than a lot of commissions but you would make it a little harder on yourselves if you say 2/3rds, yeah. BKK: I would like to table this but if there’s any discussion I would like to get some feedback on what they would like to see inside the proposed rules and we’ll just move forward from there. GD: George Donev here. I would like to keep the time at 6:30p if that’s possible. BKK: It might have been just me just putting a number... COMMITTEE REPORTS Legislative Committee 25 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: I have a report and I’m gonna read it because I wrote it. On Tuesday, January 15, I travelled to Oahu to attend two meetings with the Legislature as a representative of our County GMAC. These meetings were about the introduction and support of our bills – also in support and attendance of the meetings were three commissioners from the State GMAC – the Chair, Laurie Buchanan of Molokai; Robert Kramer of Kauai and Stanley Ruidas of Lanai. The first meeting was at 1:00p with Representative Ryan Yamane and Yamane agreed to submit three of our four bills under the condition that we vowed to get behind the bills and work hard to gain more support and he made us vow and we did and one bill is designed to give teeth to the State GMAC in relationship to DLNR decision making because the State commission was formed but now they’re finding that they have no impact – no effectiveness with the DLNR, so the bill is to put their – put it to them – that they have to work with the State GMAC and another bill is to give the State GMAC say in allocation of the Wildlife Revolving Funds where they can have influence where that money goes and, hopefully, get that money to go... MH: Sorry. We need to pause the meeting until we get connection back. BKK: What are the number, Nani, do you have the numbers for the bills? NP: These were the bills for the House and then we have two set of bills also which are here – on the top here... \[Technical difficulties\] GH: Now I can hear you guys. BKK: Can you see us? GH: No. MH: I’m sorry, as long as he can hear us... BKK: Oh, can you answer your phone? MH: As long as he can hear us and we can hear him it’s fine... BKK: Grayson, we’re gonna move on with the meeting but as long as you hear us we can continue. Are you OK with that? GH: Yes, I am, thank you... BKK: OK. Thank you very much. Nani – please proceed. 26 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 NP: All right, thank you. So and also we talked about a bill requiring the DLNR to allow and encourage more voice from public users regarding game resources and hunting opportunity. In the meeting – we worked together to craft words for the bills – the deadline for the bills was the following day so we anxiously hoped they would make it under the wire. Our second meeting was at 3:00p with Senator Ron Kochi – who is also in support of us and he, too, agreed and made efforts to get our bills out by request and afterwards we went door- to-door trying to talk to legislators – a lot of them weren’t in – we left messages with their secretaries trying to gain support for our bills and overall we were really well received – it was a really good day – we felt productive and since we received the news that our bills did receive numbers and they did make it – but now, now we’re informed that there’s a lot of opposition, of course – so the first committee the bills go to is the Energy, Environmental Protection Committee and the Chair of that is Nicole Lowen and she doesn’t want to deal with the bills – but, so, the good thing to do – if anyone would like to be in support is to address the legislators in the Energy and Environmental Protection Committee – encouraging them to support our bills – that would be our first step. MH: They’re HB591, HB 590, and HB1325 – there may be more but those are the ones that I have down for no. NP: Yeah. It is HB – well, they have different – it’s really confusing in the Legislature, but, the way they’re coming out there – HB591 and then HB1325. I could get this out in emails and HB1122 – but there’s also Senate Bill 321 and Senate Bill 323. I can compile these and forward them. BKK: Can you repeat those numbers for the Senate bills and the House bills. NP: OK. House Bill 591 – relating to watershed areas. That requires the DLNR to obtain approval of the State Game Management Advisory Commission in their designation of areas of watershed. House Bill 1325 relating to the DLNR about approval from State GMAC, yeah, it’s kinda long – but just you can look up these bills and read ‘em for yourself; and then HB 1122 relating to land use and the DLNR and it’s best you read them. Are they in here? BKK: Most of them are in there but I don’t think 1325 and 1132 is. NP: Yeah, and so and right – and SB321 and SB323. BKK: And those are all the bills that you worked on with the State GMAC and our representatives up there? NP: Generally. 