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HomeMy WebLinkAboutGMAC Minutes 1.21.25 Game Management Advisory Commission County of Hawai’i Minutes – Draft Meeting Date: January 21, 2025 Time: 9:00 am to 11:00 pm Place: Zoom and In-Person 25 Aupuni Ctr., Ste. #1501, Hilo HI 1. CALL TO ORDER/ROLL CALL: District 1 - Robert Duerr, in person District 2 – Taysen Wong Chong, in person District 3 – Rhon Leomana Turalde, Present, in person District 4 – Brian Ley – Present, in person District 5 - Vacant District 6 – Vacant District 7 – Vacant District 8 – Cortney Okumura – running late District 9 – Justin Ackerman – Present via Zoom Quorum Established with 5 in attendance. Commissioner Okumura joined at 10:10 am, via Zoom STAFF: Inha Kandatsu-Kang Deputy Attorney, Corporation Counsel – in person Barbara Kossow, Administrative Specialist – via Zoom 2. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: December 17, 2024 Action: A motion was made by T. Wong-Chong to accept the minutes of December 17, 2024. Second is by B. Ley. Motion carried by pole vote voice with 5 yes, and C. Okumura excused. 3. STATEMENTS FROM THE PUBLIC ON AGENDA ITEMS: None. 4. COMMISSIONER REPORT BY DISTRICT: RD: R. Duerr, District – 1, Concerns is the County Plan for 2040. The Sierra Club – in following this bill there’s some real problems. They talk about sustainability but there’s no place for fishers, hunters or gatherers, and especially there’s no provision for access. This was brought up by the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club has documented that in the plan of 2019 there was access for mauka and makai, for gathering and for hunting and fishing and 1 there is currently no provisions in this plan. This is a major problem. I’ll cut into the chase, this seems like a, a quick one, this seems like a lot of this plan was uphold from places far and beyond Hawaii and it’s smelling a lot like agenda 2030 from the UN, which hunters brought the issue of Agenda 2019 which was the one that proceeded 2030. Hunters brought this to our attention in the early 2000s. Update on the harbor, Senator Lorraine Inouye is having a harbor meeting on January 26, and essentially, it’s an update but she’s making this a priority. She’s making fishing for sustainable food a priority of hers. The washdown area is flooded – that was being taken care of last week. Bathrooms are being put back in order and the bumpers are being installed by Isemoto. Putting this on top of the dredging which came in about 4.3 million. The total spending on this project will be close to 6 million. DAR, I’m a part of DAR East Hawaii Fishers working group, a big priority is the Molowai. The Molowai is out of the estuaries in Hawaii that essentially has been drained and filled and what they’re talking now is this also pulls together with hunters. They’re talking mauka and makai. This is one ecosystem and so, they’re really looking to focus on that. Beth Dykstra who works in the County in R & D. She’s heading up the East Hawaii Watershed Group and asked me to join, which I agreed to do. But essentially to try and keep track of what are they doing and how is it gonna affect our mauka lands – how it’s gonna affect access for hunters. Hamakua pigs’ people who have moved here recently are really concerned. Their yards are getting ripped up, but that’s the same story everywhere. That’s all I have Chair. LT: OK. Thank you. We can move on to District – 2, sir? TWC: Taysen Wong Chong, District – 2, Makahanaloa Association will meet on January 26 – 3:00 pm at the Kulaimano Center to share updates. Liliuokalani situation – cats still a problem. I had a few conversations with elder citizens that have concerns about the pond when it’s low tide. They shared with me 50-60 years ago that the pond on the right side nearest Coconut Island when it used to be low tide it would be 10+ feet deep. Now it’s inches deep, so they were asking me, what is the possibility of dredging the pond. That’s out of my jurisdiction but that would be a good idea. It’s not gonna throw 100 fish in a ten-gallon pond, right? You know, that’s my concern. Pig posting on Instagram viewed - I agree, it’s pilau, showed 3 dead pigs jaws was ripped off again – this was from a DLNR individual as well, they said it’s pilau – my comment is – it’s pilau but isn’t that what you guys want to do? Eradicate the pigs. I’ve been working on Peepeekeo for years now, but what I’ve been noticing in the past weeks - I have a video of it – I see some banded and some non-banded nenes appearing in the pasture. So that’s a good thing to see, that’s why I want it in the report. Basically, that’s it for my update. 2 LT: L. Turalde, District – 3. The biggest thing going on right now in District – 3 is the sewer plant in Keaukaha. There was a big put out for the new director for upgrading plans. Hopefully by the end of next month we can get some updates from the mayor. Chickens - a big influx in the area, not only on my property but for the back of Panaewa stretch and Railroad, on Lama Street, behind Haihai and in Keaukaha, lot of people because of the egg shortage are starting to get egg layers. Total of 9 chickens dropped off on my property and 6 on my sisters’ property – usually Rhode Island Reds. Two non-profits at the end of Keaukaha are trying to look for any professional advice in raising mullet, woohoo, and aholehole in shared open access ponds. So, I guess, because they own the ponds in Keaukaha – just like us – we’re trying to take down the makaha and let the fish migrate and spawn on their own instead of trying to manage it because the population in Keaukaha is so low right now, so, we’re kinda just talking amongst each other – not anything official by how can we promote the fish spawning – other aholehole – and instead of cleaning our ponds – cause right now we’re all in full cleaning the pond out and don’t allow any hiding places or rocks that they can live in…Yeah, cause at the pond when the trees grow over the pond I kind of think it’s ugly and it promotes mosquitos and the spiders so I chop ‘em down, but whenever I chop down the trees – the population of aholehole go away – cause they don’t have any place to hide and go under the leaves. So that’s kinda something that we’ve been talking about among the property owners in Keaukaha – so if you guys know anybody who’s experts in that, I mean, we reached out to everyone but it kinda seems like we’re at the top right now, we’re looking for some help. That’s my update for this past month. Thank you. BL: Brian Ley, District – 4. Leomana and I were at the Leg opening. I talked to Senator Joy Buenaventura after – if they’ve got a start date for the dredging on Pohoiki – no start date yet but we’ve got a contract, so we’ll see how that works out. Her office shared, she has come out with a new pig bill, but we couldn’t get a copy of the bill or get the number or anything at this time. So, I have no idea what the bill is. Hopefully, it’s not something ridiculous like several years ago that GMAC had to step in and kill the bill – it was ridiculous – and one of our other state/county representatives – I don’t want to give any names – was telling us that they have all these things set up for pig processing and everything else and then while we were at Honolulu we were talking to other people and said, no, they don’t have that so I don ‘t know where that is – they painting a rosy picture and then we’ve got other people right in on the parade so I don’t know what’s going on with that. So, yeah, the pigs are still an issue. I suggested to one of our reps that if you guys don’t let us shoot ‘em and they said, oh, no, we can’t allow people to have guns. So, we know where the political wind is blowing on that one and we’re coming from, but I did find a senator that was willing to do something like that so I’d send information to him and hopefully we’ll see if he can do something… shoot pigs on ag land and protect our agricultural benefits. And, on another little note I got a thing today, an article – Hawaii News Now – how, it’s just amazing science these days on Oahu – they’re using sheep to keep the grasses under control on a solar farm and you can actually eat ‘em too so – it’s like a double benefit – and it’s just amazing this new 3 technology that we’ve never come across, you know, it’s just like – what’ next – flush toilets. It’s just getting ridiculous. Driving in today, Mauna Kea is so brown – the fire hazard – and they’re doing another sheep eradication next month it’s just asinine in my opinion and we need to just bring the DLNR in, I mean, start making them follow the rules, you know, HPD 1872 and from 2022 that game animals are allowed good habitat which means the waterers are working, we’ve got food plots, we’re doing these things to control these animals and protect the environment which is protecting the environment is having a low fire load so, anyways, that’s enough of my rant again, so thank you. LT: Thank you very much and for our last update of the day from the opposite west side of the Island. JA: Justin Ackerman, District 9. Greetings from the west side. Big swells has shut down Puako Boat Ramp. Bob – thanks for that update. And for those interested in all those updates – make sure everyone signs up with DOBOR for the alerts on the boat ramps, that was shut down in late December and that probably won’t get fixed until all these big swells subside and they can get a crew out there to get it fixed. So don’t expect that to get back up and running for another few weeks at least. That’s all that’s going on here. I, too, was going to mention the eradication efforts on February 11 and 12 in Mauna Kea ‘cause it’s not posted on the website. Can’t expect DLNR to get it posted in too many places, especially in the announcements section – it was posted on social media – cause you know all hunters love social media - but, yeah, so, it’s coming and, we wouldn’t want them to eat all the grass, so, that’s it from the west side. LT: Thank you. I do have a question. Do you have any connections with your military background that can help us push forward shotgun permits – to try to get the Department of Ag to allow buckshot on top of the property to take out their pig problems but, we have such a hard time pushing gun rights or gun ownership or weapons or any type of hunting tools in Hawaii – do you have any connections that can kind of write to the government – maybe like a general or something? JA: That’s not gonna assist the state. LT: Thank you very much. Moving on… 5. OLD BUSINESS: a. Nomination for Chair and Vice Chair. Deferred to February 18, 2025 meeting. b. GMAC’s “Mana Aina Award”: Continue discussion and/or finalizing the nomination form, and other related materials, to honor outstanding individuals or groups who 4 have demonstrated exceptional dedication to support the hunter-gatherer community and protecting our natural resources. This award recognizes efforts that embody the spirit of stewardship and respect for the land and community. Chair Turalde shared that the GMAC’s mission statement will be added to the bottom of our award book. Final revisions at the next meeting. c. Discussion on GMAC’s Draft 2024 First Quarter Report to Mayor and County Council, Commissioner Robert Duerr. Commissioner Duerr presented the report which is included in the meeting packet. The report was basically each Commissioner’s monthly report. Key issues, what their report was, what presentation was, who the presenter was and what the title was. The report may be used as a tool to pull together an in-person presentation to the council. A written report will be submitted to the mayor. d. Discussion on GMAC’s Draft 2024 Second Quarter Report to Mayor and County Council, Commissioner Leomana Turalde. The written report was not available during the meeting. However, brief highlights were shared. 6. NEW BUSINESS: a. 2025 Legislative Opening Report, Commissioners Leomana Turalde and Brian Ley. Chair Turalde presented photos taken during the legislative session as he and B. Ley visited senators, state representatives, Lt. Governor and office staff. Also, the past GMAC chair Abraham Antonio flew over for the Leg opening as well and joined Turalde and Ley. Learned that such land as Kilohana Ranch and some of the other places may be transferred over to Ag lands and if so, no hunting, unless you can prove direct lineal descent lineage to that area. Other topics that were discussed were goat strikes, sheep, pigs, drought, quality habitat, goat waterers, water tanks, bird propagation, slowing down the helicopter shoots – opening the areas and letting the hunters go in for us come up with a game plan. Met up with Dave Smith from DLNR DOFAW, discussed the helicopter eradication on Mauna Kea. We were informed that he cannot eliminate the court order, they are 5 mandated to do this eradication, but it is possible to transition it under a new style of management. Discussed the palila count with him – that the unofficial count is somewhere at the 200. Not sure if that is the correct number. If so, it’s a catastrophe. Discussed coming up with a proposal for training hound dogs to hunt the cats on Mauna Kea. In addition, check and monitor and repair waterers. Basically, for GMAC to come up with a management plan. TWC: Tayson, District – 2, I like to hear that, yeah, with the game – game plan because it’s management, right, eradication has no where in management. I raise sheep growing up as well is like how I mentioned \[unclear\] UH was a – raising sheep just like what is happening on Mauna Kea – if you put a bunch of sheep in a pasture – a thriving pasture with just Wainaku grass they be thriving sheep out for X amount of years – they’ll see more than Wainaku grass – they’ll see your California grass take over, you’ll see random trees that popping up – a lot of invasive weeds – that’s what’s happening on Mauna Kea right now because there’s not control with the sheep. Is there any way that since he has that plan, right, I know it’s federally put in but can or is there a way to bring Sierra Club back up into that talk? This needs to stop, from the seventies to now – two hundred palila is catastrophe, right? So, why not let the sheep repopulate and see where that goes cause with all this fountain grass and the invasive weeds… it’s more than the palila – it’s the trees and the sheep is the one to control so I don’t know if that can be a part of a future talk with the Sierra Club or something? LT: Leomana – District – 3. We already voted last month about going a couple of times to the Leg and then testify and on these trips we can, we will visit these people again and then give them updates and, kind of go over what we’ve been brain storming to… BL: Brian, District – 4, yeah, I had a talk with Dave Smith about the goat waterers, being obviously non-existent, non-working with the full water tanks and I also complained about the bird waterers. He said, his people don’t communicate with him. And, you know, we had a discussion on the game birds. He asked me what my opinion was, and it was the tall grass, the birds can’t propagate and survive in that tall grass, we need to do something about the tall grass and, it’s back to the same thing, it’s quality habitat. I said is there some reason we can’t have food plots that would benefit the palila – do you guys even know if the palila would eat certain kinds of seeds – they are seed birds, but there’s some reason we can’t put food plots in that would benefit the game birds and, we discussed that and he was saying that it’s predators, predators, predators. And I said, habitat, habitat, habitat. So, we’ve had discussions about that, the waterers in June and July – the critical times. Ninety percent of the waterers I checked were non- functional, and then we have nothing – like I said – I actually went out hunting with the dogs all day – not one bird – in fourteen years I have never – the dogs were so depressed, but we went out last week and we put up 13 birds. So, it’s hit or miss – but 6 Mauna Kea’s become the desert. These areas that historically had whole game birds have nothing. I keep going back cause this is a sweet spot – there’s all these birds and there’s nothing, and it’s just and I had no idea why, and it’s something that needs to be addressed. LT: Leomana, District – 3. Do you remember he was talking about something – sorry – I remember we are having a discussion about something and then he said send us a plan on – he was trying to figure out what the plan… BL: Oh, he wanted me to send a proposal for training some hound dogs for… LT: Yeah, hound dogs, yeah, the cats, ah… BL: Oh, then also we put in