Saving Seafood

What Does A Trump Presidency Mean For Hawaiiโ€™s Environment?

November 22, 2016 โ€” President-elect Donald Trump has called climate change a โ€œhoaxโ€ and โ€œbullshit.โ€

On the campaign trail, he pledged to dismantle clean energy plans, pull out of an international agreement to reduce carbon emissions and ease regulations on coal, oil and gas production as part of his plan to โ€œMake America Great Again.โ€

What Trump will actually do after he takes the reins of government in January from President Barack Obama remains to be seen. But nonprofit groups, lawmakers, government officials and others say Hawaii needs to remain vigilant about protecting its environment over the next four years.

They say that means lawyering up to fight court battles, empowering citizens, reminding local decision-makers of their authority and investing more resources into state and county agencies that can backstop changes Trump and a GOP-controlled House and Senate may make at the federal level.

โ€œThe state has often felt like it can just leave it to the feds,โ€ said David Henkin, a Hawaii-based attorney for Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental law organization. โ€œTheyโ€™re not going to be able to pass the buck anymore. Itโ€™s time for them to step up.โ€

Read the full story at the Honolulu Civil Beat

Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council Asks for Transparent Analysis of Proposed Marine Monument Expansion

August 8, 2016 โ€” The following is excerpted from a press release from the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council addressing transparency in the proposed marine monument expansion. In particular, the release highlighted the failure by White House officials to fulfill promises made during the expansion of the Pacific Remote Islands Monument in 2014:

The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council on Wednesday agreed to a resolution that asks the U.S. government to address a suite of concerns before acting on the proposed expansion on the Papahฤnaumokuฤkea Marine National Monument (MNM) in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Council members Suzanne Case, Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources chair, and Julie Leialoha, Conservation Council for Hawaii president, voted against the proposal. National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) Pacific Islands Regional Administrator Michael Tosatto abstained.

The resolution requests a โ€œpublic, transparent, deliberative, documented and science-based processโ€ to address the proposed expansion, which could prohibit fishing in two-thirds of the U.S. exclusive economic zone (EEZ), i.e., waters out to 200 miles from shore, around Hawaii. The resolution is being sent to President Obama, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and the Secretaries of Commerce, the Interior and State.

The Councilโ€™s resolution also requests that the U.S. government address the resources and tools needed to effectively manage and administer an expanded monument and to specify the technical, scientific and socioeconomic costs and benefits from monument expansion on marine resources, residents of Hawaii and the nation.

If any designation is made under the Antiquities Act of 1906 to proclaim an expanded monument, the Council recommends that the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act process continue to be used to develop, analyze and implement fisheries management in the U.S. EEZ waters enclosed by the monument.

Council Executive Director Kitty M. Simonds noted that the Homeland Security Department and U.S. Coast Guard did not receive additional enforcement assets to monitor the Pacific Remote Islands MNM after it was expanded in 2014, despite White House statements that additional enforcement would be provided.

Council members John Gourley of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) said promises made by the White House and Pew Charitable Trusts during the 2009 creation of the Marianas MNM were also not fulfilled, such as the construction of a monument visitorsโ€™ center and increased jobs, tourism and revenue.

Read the full release from the WPRFMC here