27 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 You know, they have to make their wording and who knows how they’ll be tweaked from here but it’s a long process and, but, Representative Yamane – he really asked us as a community to really get behind and give support since he’s sticking his neck out to represent these bills. BKK: OK... TN: I’d like to ask the members to look at the 2019 GMAC bill that is printed out in the folder. BKK: This is the one that’s in the grid – it has about 18 bills on there that relates to GMAC. This one... TN: The bills that are relating to firearms – the Hawaii Firearms Coalition started a Facebook page on it and they have a template that you just tap on to the template – these bills are not being heard yet – they’re still just going into committee but you can send an email in support of these bills or in opposition, I’m sorry, in opposition of the relating to firearms because these bills is taking away out second amendment right to bare arms and so on the Hawaii Firearm Coalition – they have a Facebook posting that you tap on to it – it takes you straight to the emails of all the Legislators – you put your name address and you write you’re in opposition of and you press the button – send – and it’s just an email – none of these bills right now are being heard – so no testimony is being accepted at this time. GD: George Donev here – I propose that we don’t address these firearm bills as a Commission because... TN: Oh, I’m not saying as a commission that we oppose or support – I’m just telling you what is going on... GD: Oh, just for information? I think, things related to firearms are completely out of our purview... TN: Yeah, no... TN: Hunters hunt and they don’t want their rights taken away so I’m speaking up for the hunters and these bills will, you know, violate their second amendment rights so... I’m just letting you know that there is a group – there’s several groups – there are several organizations that has asked for support and if the public here or members feel that, you know, individually, that you can look up more information – you can to Hawaii Firearms Coalition, OK? And, um, now I wanted to ask about the other bills – the bills that Nani spoke of and some of ‘em that she did not mention and that’s House Bill 590, 591 – Senate Bill 321, House Bill 25 regarding to Public Safety. 28 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 BKK: She didn’t bring up HB 25. NP: You got to understand, before I went to talk to these people our bills did not have numbers and so the whole – we had subject matters – we weren’t assigned a number yet and so these numbers are confusing coming at us right now – how they decided to dissect it – put it together – is something we’re still figuring out. But basically the bills are about giving the State GMAC more power both in the spending of money and in the say of what’s done on public hunting land and there’s also one on the constitution – to put the animals back in the constitution so I’m not sure if that one flew... BKK: Is there anything that the Commissioners or the Commission itself can do to – would we want to send a letter in support? NP: Yeah, contacting legislators – you can contact them via email or call and give your support. TN: Are there any bills here like the Hawaii Apprentice License Program we’ve been working on? NP: Right, that one also – I found out later – got resurrected – that we didn’t even bring up the subject of it and some legislator resurrected that one. TN: So it’s Senate Bill 927? NP: The Apprentice License... TN: So is there any of these bills that is listed on this spreadsheet that we’d like to support as GMAC? BKK: Well, I think that bills that Nani had stated – more recent, she’s been working on in the Legislative Committee – we should be able to support – also the – if there is a motion to support any of the other bills that’s listed we can probably entertain those as well... TN: Do you feel that the members need more time to look over the bills before they decide whether they want GMAC to support this. NP: I assume GMAC already voted – well we did already vote on these bills before we voted on ‘em and everybody was in support. TN: Oh, so do we need a letter from GMAC? BKK: So the ones that Nani has listed already, we already have supported them. 29 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: Yeah, I know we support them, but because it’s 2019 it’s a new legislation – do we need a letter from GMAC to keep supporting on these bills? SM: This is Stanley – I think that’s why she went down – representing GMAC – and then... TN: Yeah, but they didn’t see every legislator so we need to have our voice on every legislator’s desk that GMAC supports these bills – that Nani supported – you know what I mean? I mean... I mean if you don’t have something on paper saying we the GMAC Committee support these bills – then it goes