U.S. Watching Hawai'i Propose Environmental Suicide

At the Hawaii Land Use blog (hilanduse.blogspot.com) Jesse Souki discusses the serious negative consequences of the new "Superferry Bailout Strategy" -- that of removing from EIS consideration secondary impacts.

According to Jesse Souki, the EIS law does not mention "secondary impacts". What it says is this:

[T]he sum of effects on the quality of the environment, including actions that irrevocably commit a natural resource, curtail the range of beneficial uses of the environment, are contrary to the State's environmental policies or long-term environmental goals as established by law, or adversely affect the economic welfare, social welfare, or cultural practices of the community and State. HRS § 343-2.

The legislature directed the Environmental Council to make rules to implement this. That's where the term secondary impacts comes from:

The EIS Rules define “impacts”/“effects” as including “primary, secondary, or cumulative” effects. “Secondary impacts” are defined as follows:

"Secondary impact" or "secondary effect" or "indirect impact" or "indirect effect" means effects which are caused by the action and are later in time or farther removed in distance, but are still reasonably foreseeable. Indirect effects may include growth inducing effects and other effects related to induced changes in the pattern of land use, population density or growth rate, and related effects on air and water and other natural systems, including ecosystems. HAR § 11-200-2.

Mr. Souki then cautions that Hawai'i should keep its laws consistent with other states and with the national laws rather than narrowly defining impacts.

Now here is where things get interesting (but Mr. Souki doesn't discuss this). The Office of Environmental Council (“OEQC”) is an administration controlled by Gov. Lingle. Just recently their chairman,Robert King, resigned, claiming the Lingle administration is not interested in the council’s recommendations.

King said the Lingle administration has not supported the council or backed its proposals to update administrative rules. The council is under the OEQC in the state Department of Health.

“We just haven’t been able to function as a council for quite awhile now. We’re getting no support from the state. I didn’t feel like I could fulfill my duties as the chair and as a member of the council in these conditions, so I resigned.”

In his resignation letter to Gov. Linda Lingle, King wrote that during the past two years the council has been “marginalized to the point of irrelevance.”

So while Lingle, Hanabusa and Hemmings are claiming that rules need updating and guidelines aren't clear, they are ignoring the body that wants to clarify and update the rules.

Is that because Lingle, Hanabusa, and Hemmings want the rules "clarified" into nothingness?