A card from Lea Hong was among the many condolences sent to the family of the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye, and it acknowledged his leadership role in finding money for land conservation.
But even with the loss of its most powerful congressional champion, Hawaii is on a path toward saving some of its prized public lands because there are now local sources of funds to draw down matching grants from Uncle Sam.
Conserving important land is usually a goal common to most people, but it’s all about "showing us the money," said Hong, director of the Hawaii office of The Trust for Public Land.
The trust most recently served as the matchmaker of sorts in the just-cemented deal to keep some 1,200 acres of former Galbraith Estate lands in agriculture. The negotiations took various directions, starting in 2006 when Hong moved from environmental law practice to the trust position, before settling on partners including the state, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, the U.S. Army and the Agribusiness Development Corp.
Hong, 46, said her upbringing in nearby Wahiawa probably made her "relentless" in her pursuit of the deal over six years.
Law is something she shares with her brother Ted Hong, former chief state negotiator for the Lingle administration, and her father, Tany Hong, the Ariyoshi administration’s attorney general.
But during her off hours she enjoys surfing, and for several years she’s run a fundraiser for an environmental law fellowship "jokingly called the Land Shark Invitational," she said. A trophy featuring the land shark, a humorous icon of popular culture, sits on her shelf.
The trust is her main passion, however, and since its founding in 1979 it’s been credited with helping save 42,000 acres in 27 separate projects, often by negotiating an agreement limiting the use of land rather than purchasing it outright. The TPL’s other most recent project involves getting an agricultural easement, or limitation, placed on more than 400 acres across from Turtle Bay.
Some hope a similar deal can preserve the nearby Kawela Bay. That would take money, Hong said, and it often takes a big donor to start the ball rolling toward critical mass and ultimate success.
"It’s interesting," she said. "Once one agency or private donor or someone says, ‘I’m willing to back this with money,’ usually the other partners then quickly fall into line, because they see someone taking the lead."
QUESTION: What was it about this position when it became available that interested you?
ANSWER: I think the primary thing was that I had been involved in so many different types of litigation, regarding land and preservation of cultural resources … that I thought the approach was really interesting.
The Trust for Public Land worked with the landowners on voluntary land conservation. Once the property was purchased, or the conservation easement was recorded on the land, it had a very lasting effect.
In litigation, you can win the case, sometimes you can get overruled — like the Legislature can pass a new law. …
We had the Waiahole case I worked on. It was an eight-month contested trial-like hearing. Three days a week for eight months. …
Q: You’re talking about the state water code case?
A: Yes. … Even if the court rules in a certain way, there’s still constant battling that goes on, about the interpretation of the court’s ruling, and sometimes the relevant parties don’t obey the court’s ruling and it has to be litigated again. …
What was attractive about it was that sense of long-lasting effect of voluntary conservation, trying to make things work out for all the parties. It’s not necessarily that everybody’s happy, but usually it’s acceptable.
Q: And there’s peace in the valley?
A: (Laughs) Yeah, there’s peace in the valley. That appealed to me, because it just seemed like litigation is so expensive, and so time-consuming, and often the results are not permanent, can be changed through legislation or a special exception.…
Q: Do you think this approach should be used in other contexts, or more than it is now? Rather than government condemning property?
A: I don’t know if that’s analogous. Usually the power of condemnation or eminent domain is used for things like roads, highways. Somehow, the public policy decision has been made that the road has to go through here, then the power of eminent domain is used. …
There have been efforts made in a variety of different circumstances to increase alternative dispute resolution, mediation. In all sectors, whether it be criminal, family court, civil, folks have found that it’s far more preferable, and cheaper to agree on something you can live with, rather than go through litigation.
Q: You’ve said before that the Galbraith negotiation was an enormous effort. Have you found this work satisfying?
A: Oh, definitely. I joke with my friends about how when I used to be at Alston Hunt (the law firm), I used to drive around town and be, “Hey, this is the worst hazardous waste site in Hawaii.” Or, “Do you realize there’s a layer of benzene floating over the water table here, that’s very hazardous to human health?”