over their head because there’s 25,000 bills at the legislation, you know, and so they need something concrete. MH: I also would just like to make a point of order that you need to get approval from the Mayor – if you’re gonna write a letter as a Commission – it needs to be approved by the Mayor. BKK: So does anybody want to send a letter in support to some of these bills to send to Mayor Kim first and then... TN: It should be from the Legislative Committee. BKK: And then – work it to the Legislative body in the State? NP: I can do that. TN: Do we need a motion for that or we can just have a... NP: Should I write a letter and present it at our next meeting? BKK: It might be too late by then... NP: Time is of essence... BKK: So I recommend maybe there should be a motion on the table. GD: George here – can we give a certain committee the power to do that so... BKK: We could refer it to the Legislative Committee maybe and then go from there. So is there a motion for the Legislative Committee to. NP: I’d like to make a motion that the Legislative Committee address the Mayor concerning our bills to ask for his support. 30 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 TN: I second. This is Teresa. BKK: Nani Pogline moved to write a letter to the Mayor to support some of the legislative work that we’ve been doing and get referred to the Legislative Committee. Seconded by Teresa Nakama and carried unanimously by a voice vote. SM: This is Stanley. It was brought to my attention –that we have public access in the County ordinance for makai – ocean – but we don’t have an ordinance for mauka. So I was told by the Na Ala Hele Trails System person that we should go to the County Council and get one ordinance for mauka. BKK: Do you know what the ordinance of the... SM: You mean makai? I don’t know what that ordinance is but we need to add mauka, I mean, the mountain to it. Cause right now the, you know, with access to hunting areas and stuff like that it’s landlocked and, you know, you cannot do anything so he said we need one ordinance. BKK: And did you hear any reason why it wasn’t in it... SM: It’s not there in the ordinance so they cannot force anybody to or even go and bring it up to them that, you know, to let guys go up. BKK: You’re requesting it to go to the Legislative Committee? SM: To the County Council so I don’t know if it’s a... BKK: OK. We can probably have a working group – work with County Council, probably recommend referring it to the Legislative Committee – so if you want to make that motion... BKK: Stanley Mendes moved to have a mauka access in the County ordinance for mauka access. Seconded by Nani Pogline and carried unanimously by voice vote. Traditional Customary Practices & Fishing TN: This is Teresa – I had my first meeting on December 4, I believe, my attendees were Reed Chook, Zen Hewlin and Darryl... Anyway, they all attended the study group Conservation International meeting both in Kona and they didn’t go to the one in Hilo and they felt like everybody else felt – and they felt that the community should be really involved and they want to be involved and we’ll be meeting monthly and they’re reaction to the whole 31 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 meeting of the study group is that there was no transparency and they stayed to the very end where they drew conclusion on a board, which did not give them the opportunity to say no and I contacted – I gave them information so they can contact the people that brought the study group together, which was HFAC, PTF and – like I said – this goes back that when DAR Division back in 1995 wanted to pass this registration thing – so back in 2016 they did a feasibility study – what came out of the feasibility study is this study group and there was division in their conferencing that Conservation International that did the presentation and the rest of the study group, which includes HFAC and the other group and Westpac – they couldn’t have a meeting of the mind of how the presentation and so what came down they agreed to disagree and they told Conservation International that with the public you need to be transparent but that totally didn’t happen at the meeting so I’m having my next meeting in February and I’ll do my report back then – and the report I have with them is the same report I said earlier – so I’m also asking for Hilo to have a group on Traditional and Customary Practices and Terrin Apiahi of Kekaha has agreed to step on board and hold the Hilo meeting on Traditional and Customary Practices. That’s my report. Thank you. BKK: Do you have a date for the February meeting? th TN: It’s gonna be on the second Thursday of February. I believe it’s the 9 – if my date is correct. At the Mayor’s conference room at West Hawaii Civic Center... Let me check th the date – oh, Thursday, the 7 of February at 5:00p. BKK: OK. Thank you. And can you send an email to