[ OUR OPINION ]
Military should share
in cost of snake inspection
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So it is alarming that the U.S. Department of Agriculture will be forced to cut the number of employees whose jobs are to do exactly that. Lacking enough funds, the department's Inspection and Wildlife Service on Guam already has eliminated four positions and intends to cut eight more next month.
Guam is the epicenter of the brown tree snake's dispersal in the Pacific. Introduced there in the 1950s, it has decimated Guam's bird population, destroying nine native forest species and other native wildlife. The reptile has since spread to the northern Marianas, the Marshall Islands, Okinawa, Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, all the way to Corpus Christi, Texas.
Most of the snakes get around by stowing away aboard military planes and ships. Nearly two-thirds of the 6,000 snakes removed every year from Guam's ports of exit are found at Air Force and Navy cargo facilities.
Yet the Department of Defense has not increased its funding for inspections in 11 years even as military traffic has increased because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. State officials say $2.8 million is all it would take to assure that 100 percent of planes and boats leaving Guam are checked for snakes, a tiny drop in the $400 billion military spending pot.
Even with inspections, brown tree snakes have made their way to Hawaii. Since 1981, eight have been found here. That may seem like a small number, but there is no way to know if others have slithered by undetected. Just last month, two Maui residents spotted a suspect brown tree snake in Hamoa, and all it would take is one to establish a population here since a pregnant female can hold living sperm for up to four years.
Keeping Hawaii a snake-free zone has been viewed as a laughable concern in the rest of the country. It was only last year that Sen. John McCain of Arizona, where snakes are common, labeled as wasteful the $1 million Sen. Daniel Inouye sought to place in the defense budget to combat infestation.
McCain contends that such funding "does not belong in the Defense Appropriations Act," not recognizing that the snakes are hitching rides with military cargo.
In recent years, the state has developed various programs to control invasive alien species. A multi-agency "rapid response team" was established, training members to search for and capture snakes as they do on Guam.
Hawaii's native birds would surely suffer if brown tree snakes migrate here, but the state also has a clear economic interest. A recent University of Hawaii study showed that the snake's presence would cause as much as $405 million in annual damage in the islands.
Weighed against the $2.8 million needed for inspections in Guam, it is evident that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