that, also on top of raising hound dog to hunt the cats on Mauna Kea – that I also put in there that I would also check and monitor and repair waterers as needed since I was up there anyways, chasing calves with hound dogs, but – I haven’t \[unclear\]. LT: So I remember with Dave Smith we were talking about the –he cannot eliminate the court order and under they’re mandated to do this eradication but if we do it a certain way that he was telling us – they can stop it and transition it under a new style of management, right, because it’s a legal thing – they, like they got the money to do it – the court order they have to do it so they have to. BL: Brian, District – 4. Now, all that DLNR have to do was go to the Attorney General of Hawaii and say that this is not working and we’ve got the science forty years of this and we need to go take it back to court that the sheep are no longer our problem and we can stop this eradication and that’s how the court systems work – you file the thing and then you come back later and say, you don’t – it’s not working – and get it removed cause, you know, if that was the case slavery would still be legal. They just need the DLNR and state to get together with the Attorney General’s office and go to the Feds and say – look, this is not working - we want to file the lawsuit and get removed from it and the Feds probably wouldn’t argue with it. JA: Justin, District – 9. All the money that they waste on helicopters and be redirected in a better method to save the birds for, you know, the grass, the feed, something else. There’s a better method for that money than. The money they waste on fuel. BL: Yeah, eight hundred dollars an hour for the helicopters. TWC: Tayson, District – 2, they said – but I remember speaking one time this is, ah, this was a zoom meeting two years ago – was estimated 15 to 20 thousand dollars and that’s two days per month they spend on this eradication. So, yeah, I agree, that’s a lot of money that can be transitioned into, you know, like feeders, management of the grass for 7 repopulating this mountain back up with the sheep, taking care of the cat traps that they have which I still see is not being managed – you have three foot of grass growing through – but they got the funding for it – somebody’s not doing it though, so, yeah, a lot of wasted money in wasted areas – there’s always something… JA: Yeah, actual management not just the word but actual management. TWC: Actual management, exactly. Yeah. RD: Chair? District – 1, Duerr. A little historic perspective, the judge – was it judge Ezra who made a decree which said that the sheep needed to be – the order – court order – the sheep need to be brought to zero. The County of Hawaii actually challenged that order and used their attorney efforts and were basically blown out of the water by the state AGs. However, a question for Corporate Counsel – if a judge makes an order and you are not living up to the order what typically happens to them? IKK: Deputy Attorney, Inha Kandatsu-Kang - Well, if there’s the violation of an order than there are consequences – if they \[unclear\] violation they’d be liable for whatever comes out of this – whatever it is – just generally speaking. RD: Right. IKK: Yeah. RD: So, the question is – when a judge gives an order to go to zero and you’ve had it… IKK: Zero? RD: The population of sheep... IKK: OK. RD: ….on the mountain needed to go to zero. When you had a quarter century to do that and you’ve failed do you think that would be worth revisiting the judge and say, you gave these people a doctrine, they obviously haven’t done it - and by the way it’s not working and the consequences of failure of not going to zero is worse than the consequences of coming up with a new plan. IKK: Sure, OK, going back. The court’s not going to take any action – someone would have to take action. So, an individual like… RD: Would the county be able to take action? IKK: Yeah, or you. 8 TWC: An individual, an individual. IKK: Oh, just you in theory – like you and people who are affected by the order. RD: Stakeholders. IKK: Yes. Not as GMAC members… RD: Yeah… IKK: Because you’re an advisory group and you only have so much authority, right? But as an advisory group you can advise the county to do so – to take action, um, Council – you can advise them to take action or you as individuals gives in a personal capacity that you – but if you take that route you must be sure not to mention anything about you being a GMAC Commissioner because you don’t want to blend the two, you want to be clear and we can talk more about that… RD: Yeah… IKK: ….if that’s something you’re interested in doing – that way I can just make sure that you don’t blend the two, right, because in your personal capacity you have every right to take action against a federal agency or a state agency or what have you, or even county – as an individual, right, but GMAC Commissioners – you don’t, you don’t want to use that name when you’re doing these things cause the authority for GMAC Commissioners is limited to advising Council or even with the Mayor, county government – different agencies – but just don’t forget your individual rights and, the powers that come with it. RD: Yeah… So, crossing over from GMAC to make any recommendations – if a recommendation was saying that like revisited – could the county then have a discussion with Earth Justice, which was the organization that brought the suit and won the suit to find out how they’re looking at the world now and is there a need for change. IKK: Yeah, I mean, theoretically you can do that but is that the most efficient channel to resolve this issue? I don’t know, we’d have to look into it, right? So, county resources are also limited so what is the most efficient use of county resources? I can’t tell you right now but that’s – if that’s something you’d like to look into just email me and I can look in to it. These are legal questions and that’s what I’m here for so I can’t give you an answer right now because I just don’t have enough information but we can talk. Yeah. RD: Thank you. IKK: You’re welcome. 9 LT: OK. Leomana, District – 3, right on – good discussion on Dave Smith DOFAW, Mauna Kea, and the helicopter eradication so just keep that on the top of our mind as you go through this new political year. That’s, as a GMAC Commission – that’s what I see our power as, you know, where we have to go advise people, so our power is actually going and directly talking to these individuals and representing game management and testifying and doing all the political stuff. I didn’t know that at first, I thought people were going to come to us and ask our advice but, after a year in this position that’s not what it is. You have to go give it to ‘em. OK, anyway, we’re moving back on the photos, this is Diamond Garcia – he’s a republican but he supports second amendment – he supports hunting – he supports gun rights and, he’s one of the people we can go to whenever he comes to Hawaii, and all of the hunting issues that come with hunting tools like rifles, weapons and where we’re allowed to use them, and it just so happens we caught Junior Tupai the candidate for mayor and Lt. governor… RD: Leomana, one question. Who’s the fellow in the middle? LT: That representative is Diamond Garcia from Oahu. He’s just, ah, he supports second amendment rights and, you know, that’s our hunting tool so I figure we put him up there and just let everybody know they can go to him if they have any… JA: The only republican. LT: Yeah, the only republican is there. JA: Yeah, he was the one I sent the pig gun. LT: This is our old District – 3, County Council woman Miss Sue Leeloy – I don’t know what district she’s in now because the state and the county is different, but she’s a primary source of contact for us and she just left the County Council. So, she’s kind of fresh in our communications about handling all the pig issues in Hilo. But that’s a good source of contact for the Big Island. Another one on the way in – we had a chance to aloha our Mayor and managing director, Kimo and Bill. We actually had a meeting with them the two weeks ago regarding Leg trip and we spoke on majority of our issues – what we’ll be doing up there (Leg) – they’re on board – they look to us as a primary source of knowledge leading Hawaii County and even the