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Kauai hunters
protest protected-
land plan

Dozens call for designations
to be scaled back; environmentalists
want a larger area covered

---

By Anthony Sommer
Star-Bulletin

LIHUE -- Kauai's hunters turned out in force at a public hearing yesterday to vehemently oppose a proposal to designate 60,600 acres on the island as critical habitat for 76 species of native plants.

Their chief spokesman was Ron Kouchi, Kauai County Council chairman and likely mayoral candidate in 2002. As in much of Hawaii, hunters on Kauai constitute a powerful lobby and major voting bloc.

The proposal comes from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which in 1998 lost a lawsuit filed against it in federal court by the Earthjustice Legal Fund -- then an arm of the Sierra Club -- claiming it was violating the Endangered Species Act by failing to designate critical habitat for plants on the verge of extinction.

The designation prohibits development on federal land that would threaten the future survival of a plant species. It also prohibits similar development by any state or local government or private nonprofit group that receives federal funds.

It gives considerable leverage to environmental and anti-development groups. "We've got the feds here in about every kind of activity on this land," said Marge Ziegler of Earthjustice, which filed and won the suit, at yesterday's hearing.

The proposed areas for Kauai were the first to be unveiled and the first to be challenged, primarily by the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.

The designation area covers all of Kokee and Waimea Canyon State Parks, both major tourist attractions -- and hunting areas.

Hearings have been requested by the DLNR for the plans on all the islands in the Hawaiian chain, but hearing dates have not yet been scheduled. The DLNR wants a much smaller area designated as critical habitat.

About 90 percent of the crowd of about 80 at yesterday's hearing were hunters. They argued against the designations.

"We do not want this (the right to hunt) taken away from us," said Winnie Cummings, a hunter from Wailua Homesteads. "This is something that is very strong with me."

Environmental groups said the designations are not broad enough. "We should also include areas not currently occupied by the plants," said Crystal Webber of the Kauai Sierra Club.

Kouchi said many of the hunters at the hearing "do not feel comfortable speaking and I have come forward to do that.

"The hunters are angry and they speak a very different language from the Sierra Club."

Kouchi suggested the matter be handed to the State Judiciary's Alternative Dispute Resolution Center.

Several hunters who did speak said the critical areas mapped out by the Fish and Wildlife Service in many cases are based on where endangered plants were seen 30 years ago but where they no longer exist. "The study is outdated, flawed, inconclusive and done with a bias," charged hunter Michael Broyles.

Kent Yamaguchi, spokesman for the Kauai Hunting Association, said the designations are not accompanied by any plan to protect the areas' native plants. He questioned whether federal money exists to control alien weeds that crowd out natives.