the Commissioners and maybe Donna maybe to get it out to everybody regarding that. TN: Yes, I can. Thank you. BKK: OK. Thank you. All right – any other questions for Teresa? All right moving on to... TN: Oh, I just wanted to say Reed Chook is a marine biologist and he stepped up the plate to do studies if we want him to do studies and Darryl works for the County parks. Public Outreach - Website update - Creating Social Media 32 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 BKK: Is there any update on Public Outreach committee? Oh. Who is that? I have no idea. Oh, yeah, I have a cheat sheet. All right – well, what I wanted to kind of add on the Public Outreach Committee is a website and creating social media – that way we can get the word out there – we can work with the community hands on if we start I think making those two – you know, Facebook and Instagram is a big thing so I was hoping that whoever’s in the Public Outreach Committee would be able to outreach through those capacities. GD: George, here...regarding the website – I think there’s some specific things we have to do. MH: This is Malia. I would suggest either working with the Mayor’s Office or with IT to just see what the policies are cause we do have County policies on social media and stuff like that – just to make sure we’re n not stepping on anybody’s toes, as well, it would be good to just have them in the mix before we do that. NP: So on Public Outreach, right, I forgot I was on that committee – but I did have some ideas that if we can get our meetings all scheduled ahead of time for the whole year – that we can post those dates on places were interested groups would go like Tokunaga’s and Jay Hara’s on their bulletin board a hard copy posting. We’ve tried putting – I tried putting the meetings in the calendar’s on the Tribune Herald but West Hawaii but nobody seems to go there so I stopped doing it because there was no feedback on it. BKK: There’s always all avenues of getting the word out there... GD: George here. I was just thinking that maybe one of the more effective ways of spreading the word would be communicating directly with whatever interest groups or clubs – things like that – that we can, you know, directly communicate with because although social media is good I feel like it would be a very specific thing to pursue and I’m not sure if our target demographic is necessarily there – in the entirety. So there may be like more direct and better approaches to communicating with the demographic we want to reach out to. NP: So Malia did you say that – but we could just do a simple website – just stating our dates? MH: I would have to check with our County policies on web presence and social media – I know that you guys do have on the County website already – there is like a folder where we have all our agenda minutes and communications so I don’t see why you couldn’t then, you know, put other communications in there if you wanted to... NP: People have said that’s hard to find... 33 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 GD: Yeah... MH: Yeah, it can be but, yeah, on your own independent website I would have to check our policies and get back to you on that. Shooting Range Working Group BKK: So for now is it all right if we table this discussion until the next meeting? So the next committee report is for the Shooting Range Working Group. I’m not too sure... NP: So Tom couldn’t make it and he wanted to give a Shooting Range report so he gave me a text to read and I can if you guys give me a moment – it’s long and I don’t know if I want to read it all but... BKK: Just and FYI – I did receive a letter from Council Member Tim Richards regarding the Shooting Range Working Group. As far as he’s concerned – there was no correspondence between the two and so I was hoping to make some communications with him from the Shooting Range working group. NP: OK. Over the last three months the Gun Range Committee has had a number of meetings with Parks and Recreation, State DOFAW representatives. Initially, DOFAW, Parks & Rec Administrator Roxcie Waltjen, Parks Project Manager Jeff Ochi, and Parks Planner James Komada through a series of meetings regarding the site selection of Puu Kaohe – just east of Mauna Kea County Park and Facility adjacent to PTA. Initially, we – me with Joey Mello, East Hawaii Managing Biologist; Dave Smith DOFAW Administrator out of Honolulu; Commissioner Jim O’Keefe, Stanley Mendes, Tom Lodge and myself, as well, yeah, I was there, too, as Past County Commissioner Ike Yoshida and Parks representative Ochi and Komada. This land is DOFAW land and DOFAW was in full support of this venture, unfortunately, there was some communications misinterpretations of who would be involved in the building of the Range and it was referred to the Board of Land and Natural Resources where Deputy Chair Bob Masuda – Bob Masuda apparently had forgotten the