state – they were so motivated when I said – we don’t have a state game management plan – there’s only eradication plans and, I tried to push that Hawaii County GMAC can lead the state in game management – we really need help so they’re on board – they’re motivated because if we can do that for team Hawaii County that’s a win for them. So, they saw us up there, they walked in with us, so they’re really motivated to help… BL: Brian, District – 4. Since we got Mayor Kimo up there and I’ve got this letter from Richard Hoeflinger talking about it – when we have the meeting with Mayor Kimo we 10 mentioned the fact that the generator had been stolen from the trap range and they said they were gonna get on that and try to get that opened up for us as ASAP, you know, he was not aware at the time that the generator for the trap range was stolen and was not working so he was very supportive when he found out that he was gonna get on it – get a new generator up there. But I like the thing move with that permanent power from Richard Hoeflinger’s letter so, hopefully we can work out something it would be nice if we can just lock up these criminals but that’s not gonna happen. LT: Yeah, - Leomana, District – 3, I saw the range opened up – I follow them on social media and I think I saw them on Big Island News, – one of the local news stations. OK. Moving on – this is – is this you? This is our County Councilman from Kohala \[Hustace\]. JA: No, but he was very pro-Bill… LT: Yup, from Hawi I think, this guy’s from Hawi, so he just got elected into the County Council… JA: Yeah. James Hustace. LT: Yeah, OK. We just met him up there so, real cool guy. He’s interested in working with us and waiting for our reports and he just got in there so he’s kind of wanting to learn about all of this stuff too. So, if you guys are on that side of the Island you guys give him a call. Some of the things we talked about were the Waikoloa fire escape road going through Waikoloa, some of the sheep in his area and shoots – I cannot think off the top of my head, but I remember we were talking about the second fire road leading out of Waikoloa and how they’re planning on building that. JA: I’ve got an email out to him and his staff about the shooting range. LT: Oh, all right, OK, we can actually – my plan was to email all of the representatives and senators and send them these pictures to remind them,that we came to talk to them – just showing some faces so they can remember we come from GMAC so I’ll reach out to… RD: Ah, Chair, quick question for Justin. So, Justin, what was the issue you’re bringing to James on the shooting range? JA: Lack of… Just to get his awareness, you know, I mean, got to stop kicking that can and, get some action from the County Council perspective. I can’t remember the gal he replaced – she was aware and was semi-interested in it but wasn’t putting a lot of pen to paper, you know, she had some comments on it and was semi-supportive but just trying to get more action from the County Council and not just lip service. 11 LT: All right. I think we made a really good impression on him and his team that they even – if you see on my lapel – they gave us all of their pins – so, they kinda like us. I think we’ll work out well with that man. JA: \[Unclear\] LT: Ah, OK, um, moving… RD: Kush, yeah, is that Kush? LT: Yeah, Kush. I forget what we talked with him about, but you know his position is kinda what he deals with? RD: I know he’s a fisher. I know he fishes, but I’ve heard mixed reviews from – mixed reviews so he also likes closing off areas. LT: I don’t remember too much the conversation we had with this guy, OK… ?: \[Unclear\] fire department. BL: Oh, District – 14. ?: Yeah, captain, yeah. ?: Yeah, yeah. LT: Oh, OK, yeah. OK, so right there is, ah, this is – is he, um, Honolulu Council or he’s a senator. Anyway, this is one of the representatives from West Oahu Cedric Gates – his team – his staff was the chair of the Department of Ag? BL: Yeah. LT: That’s how we found out about… BL: Yeah, he was the one who told us about the Ag land no hunting thing. LT: So, his team is the one we found out about the transfer of the Ag property and no hunting whatsoever on top of any Department of Agriculture properties unless you belong to the lineage of that ahupuaa. So, his team, I guess, they know a lot about that because they had the whole committee. So anyone wanting to learn about the Department of Agriculture, ah, as their new property acquisitions in Kau and how they’re planning on managing their properties cause they said that they, they know that Kapapala Ranch allows hunting on the property somehow and they were kind of interested, kind of not interested in learning how they do that, but they’re probably not 12 going to so if we can kind of just force feed them some information about that maybe they’ll \[unclear\]. OK. And that was Cedric Gates - West Oahu, OK, remember that Abraham was with us over there so we’re just gonna let him jump on and give us a little bit of what he remembers discussing with Mr. Gates and his team. AA: (Abraham Antonio) Good morning team. LT: Hey, aloha. AA: I’m just jumping on – I listening to the meeting – seems like you guys need some assistance. This is actually, the Department of Agriculture’s like – he’s the secretary for the head of the Department of Ag. And, this Act 90 thing I was gonna wait till later on but might as well speak now since I’m on right now. But this Act 90 thing they kind of buttered it up where the Department of DLNR was going transfer lands to the Department of Ag and our interpretation was they was gonna still allow hunting and stuff like that but we walked up on the chair of Department of Ag and we asked him that question – if they would still – simple question – would they still allow hunting on the Department of Ag lands because of the Act 90 and she said absolutely not – there’s no hunting on agricultural lands unless you can prove lineal descent like Brian said. So that was very disturbing from what we was getting from our local reps at the DOFAW office and to what the Department head of Agriculture said, so it’s something that we need to look into or you guys need to look into – we had very much support from Lorraine Inouye when you brought it up to her and also Tim Richards and also Diamond Garcia. They all, after we had that discussion with the Department of Ag chair – like I said that was very disturbing so we brought it to light to the members and they were pretty disturbed as well and they said that they would look into it. But we need to set-up an email chain with them and get that moving. Other than that, we are the only county state GMAC, as you guys all know. We ran into, Mr. Kawakami, which is the Mayor of Kauai and he is very interested in setting up their own county GMAC on the island of Kauai and he said if you guys can send just the outline of our GMAC to Kauai’s county or to the mayor of Kauai County and he will definitely look into it and see what he can do as long as he’s in office to get their own county GMAC going, cause right now they only have a state representative. David Tarnas, he just was talking about his normal spew about the sheep and accidents and stuff like that. As far as Tim Richards he is in support of the sheep on the mountain and stuff like that but a lot of his conversation was he’s still brand new and he doesn’t have that much power as of yet, so, we’ll be working with him in the future. Dru Kanuha, which you guys never get to him yet but he’s very in support of GMAC, he actually asked us, first thing that came out of his mouth – what do you guys have and you guys want to propose and basically we don’t have anything at this time but we’re just back in and just watching what’s happening so we can support our rights to gather and our two-way rights and fishing rights and whatever that’s happening in the Leg that we’ll be watching and supporting or not supporting, yeah? That’s pretty much it in the rough. We briefly ran into Sylvia Luke, which is pretty cool. We didn’t really have a 13 discussion – I think Leomana took couple pictures with her but that’s pretty cool. She remembered us from last time. Kurt Favela was another one – he’s a legislator from Oahu – he’s very supportive of us too. Chris Todd – Chris Todd is willing to work with us and see