Q: So, you were a real riot at parties, right?
A: (Laughs) Or I’d be, “Hey, that’s the case where people were fighting over this, or that.”
And now I can drive around with friends and family or visitors and be like, “Hey, this is a TPL project, Waimea Valley, beautiful waterfall, important cultural sites that have been conserved.” …
Q: But isn’t what you do in these negotiations the practice of law?
A: Well, I’m really the client. I’m not really the official lawyer on those transactions. I’m really what we call the project manager, and that is, I’m the one who does negotiate with the landowners and with the different agencies and tries to move things along as best we can to an agreement, and then through due diligence in closing. The folks who actually write our option agreements are our legal counsel in San Francisco. And that’s why we’re able to accomplish so much with so few staff. …
Q: Moving to the Galbraith pact, how did the Army get involved with a deal to preserve agricultural land?
A: (Indicates map.) This is the road that the Army built to connect Schofield to the Kawailoa and Kahuku training areas. … It’s for the Stryker brigade. You can imagine that they don’t really want to have a dense residential population living in the middle of this road where, literally, a large unit of Stryker vehicles might be driving through.
Q: So, this works for the Army?
A: Yes, very much so. It buffers access to their training area, and buffers Schofield and the West Range.
In addition, there’s a big hub of helicopter training that goes on above this area. There’s this corner where everybody kind of turns the corner and lands at Wheeler, right here, right above the Galbraith land. That makes a bit of noise. The Army was worried that if there were residences that were built in the property, that people would complain. And there’s not a whole lot of airspace to maneuver and change air flight paths.
The Rand Corp. has actually done studies on how this buffer program that the Army and the other military services have, and determined that it’s very cost-effective. Because it’s proactive: They look around at their training areas and they see what the development patterns are, and where a buffer would be good to try to acquire if it was voluntary, in partnership with groups like The Trust for Public Land, or on the mainland it might be The Nature Conservancy or some other conservation organization. It determined that it really saved the Army money, because if you can imagine, moving a training area is really, really expensive. …
Even if they didn’t move the training areas, they might have to modify training in a way that’s detrimental to their goals, to the troops.
So, for example, Mililani Mauka was built next to East Range, and people paid a lot of money for those lots, like over a million dollars. The most expensive lots are right on the rim, next to the East Range. Even though it’s in their covenants that they shouldn’t complain about the training because they’re aware that the training goes on next door, nobody reads that.… The Army receives all these complaints and then the Army might have to modify its training, like not train at night, for example. But not training at night is not a realistic thing for the troops. It’s detrimental to the troops. …
Q: Couldn’t this have prevented the noise complaints around the Kaneohe Marine base?
A: Unfortunately, all that development near Kaneohe took place before this relatively recent program was started, the buffer program. Had it been around back then, maybe they would have tried to conserve more of the land around Kaneohe Bay.…
Q: What was the Office of Hawaiian Affairs’ role in Galbraith?
A: They’ve been a great, great partner, because we worked with them previously on Waimea Valley, and we worked with them on Waokele O Puna. They’ve been a good partner for us.
Q: In what sense?
A: In terms of wanting to actually protect land and own it, to take on the kuleana or responsibility of actually managing and stewarding it. And also contributing money to the acquisition. …
Q: How typical is it that saving agricultural land is the goal of TPL?
A: Our national mission is quite broad. But what’s great about The Trust for Public Land is that the organization recognizes that every state or region is different.
So our local Hawaiian Islands Advisory Council developed a strategic plan that focuses more of my efforts in three areas. And one of those areas is working lands that promote Hawaii’s self-sufficiency in food, energy and water. Agricultural lands are a big component in that. In Hawaii it’s one of the three focus areas that we have: coastal lands, heritage lands — native lands that perpetuate Hawaiian culture — and the working land initiative.
People often ask me, “What is the difference between you and The Nature Conservancy?” The Nature Conservancy mission is focused on biodiversity; The Trust for Public Land’s mission is much broader, in that it focuses more on the connection of land and people.
