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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, April 4, 2002

Maui habitat plan revised to address concerns

By Christie Wilson
Neighbor Island Editor

A revised proposal for establishing critical habitat for endangered plants on Maui and Kaho'olawe adds 11 species and more than triples the amount of designated land to 128,294 acres.

Most of the acreage is in inaccessible areas unsuitable for development, according to Anne Badgley of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. It includes not only areas where endangered plants are clinging to survival but also areas where rare plants no longer exist but where it is hoped they may be re-established.

Attorney David Henkin of Earthjustice in Honolulu said conservation groups are pleased that the Maui proposal includes habitat not occupied by endangered species. Environmentalists protested against the earlier proposal, released in December 2000, because those areas were not considered.

Henkin said "unoccupied habitat" is essential to any effort to re-establish rare plants to the point where they can be removed from the endangered species list.

Badgley said the revised proposal reflects public response to the first proposal as well as new biological data. In addition, some of the boundaries were adjusted to more accurately follow the topography of Maui and to eliminate agricultural fields and rural developments.

The proposed rule would establish 13 critical habitat units on Maui comprising 126,531 acres mostly in East Maui and the West Maui Mountains, and two units in Kaho'olawe coastal areas totaling 1,763 acres. Sixty-one plants species are covered.

Approximately 45 percent of the lands are under the control of the state, about 17 percent are federally owned and roughly 37 percent are privately owned. More than 77 percent of the lands on Maui and all of the lands on Kaho'olawe are in the state conservation district.

Critical habitat designation affects only activities that are conducted on federal lands or that require federal permits or financing.

Henkin said the designations will not affect hunters, Native Hawaiian cultural practitioners or private landowners. The designations are a way to ensure that federal agencies will not be involved in activities that degrade the environment, he said.

The Fish and Wildlife Service's actions in preparing proposals for critical plant habitat in Hawai'i are the result of a lawsuit filed by Earthjustice on behalf of the Sierra Club, the Conservation Council and the Hawaiian Botanical Society. A federal court ruled in favor of the conservation groups in 1998 and ordered the service to develop plans for the Islands.

The service has issued revised proposals for critical plant habitats on Kaua'i, Ni'ihau and Lana'i, and is working on a plan for Moloka'i. Proposals for plant species on O'ahu, the Big Island and the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are scheduled to be published for first time within the next few weeks, Badgley said.

Public comment on the Maui-Kaho'olawe revisions will be accepted until June 3. Requests for a public hearing must be submitted by mid-May. Send comments to: Field Supervisor, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service-Pacific Islands, Box 50088, Honolulu, HI 96850.