what we have and if you have any problems, he’s gonna reach out to the GMAC Commission too, as well, pretty much it. It was a great day, we got there like at 8:00 before the ceremony – we stood in one short line then they told us to stand in the long line and get the ribbon and ended up being the same color ribbons so was just very disturbing right there too, yeah, it was a long day just treading the floors up and down, up and down and it was pretty great and me and Leomana and hopefully all you guys get to, ah, all you other Commissioners get to experience that because – a great, great day so that’s all I could say at this time. LT: All right. Thank you, sir, for that update and all that information. That’s all we got; we got the expert in the field. RD: Chair, I have a question to Abraham? LT: Go ahead. RD: Abraham, are there any legislative bills that you’re watching? AA: I didn’t go on the Leg site yet, I didn’t have time even though it was a long weekend. But, I know, \[unclear – sounds like stubes\], \[unclear\] guns and ammo right here in Hilo – they’re watching some stuff about buying ammo and you gotta do background checks, um, you shouldn’t need one background check to buy bullets, other than that – like Brian said, Sen. Buenaventura has a bill, that she has about feral pigs, but when I discussed it with her briefly – everything is – there’s so much things going on so you can’t like really sit down and have conversations with these people at the opening day because there’s other people like there’s literally lines in every office and you gotta wait in line at every office before you get in – this was my experience on the first opening day. So, and I expected that to be just like, eh, just fast briefing, ah, conversations – tell them what your point is and then you’re out, and then that’s a pretty much what they expect too, when you go up later on, when we’re fighting for bills then you gotta set-up appointments or if they’re available then you get little bit more time to talk story with them, but other than that opening day it’s a real busy and chaotic day for everybody and we pound the floor with that place That’s yeah, only those two bills that – I know there’s other stuff going around but like I said I didn’t really go and look and reach out to my contacts yet. RD: Thank you… LT: OK, thank you, I’m interested in that too so if you reach out to your contacts and they, they got some bills that they’re eyeing out please share that and we can all jump on board too. 14 AA: Yeah, and, Justin, your Council Member is very interested in the shooting range, as we discussed, as Leomana guys discussed. I shared with him your contact information so not so sure when, but he said he’ll reach out to you about the shooting range and whatever issues that you see in his area. JA: Sounds good. I’ve sent him an email with my contact info so hopefully he and I can link up and on that ammo thing – the big blue wall of California passed that about 8 years ago – the background check on ammo – and it’s a giant pain – hopefully Hawaii does not follow suit – unfortunately, they typically do follow the big blue wall that is a huge mistake, hopefully they don’t so… Let your legislator \[unclear\]… LT: OK, mahalo, OK, moving on. Yes, yes sir? TWC: Tayson, District – 2, I second on that, ah, stock up ammos now one another thing I’d like to say, I’ve seen this on – speaking – Abraham bringing up Stuebs on the story of Stuebs guns on Instagram the other day – the talks right now – \[unclear\] designated \[unclear\] 60 Mile Marker for any issues on a shooting-use range, right. They’re saying that the rubbish continues to, basically in their words “flourish” up there – they gonna shut that down so – they’ll try and keep that \[unclear\] like, um, yeah, hopefully that doesn’t happen but I just wanted to bring that up. ?: Steel trash barrels up there would be nice. TWC: Yeah, something, I mean… BL: \[Unclear\] waste into so – people are lazy so maybe if we had some trash cans up there it would help the problem. TWC: Yeah. LT: Maybe we can set up a – Leomana, District – 3, I was just brain storming – maybe we can set-up an annual community cleanup day – something like that where we can all go up as the, as the community of gun users and go clean it up. District – 9 reports this issue. Maybe go public with a PSA – and I’ll post it on to my social media and try get engagement and the attention of everybody in town cause I can reach a lot of people that way. IKK: Just to add on, sorry, I don’t mean to be Debbie Downer, but less than quorum – you’re gonna go as GMAC less than quorum – you go and then you can prepare your report. LT: Oh, OK, yeah, yeah. RD: Can GMAC just make an announcement… 15 IKK: Oh, yeah… RD: ….it’s not a GMAC event. IKK: Oh, OK. RD: Could that be one way… IKK: Well, that’s different. RD: Public awareness… IKK: Yeah, oh, no… LT: Do we need a vote if I want to put out a PSA like on the radio – cause I can call the radio station and be like, the Hawaii GMAC Commission has an important message for the community who uses the shooting range is, and I think they allow 30 seconds on all the radios stations if you have a, a non-profit or a local organization that has a PSA. So, I think we could do something like that too. IKK: Yeah, and you would vote to decide on which social media piece. LT: Oh, OK, we… Um, now, I was \[unclear\] at the end of the meeting so \[unclear\]. IKK: Yeah. LT: OK, just moving forward right now. This is (photo) Mr. Gabbard, right here. He’s in charge of – what committee is he on this year? JA: I think Ag. LT: You know, he’s so popular, I was walking in there – it’s the second time – it’s the second year I’ve seen him and then I totally, didn’t remember what committees he’s on – I don’t know if we talked about the committees or just about the last two years or progress that we had. But he’s an important contact – he enjoys our conversations all the time and when we go to visit him, um, that’s Brenton Awa’s staff, cause he wasn’t in his office. Brenton Awa had to run out right after his speech, um… ?: This is Dela Cruz? LT: Dela Cruz, yeah. He, he… AA: Dru Kanuha… 16 LT: Yeah, so he was real excited about, um, all of our plans and I remember he had good things to say, ah, real active and engaging in why we were there and – so I’m excited to get with him, cause he seems like he’s on it. This is your representative for everybody living in East Hawaii, um, shoot, she, ah, this is Lorraine Inouye – she’s in charge of the Water and Land… RD: Water and Land, yeah, powerful – everything that comes from hunting, fishing, gathering goes through her. LT: Yeah, um, you wanna give us the update about just her status and what she’s running. RD: Ah, well she’s, she’s Water and Land – very powerful and, wants, she wants to hear from the community and then a basic reach-out a personally to her is important. Her time is valuable – she wants to work with community associations, you know, groups of people and she wants to know the issues. We can have her as a guest speaker too. LT: Yeah. Do you have that connection to ask her? RD: Yeah, we could have her as a guest speaker – zoom her in – her time is valuable – she’s in the legislature now so it’s very, but, she could work, maybe after the legislature but we could totally reach out to her. BL: Brian, District – 4. I did have a discussion with her and talked about – she wanted more information about the DLNR not following the law that we – 1870 – whatever – we had passed in 2022. She was very concerned that the DLNR wasn’t doing anything and she wanted some information and I haven’t got to that yet, so, that was on my list today is to send her an email with the law that we got passed and also the resolution that the DLNR is supposed to contact the legislator about what is going on with the palila birds and the stats on that - there was a resolution in 2023 that they were supposed to do that and it didn’t sound like the DLNR has been doing it so… There’s a lot of things – people are not happy with the DLNR – we just need to give ‘em ammo to bring them to task. LT: Yeah. All right. RD: She’d also be good on Act 90 that Abraham brought up on the, the Department of Ag crossing over to hunting leases which is new information to us. LT: Yeah, because of the, you know, \[unclear\]. All