numerous communications and documentation provided him by Commissioner Tom Lodge and nixed it as being palila habitat and the noise was going to be prohibitive. \[Technical difficulties\]. BKK: Nani, is it possible to summarize – we’re getting to the time limit... NP: I guess the summary is that things are happening and Parks & Rec is working on that and, of course, there’s opposition but if not the project is going forward. BKK: Does anybody have any questions for Nani? 34 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 GD: George here. Do we – does the GMAC actually get those reports? Have you seen any developments? BKK: What reports are you referring to? GD: From the working group or updates or anything written that we can read or that was written... NP: I’ll forward you this text... BKK: That would be perfect. Ah, yeah, if possible, I can ask Tom for a little bit more clarification on some of the correspondence he has. GD: George, here... I think it would be nice to get little updates every so often about what’s going on – it seems to be kind of obscured. BKK: OK. GH: This is Grayson. I had a question. Is there gonna be a shooting range and when? BKK: Not soon enough and they’re working on it. All right. Any other questions? All right moving forward to Communications Committee. Anybody in that committee. We got the cheat sheet over here. Communications Committee TN: This is Teresa. I have no report for the Communications Committee. BKK: Tom’s not here. Nani you got anything? NP: I think these committees crossover and, of course, my communication as part as being a Communication Committee – the legislative action was a lot that. COMMISSIONERS’ REPORTS BY DISTRICT BKK: Thank you. And moving forward, too, any Commissioner’s Report? Anybody have anything. SM: District 1. There was a meeting for the Ookala Dairy – the dairy’s trying to put up a gate for keep the theft down cause they’ve been having a lot of stolen property and it was last week Friday and they’re going – but Valerie Poindexter Councilwoman had – get the meeting and Masuda came and nothing came out of the meeting – they said they going look into it so 35 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 nothing’s happening but hunters is all there an all pretty mad so, um, and then back to the these bills that is being introduced – I have a meeting with the community hunters on Tuesday to explain to them the bills and who they should call and all that. So more like an informative or action, you know, to take – to get the – so hopefully I get a lot of people there. TN: This is Teresa – where’s your meeting at and what time? th SM: It’s gonna be at the Paauiko Annex 6:30 on Tuesday, February 5. BKK: Is there any other commissioners that have a report? rd GH: This is Grayson from District 6 – on March 23 – I’m sorry – March 22 and March and March 23 – I’m working with the DLNR to put together a hunter education class for the Pahala/Naalehu communities, um, so if you have anybody in that area that could benefit from that please let me know and if you’re interested I’ll send out a flier within the next week and thank you to DLNR and thank you to the Parks for helping us put together this very important class for the community, um, in general, I think, I’ve been fortunate – I’ve met with various people in our district who really feel like restriction of hunting or restriction of fishing is not the answer. In fact, the opposite is the answer – that more responsible fishing and more responsible hunting practices and people we feel will not only increase the amount of game and fish in the environment but also improve the environment itself and fisheries and hunting amounts of animals and stuff, so, really we’re just trying to come together as a community to try to promote responsible hunting, so, thank you. BKK: Thank you, Grayson. Stanley and Grayson can you send those dates to myself or Donna and that way we can get it out to the other Commissioners? NP: A quick note before we close – Tom just wanted us to announce that a bill is coming out from Lynn DeCoite – HB265 – write it down – this bill calls for complete eradication of deer on Molokai. Heads up... BKK: Any other discussion? TN: Just a quick question on the deer on Molokai. What harm has it done that they’re stating that they need to eradicate the deer? NP: We’d better read this bill. Look it up. We should all look it up and respond right away. HB265. BKK: Any other Commissioner’s Report? Without hearing or seeing none – is there a motion to adjourn. 36 Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – January 29, 2019 ADJOURNMENT (8:30p) TN: Motion to adjourn the meeting – e kala mai... BKK: Teresa Nakama moved to adjourn the meeting at 8:30pm. Seconded by Nani Pogline. Motion carried unanimously by voice vote. Respectfully submitted by: Donna Urban-Higuchi Secretary ATTEST: Bronsten “Kalei” Kossow, Chairperson 37