Northwestern Hawaiian
Islands should be
‘Yellowstone of Oceans’

This precious marine resource
needs our protection

My Second Congressional District is a treasure trove of natural wonders, from Hawaii Island's Kilauea Volcano through Kauai's Kilauea Point. But a whole other incomparably valuable part of my district stretches another 1,200 miles to the northwest, from Nihoa Island to Kure Atoll.

This is the incredible world of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, Hawaii's ancient geologic beginnings and today a chain of islands, atolls, reefs, banks, seamounts, nearshore waters and open ocean in which lie 70 percent of our nation's coral reefs. This is home to some 7,000 terrestrial and marine species, many endemic and endangered, like the Hawaiian monk seal and green, leatherback, loggerhead and hawksbill sea turtles, and an estimated 14 million seabirds. Yet this world faces the devastating, accelerating and cumulative threats of invasive species, marine discharges and debris, and overfishing and other human occupancy and extractive uses.

There have been laudable efforts to preserve this unique and special place, where even seemingly insignificant and benign human interaction can have the most magnified effect. The islands and some nearshore waters are well-protected national wildlife refuges. The Hawaii Board of Land and Natural Resources recently created in state nearshore waters (out three miles) a true state refuge, for which it deserves great credit.

But these are just parts of the big picture, for most of this vast and inter-reliant ecosystem lies beyond. In 2000 our federal government designated the NWHI's waters out 50 miles as a reserve administered by the Department of Commerce to be transitioned to sanctuary status. Yet both current reserve and envisioned sanctuary management anticipates continued commercial fishing and other extractive and invasive uses. To put it bluntly, the sanctuary won't be a sanctuary.

This world -- all of it -- must be a true refuge, in the spirit of the puuhonua (places of refuge) of old Hawaii, because only that maximum protection will assure its survival. But more simply, there should be some special places on this Earth where our marine ohana can live and thrive in their natural state, free of the hand of humankind, and the world of the NWHI is it.

Our current laws and regulations do not envision a true marine refuge; that would "take an act of Congress." So that's what I introduced last week: House Resolution 2376, the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Marine Refuge Act of 2005.

My bill would create not only our country's first marine refuge, but, at 137,000 square miles and encompassing virtually all NWHI waters, the largest in the world, larger even than Australia's Great Barrier Reef Marine Protected Area. Virtually all refuge activities would be by permit only, with permitted uses including scientific research and Hawaiian cultural practices, but not commercial fishing or other extractive uses, and with existing fishing permits bought out at fair value. Commerce would continue management in consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (which would continue managing the wildlife refuges at Midway and elsewhere) and the state of Hawaii, and with input from the scientific, marine conservation and Hawaiian communities.

The initial sledding on my bill will be tough, as whole mindsets must be changed and courses altered. In that, it will resemble establishment in 1872 of Yellowstone National Park, which, although revolutionary for its time, became the foundation of our National Park System.

Yet I am optimistic that, with mutual effort, we will prevail in creation of this "Yellowstone of Oceans," for its time has come and we know it. The natural inhabitants of our Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, and our Hawaii, country and world, deserve no less.