right… So, on state land… \[Unclear\] BL: Yeah. This is Joy Buenaventura, Senator for District – 4. JD: Five… 17 LT: Yeah. You guys need to contact her and can reach out to the Commission, reach out to Abraham, and they’re always the go to place if you’re hungry. Yeah, anti-guns, I got to, um, \[unclear\] Lieutenant Governor and the passageway and just let her know who I was, why we were there and then what we represent and hopefully in the future we can reach out to her – I’ll send her this picture and then get her on board with some things but not too much of a conversation – just basic introductions with her. BL: Well, she remembered Abraham and I from the other year so… LT: Yeah, she seemed excited, yeah? BL: Yeah. LT: Here is a photo of Mr. Kurt Flavela this is considered as the radical inside of the building, He was telling us about his dealings with DLNR and how the DLNR was making plans with him over I think it was the boat ramp and the surrounding areas but, DLNR’s dropping the ball – so he had a lot of things to say about that relationship that he has with them. BL: He was the one that started the Stop the Dawn movement with the senators, that Green had stepped in and said he was all in support of Dawn, but he was the one leading the charge on Stop Don and was not happy with DLNR management under Dawn. LT: \[Unclear\] it was on the news, yeah, I think I saw it… BL: Yeah. LT: Ah, what else… BL: He’s the guy – sent a letter to – with what was going on with the DLNR cause he sounded like somebody that I would love to follow up on. LT: Yeah. Cause if you have anything – that have – you want answers from DLNR or, you know, there’s problems or issues – I would reach out to him cause he, um… BL: Has an axe to grind… LT: Yeah, he likes to take accountability with the DLNR, so Kurt Flavela. Oh, and the Kona rep… ?: Attorney… LT: Yup. 18 RD: Duerr, District – 1, Tarnas is chair of Judiciary, which essentially, once a bill comes through – it’s gotta go through Finance and Ways and Means, Finance and Judiciary and essentially… He’s house. He’s very powerful and, hunter/fisher gatherer \[unclear\] is a little… ?: We’ve gone both ways but… RD: Yeah, right. BL: \[Unclear\] it’s important in the past and we’ve had him block us another… RD: You’re right and with a favor – with a lot of times, you think you’re in with them and then you find out that, you know, without the conversation, you’ve been axed. LT: Yup. OK. Moving forward – this is Chris Todd right here, ah, we have good communications with him. Abraham had a long relationship dealing with game management with Chris Todd. His brother is a fire chief for Hawaii island and so when we walked in the office, he had actually all the fire chiefs from around the whole state in the office. They just lost one of their fire fighters so when we walked in we had the – we got to greet all the fire chiefs of the – every island – that was kind of a, good introduction and then got to talk to Chris Todd about a lot of our local issues especially the pigs digging up everywhere during when it’s all rainy in Hilo. So, he’s gonna be helping us a lot over the next couple of years while he’s in. This is Mr. Tim Richards – the cowboy, his whole family was in there. He was talking to us about his plans – we were trying to share some of our ideas and our plans and our mission and then he started to tell us about what he’s focusing on and I think we can think of any crossroads between what we’re trying to do and what he’s trying to do then he can maybe jump on board. He listened to us. So, like Abraham mentioned earlier he’s kinda new – he doesn’t have too much power over everyone else – introducing things out of the spectrum was, I guess, not in his mission plan. RD: Chair, one touchstone for Tim Richards – is he’s really concerned about fire danger, right, having seen him at another meeting it was dealing with fire issues on the west side. He – it’s a real touchstone for him. It segways to palila on the mountain, yeah. BL: And the Waikoloa road safety and everything else… LT: Yeah, yeah. BL: \[Unclear\] going on in LA, we’ve got our fair share of \[unclear\]. 19 LT: Yeah, and that was it. Well, we stopped in to go see the only other – there were two republicans that we wanted to go talk to about second amendment rights - and Brenton Awa wasn’t in there, so this is his staff, so let’s send them some stuff later. OK. Thank you, guys. That’s all the pictures that we have and that was our kind of puakai and our trip to Oahu. For myself, I found it real beneficial looking people in the face, shaking their hands, getting to know what they look like and actually having that conversation in person and making those statements in person – so thank you guys for voting to send representatives cause I think this is the biggest thing that we can do as a commission. Any last mana’o? None? RD: Well, done. TWC: Mahalo. BL: I want to say we need a round of applause for how dapper Chairman looked. He got comments from everybody about how well dressed you were. He was the shining peacock \[unclear\] people just wanted his picture taken cause he was so sharp looking. LT: There’s a point in my life where we used to stand for inspection for hours, right? \[Unclear\] OK. Thank you very much, um… IKK: \[Unclear\] LT: Yeah, OK… Where were we on… IKK: \[Unclear\] New Business. LT: OK, mahalo for that discussion and our \[unclear\] trip to Oahu, before we move on, I’d like to make a motion, oh, can I ask for someone to make a motion to send a representative to create a public service announcement on behalf of cleaning up the shooting range. This public service announcement will go on the radio like KAPA and KWXX and also on, and also to share on social media. So, just a motion to make the PSA. RD: Duerr, District – 1. I would like to make a motion that GMAC prepares a PSA that will go on radio and social media, which is telling the public to clean up, take in, take out – clean up trash at Mile Marker 16 range for or there’s a threat of it closing. LT: Leomana, District – 3, I’d like to second that motion. Thank you, and discussion. BL: Brian Ley, District – 4. Since we’ve got this on the table can we go ahead and do a PSA about the – stopping the eradication on Mauna Kea for fire and safety hazards and with a number for the people to call, you know, say PSA – you just stop the eradication on Mauna Kea due to the sheep keeping the fire loads down and if you have a concern with 20 that please call your representative or DLNR, I mean, we might as well do two PSAs so they can do it at different times or something. LT: Leomana, District – 3. I think that’s a good idea. I would just close this one out and we’ll make another one right after. Discussion on the first motion? Ah, none so… RD: Do we have a contact – do we have a contact number to call if people are concerned? LT: I don’t want to, ah, so no contact yet but… RD: Would you mind if they contact you if your number was the contact. LT: I could put my number, I’m actually heading right up to Micah’s office after this, oh, wait, Barbara has her hand up. BK: We do have a press person in the mayor’s office that you should be working with and Micah’s in Kona today, sorry. RD: Yeah, it’s Tom Callis. LT: OK. We’ll go and talk with him too. BK: Yeah, he might be in but I’m not sure. LT: OK. Just to talk with the PSAs is topic: shooting range, any results we don’t clean it, it’s gonna shut down and then contact. Any further discussion on that? Nope, we can take a roll call vote. District – 1? Action: R. Duerr make a motion that GMAC prepares a public service announcement (PSA) that will go on radio and social media to inform the public to clean up, take in, take out trash at Mile Marker 16 shooting range or there’s a threat of it closing. Second by L. Turalde. Motion passed by voice pole vote with 6 ayes, 0 nays. LT: Another motion, Brian. BL: Brian, District – 4. I make, a motion for another PSA about stopping the eradication on Mauna Kea for fire safety concerns. LT: Leomana, District – 3, I’d like to second the motion, ah, for a PSA about Mauna Kea, the eradication of sheep and fire safety concerns – any discussion? Um, for this, is there a… RD: Duerr, District – 1. So, what’s the action item? 21 BL: The action item is that we decide who would be the benefit and with the PSA that we