Sierra Club drafts conservation bills for tough times
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Science Writer
The Sierra Club will ask the Legislature this year to increase controls on coastal runoff and strengthen the public's ability to take state agencies and polluters to court.
State agencies strapped for money may cut into the government's ability to respond to problems, and it makes sense to allow citizens to step forward to protect the environment, said Jeff Mikulina, chairman of the Sierra Club's Hawai'i Chapter.
"With cuts across the board, there are probably going to be cuts in enforcement and in staff. It's important for citizens to be able to bring suit against government and violators," Mikulina said.
The so-called Blue Waters Bill leads a list of 11 measures the environmental group will be taking to the Legislature this session. Mikulina said mud from coastal grading on every major island has discolored the ocean, smothered corals and introduced nutrients that could affect the balance of marine life on Hawai'i's reefs.
The measure would increase penalties for grading that leads to runoff, applying them to people operating the equipment and those who hired them.
It also calls for the Department of Health to assess possible damage to the coastal environment from the development of injection wells, which can be used to dispose of treated sewage and push nutrients into nearshore waters.
Another bill, the Environmental Bill of Rights, would set strict ethical standards for those who serve on permit-granting boards such as the Land Use Commission, ensuring they have not received a significant amount of money from developers and others applying for permits.
A separate measure seeks to do away with automatic granting of permits in cases of tie votes or when an agency cannot meet deadlines to make a decision.
An environmental disclosure bill would require landfills, power plants, refineries and similar projects to undergo environmental studies, even when they are privately funded.
The Sierra Club will lobby to extend the solar investment credit, which gives a 35 percent income-tax credit for installation of solar water heating, solar photovoltaic, wind energy and certain other renewable energy projects.
A solar bonds bill would allow government agencies to float bonds to do energy-efficiency work. The bonds would be paid off by the savings in electric bills.
The group also wants to ban the use of recycled sewage sludge as fertilizer on school grounds, and will seek to impose environmental regulations on the cruise ship industry similar to those in place in Alaska. Another measure would set a fee on incoming ships and planes to pay for a program to intercept and eradicate harmful alien species.
A separate bill would set aside a dedicated amount or percentage of tourism promotion money to protect natural resources. A previous measure designed to do that was flawed, Mikulina said, because when tourism money was cut slightly, the share for natural resources was wiped out.
Sierra Club lobbyists also will seek more public involvement in the development of habitat conservation plans and safe harbor agreements, with provisions to allow their modification if they no longer protect endangered species.
The measure also would allow the public to sue to enforce the state's endangered species act.
Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.