need to stop the eradication on Mauna Kea to leave the sheep alone to keep the fire hazard under control and either call Dave Smith – whoever we think should be – these phone calls should go to let him know that the people want – they’re tired of the eradication and we need to stop it for fire and safety reasons. TWC: Taysen. Would it be possible to give Dawn Chang’s number? Dave Smith is all, \[Unclear\] I’d just go straight – well ask him and… LT: Yeah, I don’t mind adding the officials’ actual numbers, right, chain of command – let’s go with start – the top of the board and then just anybody left in charge of making these decisions. Their numbers – they’re not private numbers – they’re public so we can just add ‘em. TWC: And she did say before she would like to hear from the public so, hey, here’s your chance. LT: I don’t mind putting together the range PSA cause that’s kind of simple like plenty data – there’s no – for the script… RD: Duerr, District – 1, Well, Tom Callis as a member of the Big Island Press Club – I’ve known Tom for – Tom will do this – he’s a journalist – he can help you shape it. LT: OK. Yeah. Cause I don’t really know the data behind that – writing a script to go tell people to clean up is easy. IKK: Yeah, like what Barbara said – GMAC wants to make announcement \[unclear\]. LT: Yeah. RD: He (Tom) could also advise you when you’re up there – like what the draft would be or if you need more information, you know, is this directed and, does this PSA want to hold until we’ve pulled together the palila and the earlier discussion on how, do we revisit on Mauna Kea. LT: Right. BL: I was just thinking just stirring up some noise so they, you know, that everyone’s not happy with it. RD: Yeah. BL: And when we’d come back with the other alternative plans \[unclear\] look at all the feedback we got from that little PSA and then… 22 RD: And one question on discussion is – it would be helpful because if it goes to – if the only place it’s going to is DLNR – and it’s a measure they don’t want – they’re not going to let us know how many people actually called them and if they had legitimate concerns and they were legitimate people. How do we keep – can they contact us as well – asking the public to contact GMAC with this issue. LT: Well, that, that was \[unclear\]… JA: Well, here’s an interesting question and this was kind of brought up in the beginning of the palila conversation from the Seventies. How many palila birds were in the Seventies? You guys were saying, say 1200 right? And if they’re saying now they’re saying now there’s 200 – how much money’s been spent since the 70s in eradication? LT: Yeah. JA: Right. So, we’ve wasted how many millions of dollars to come down a thousand birds – millions – that’s the information the public needs to be aware of – that we’ve wasted millions to actually decrease the population. LT: Failed… TWC: So, at the end of the day it’s tax money, so… JA: So, there’s the information that needs to be out – is that we’ve wasted millions of dollars in actually decreasing the population. So the efforts aren’t working and all we’ve done is actually kill a bunch of animals that could be food on our plate and if DLNR – and that’s a great point Bob, is that DLNR’s gonna, let’s just be honest – cover up the information because they’re gonna sit on it instead of putting out the information and doing something about it – maybe it’s the news outlets that should be putting out the information maybe there’s a story in there somewhere that the press should be doing. LT: Leomana, District – 3. I agree with that, and I think that’s gonna be an avenue of my approach from now on, where I probably will reach out to news people that I don’t know. TWC: Tayson, District – 2, question on that, so is there a way that maybe – I don’t know if this is even legal or not but I’ll – Hawaii News Now and Na Leo TV – stuff like that – is that even possible or is it still gonna have to be a whole individual situation. IKK: So… Yeah, um… TWC: Cause that’s a lot of public outreach going through those \[unclear\]. 23 IKK: Right, and, I’m just looking at the Charter – Hawaii County Charter because it does flush out what this Commission is authorized to do and it talks about like advising county, state, federal agencies, also, um… TWC: The reason why I ask is because, you know, do this thing \[unclear\] we throw Dawn Chang’s number, you know, she’ll get all the public calls or whatever, but DLNR is – example for me – they blocked me on a social media – I’m not even allowed to tag anymore – they blocked me cause I tagged them so much – so if they can cover up stuff like that they’ll definitely cover this up \[unclear\] like it would get shake the right – not branches but trees – I believe that a movement can be made, right? And citizens they call, um, just \[unclear\] it’s not thousands, it’s millions to depopulate something that we’re supposed to protect. That’s just a waste of time and money. That’s what I believe, so that’s why I asked that question. IKK: Yeah, so just to answer your question, they would have to be in your personal capacity, yeah, and just keep your title out. TWC: Yeah. IKK: When you’re providing these reports, that way you don’t make, blend the two, and we can talk more about it as well, behind the scenes to see how we can go about making sure you’re not bringing GMAC in, yeah, but I can’t assist you in your personal endeavors, but just the kind of shield GMAC guys – that’s where I come in, ah, \[unclear\]. JA: But honestly, wouldn’t there be whistle blower protections under anything, even if something official was to come out it would be whistleblower protection under this whole thing because that’s – that’s… ?: That’s \[unclear\]. LT: I could exercise that just because \[unclear\] IKK: Well, that’s a good question whether it’s whistle blower protection act protects GMAC Commissioners – I would have said so, so legal inquiries – I would have to do legal research, I can back to you guys on that, but I don’t know right now – but I will look into that. JA: I know it’s not the Tuesday morning you were looking for… IKK: No, no… JA: She’s like, yeah, go work with GMAC it’ll be easy… 24 LT: OK, just to clear it up we voted on the first one, the second one this was the discussion so just so we can clear it up reiterating, creating a PSA contact – what’s his name? RD: Tom Callis. LT: Callis, Tom Callis – PR person for Hawaii County and getting on it with creating a PSA to let people know about wasting millions of dollars with the eradication of the sheep on Mauna Kea. BL: If that was the mayor’s number down there – does the mayor know many people support GMAC and since it is Hawaii County \[unclear\] that the mayor maybe \[unclear\] yeah, tell them to call the mayor’s office so the mayor can say well I’ve had 5,000 calls and Dawn Chang will listen to the mayor. RD: Duerr, District – 1, so essentially what Barbara has told us is that when we outreach to the public we have to go through the PIO of the County – public information officer. One thing we can do is – in that conversation of like presenting this to him – he’s gonna have opinions of like what this deems to happen and 2) is it something that could happen, so though we’re, though we’re drafting a PSA we still need to go to the PIO – Tom Callis – who will give his mana’o on it and that will give us a heads up of what it is. At the very least, he will know it’s a concern and he will likely share it with the mayor so that there’s a concern. IKK: So, sorry, I don’t mean to interject but okay reading the Charter it says the Commission shall provide reports or legislature recommendations to the Council as necessary – so this could be a report that you can prepare, and suggest to the Council that, you know, put this out in the news outlets and then they say – give the approvals – and then, you know, there you go RD: Oh, yeah. It’s not a bad idea. IKK: Yeah. LT: I like that idea. IKK: Cause then you’re within your authority clearly. ?: Yeah, right. IKK: You’re not just acting outside of your… RD: Right, no it still makes sense for Leomana to have a conversation with Tom to kind of like, you know, open up the gate… 25 LT: I’d like to do that… RD: Right, yeah. IKK: Oh, yeah, yeah, you’d be advising the County. RD: \[Unclear\] like of how he works with it, how he will draft, how will it help. IKK: Oh, yeah, so if I, you know, like prepare the report or just like a summary or something – give it to the mayor’s office, you know, this is what we want to do – what do you think the County should do and then go from there and like work with the mayor’s office to \[unclear\]. Two minutes… LT: OK, that’s the end of the discussion. Roll call vote, Action: B. Ley motioned for a public service announcement (PSA) stopping the eradication on Mauna Kea for fire safety concerns. Second by L. Turalde. Motion carried by voice poll vote with 6 ayes, no nays. LT: All ayes. Bill passes, no nays. Thank you, guys, very much. So, we got out PSAs announcement, going up to Tom Callis and I’ll have that discussion with him and then I’ll reach out to everybody individually if we need information. b. Discussion on inviting speakers from Hawaii Division of Conservation Resources Enforcement (DOCARE) to provide status update on policy and operations on Hawaii Island. LT: OK, let’s move on to New Business. Item number c. c. Discussion on the Skeet Shooting Range Shutdown, Commission Robert Duerr. RD: Just talking about item number c – Shooting Range – we had a discussion with the mayor – we had a meeting with the Mayor and the Managing Director Bill – last month where we talked to them about our primary concerns about the skeet shooting range and how it was shut down – a thief stealing the generator and no security. No first aid and they cannot operate. Anyway, we had delivered the message, and I think the Mayor and the Managing Director are already on it because I’ve seen that the Shooting Range started posting on their social media that they were open, so, that was my update for that. Ah, we can move on to the next agenda item – game birds study. LT: Leomana, District – 3, did we talk about this already. 26 d. Discussion on Hawaii County DOFAW Game Bird Crop Study, Commissioner Robert Duerr. RD: No, I mean, I introduced it last \[unclear\] you know, supplying a DOFAW, you know, maybe next month Josh Pang-Ching… LT: I was gonna ask you to address it right after \[unclear\]. RD: So, he might know. LT: OK, moving forward from… IKK: \[Unclear\] LT: Yeah, I was just gonna, oh, OK, ah, Josh, aloha, are you still on? I cannot see a status update. JPC: (Joshua Pang-Ching) Howzit, I been here (Zoom). LT: You know, we’d love to have – I don’t know if you’re open to this – I know we was trying to email some of the people at DLNR, but we wanted to have kind of just like a question and answer, you know, if you came in and we just had general questions, just to check in on the status of everything that we talk about, I know the last time we talked was a couple of month ago and I’ve been talking to a couple of the Commissioners and they would love it if you could just come in and just give an update or a report on a lot of our game bird situations. JPC: I’d be happy to, I mean, yeah, what is it – every third Tuesday… LT: Third Tuesday, yeah. JPC: I’m looking at my calendar and off the top of my head, yeah, I should be able to come in, and we can comment, I’ll comment on anything that I can within my capacity and would it be up for like probably talking about A, B, C topics \[unclear\]… LT: Yeah, I’ll email you over kind of like a general discussion A, B, C and then maybe at that time you can just comment whatever you think we want to know, ah…And if we just have three general topics that we can start from there. JPC: OK. That sounds good. LT: Oh, right on, yes, sir. Thank you very much. Should I email the state or else can you drop your email in the Chat so… 27 JPC: State, yeah, yeah, it should be the same. I think I have emails – I’ve gotten those before from you, Leomana, so should be the same. LT: OK, thank you very much, we’ll stay in touch and thank you for joining the meeting. JPC: Yeah, easy, Barbara has my email as well. LT: OK, yes, sir, thank you. OK, guys we’re on and we’ll email what we got him and then get that meeting so we can have our Q & A session cause, yeah, we got, you know, expert bird hunters – a part of the Commission – we actually saw Kohala – up at the capitol we saw the class \[unclear\] class – Kohala High School, ah, game bird club that they got – they raised a lot of the game birds in Kohala High School and they released them in the wild so I want to help support that too. BL: B. Ley: I’m sorry, since we end in two minutes I got a text – we were – asking about the paperwork that’s supposed to be loaded in the GMAC folder to the Lower Puna future units maybe, oh, yeah, we did talk to some representatives and stuff like that and pointed out that, you know, down the pike we want between Hawaiian Beaches and Hawaiian HPP – we want to turn that into a \[unclear\] unit and also, we’ve got a few minutes – it’s back to the gun things. One of the laws was if you own a 30 round magazine and you actually put it in your gun, it’s a $1,000.00 fine and jail time is what they want to do - is some stupid thing to get around the - cause they’ve already proven that limiting magazine rounds is illegal, so they were going to do something retarded like that. And also, with the animal – one of the other sticklers was that you would have to prove that you owned a gun in that caliber to buy that caliber tagging along with the background check. So, yeah, you would have to take your paper where it says I’m allowed to buy 22 rounds or twelve-gauge shotgun to serve my certification that I have a legally registered gun so like I said it’s just Hawaii’s just got to be stupid like California and just got to follow along and it’s just ridiculous waste of my time, taxpayer money and everyone else to do these things that have already been gone through the court system but that’s my soapbox my 2 cents worth. CO: I just want to check, sorry, I was late, was this SB174 – is that the one you guys are talking about? The ammunition bill? BL: Yeah. ?: Thank you, sir. LT: \[Unclear\] ?: Oh, I think we lost them. 28 JA: Well, I guess we’re done. ?: Oh, oh, there it is. LT: OK, sorry, the computer \[unclear\]. ?: Yeah, so the main computer… ?: \[Unclear\] there you go. LT: There you go… ?: Barbara can you hear? LT: OK, yeah, yeah… RD: Barbara what’s the status on Abel Aquino who is a prospective District – 6 Commissioner. BK: When I checked two weeks ago – we had not received his application and I know Micah reached out to him as well and I did too. LT: I even sent Micah the interest sheet too. IKK: Barbara is this still recording, I don’t think so, right? BK: Well, let’s see, there’s a red dot on the top – let’s see… IKK: Oh, yeah? CO: It’s telling me it’s recording. BK: It’s recording. IKK: OK, so it’s still recording, OK, OK. LT. Leomana, District – 3, Barbara sorry I just wanted to check – I submitted the hunting maps and a couple of other papers upstairs… BK: OK. Uh-huh. You want copies? LT: If you got that. 29 BK: Ah, I will check. LT: Yeah, OK. 7. NEXT MEETING AGENDA ITEMS: a. Open Forum: Public’s opportunity to submit a request to place specific items on the agenda for the next meeting. *No discussion or voting on these matters.* So this is our opportunity for the public to come in and let us know what they’re dealing with, what they have on their minds, you know, we’re not allowed to communicate – we’re not often communicating with everyone in the public and we don’t listen to them – we kind of set our own agenda – but this meeting will be important so people can come and tell us what they care about during our meetings, instead of having them only present on our agenda items. So spread the word – next GMAC meeting – everybody will be able to testify on what they care about. b. Commissioners’ opportunity to suggest any other items to be placed on the agenda for the next meeting. *No discussion or voting on these matters.* 8. ANNOUNCEMENTS: a. Next Meeting: February 18, 2025, at 9:00am, 25 Aupuni Street, Puna Conference Room, 1501, Hilo, HI 96720 b. Open Forum: Public’s opportunity to announce past, ongoing or future matters in the County. *No discussion or voting on these matters.* 9. ADJOURNMENT (11:00 AM): Action Item: A motion was made by R. Duerr and seconded by C. Okumura to adjourn the meeting at 10:59 am. The motion passed unanimously by voice vote with 6 ayes, no nays. Respectfully submitted by, Barbara Kossow Secretary 30