Hawaii ranchers want state agency to transfer more eligible land

Cattle ranchers in Hawaii want more eligible land to be transferred from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources to the state Department of Agriculture while the departments struggle to accommodate both local farming and environmental conservation.

Over the past 20 years or so, the DLNR has reportedly transferred more than 19,000 acres of eligible land classified for agricultural use to the DOA, following a 2003 law, called Act 90, allowing the transfer so long as the boards of both departments agree to it.

But the DLNR has been hesitant about giving up some of the 100,000 eligible acres it’s still managing after determining they are important for other uses, including forest restoration.

It’s been a problem for some ranchers who are leasing land still under the DLNR’s jurisdiction and say it’s hurt farming and even land management.

In Brendan Balthazar’s case the land he is leasing is being taken away.

Balthazar, owner of Diamond B Ranch in Makawao, Maui, told a working group that included state lawmakers on Aug. 23 that he’s losing 60% of a leased parcel of land because the DLNR wants to set it aside for reforestation.

“The state informed me about … that they will be taking 2,100 acres out of my 3,400-acre lease to put in forestry,” Balthazar said. “The state wants to increase food production. … That can’t happen when productive farming and ranch lands are taken away.”

In a letter that Balthazar provided to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, the land department told him that in June it will withdraw 2,168 acres that border the Kula Forest Reserve.

During this year’s legislative session, lawmakers passed House Bill 469 to form a working group to gather more information about the transfer of lands between the departments. Ranchers reported to the working group, led by state Rep. David Tarnas (D, Kaupulehu-Waimea-Halaula) and state Sen. Lorraine Inouye (D, Kaupulehu­-Waimea-North Hilo), about the stresses of leasing land managed by the DLNR.

Balthazar said he’s put in hundreds of thousands of dollars that he borrowed into infrastructure projects for that land, including putting up fences, digging wells and paving roads.

About 15 years ago he initially leased the property from a private owner, but ownership exchanged hands a few times until it was acquired by the state and put under the management of the land department. Balthazar said his lease with the DLNR is good for about 10 more years, but it also allows the department to take back “a portion or all” of the land, which they did.

“What good is the lease? The lease wasn’t as good as the paper it was written on,” Balthazar told the Star-­Advertiser.

Additionally, the DLNR is required by state law to auction leases for public land, potentially forcing farmers into bidding wars if they want to renew leases for lands on which they’ve already made improvements.

That happened in 2002 to Ponoholo Ranch on Kohala Mountain. It won an auction to renew its expired lease, “in essence buying back the improvements WE had made over the years,” it said in testimony to the working group.

That has discouraged farmers from making improvements to the land.

“The public auction process disincentivizes a lessee from taking care of the infrastructure,” said Lani Petri, who runs Kapapala Ranch near Pahala. Petri has just finished overhauling seven miles of fencing next to the Kapapala Forest Reserve, but she told the working group she did so because “we believe there will be lease reform.”

Further, many ranchers are temporarily occupying land via 30-day revocable permits, and the month-to-month uncertainty makes running a farm an even more difficult task, the ranchers said.

Petri said 22,000 acres of her ranch fall under a general lease with the DLNR that expires in eight years, but 12,000 acres are occupied by two revocable permits that “could expire at any time.”

Ranchers believe the DLNR, an agency with a broad mission statement to “enhance, protect, conserve and manage Hawaii’s unique and limited natural, cultural and historic resources,” by taking over land being used for farming and setting it aside for conservation efforts like forest restoration, is relatively uninterested in encouraging farming.

They prefer the DOA’s focus and expertise on agriculture as well as its leasing options that offer more stability and flexibility than the DLNR’s leases and revocable permits.

At least recently, the departments themselves have also appeared to be at odds about which parcels of land to transfer.

The 19,000 acres that the DLNR has transferred since 2003 make up 242 parcels, but this year just three eligible parcels have been transferred while 117 have been rejected, according to the DOA.

The Agriculture Department reported to the Star- Advertiser that as of January a list that was developed by both departments contained 195 eligible parcels totaling nearly 104,000 acres. The DLNR has declined to transfer 68 of them, for potential conservation and public-access reasons among others, and the DOA has declined 49 after reviewing them for their agricultural suitability.

The DLNR still has to make decisions on 69 properties, and the DOA needs to decide on six.

On Aug. 16, during the working group’s first meeting, DLNR Chairwoman Suzanne Case said the department wants to at least “hold the line” to ensure that what’s left of Hawaii’s native forests doesn’t continue receding because of continued human development, but advocated for expanding forests. Many of the qualified parcels, she said, border native forests.

Case added that the DLNR does account for agriculture, and when evaluating parcels it considers factors like Hawaii food sustainability.

Many of the properties in question also are “multiple­-use areas” where activities like farming, hunting and renewable-energy projects can coexist, she said, but the DOA’s focus on agriculture allows it to exclude consideration for other potential uses for such land.

“We’re not trying to displace anyone, but we’re trying to collaborate,” Case said before emphasizing the need to preserve Hawaii’s forests. “We don’t want it to be a gradual wearing away of our forests like it has been in other places.”

Since the arrival of humans, 90% of the state’s tropical dryland habitats, 61% of its mesic habitats and 42% of its wetland habitats have been lost, according to the 2016 Forest Action Plan prepared by the DLNR’s Division of Forestry and Wildlife. Native vegetation grows on just 40% of the state’s land area.

The DLNR has said that land, under its management, can also be used to promote carbon sequestration, wildlife management and public access. It has generally excluded larger pasture lands from transfer because they have “high natural resource value.”

The Sierra Club of Hawaii also opposed the transfer of eligible lands to the DOA while HB 469 went through the state Legislature earlier this year, arguing that they include watershed lands that are important for providing drinking water and contributing to healthy forests.

An agency like the DLNR, rather than the DOA, is more appropriate for maintaining those water supplies, the organization said.

In line with the ranchers, the Sierra Club has been critical of the DLNR’s use of revocable permits, but wants to change the way the department handles land dispositions to address their concerns. An early version of HB 469 gave the DLNR leasing flexibility similar to the DOA’s, which the land department supported.

“The real issue behind this bill is the challenge the ranchers face in securing proper land dispositions from DLNR. We understand this problem,” the Sierra Club wrote in a testimony against HB 469 in February. “The proper solution here is to fix DLNR’s process for handling land and water dispositions, not to transfer specific pieces of property away from the very agency that should be managing them.”

Those who want land to be transferred, however, have argued that an underfunded DLNR hasn’t been effective at conservation efforts on land already set aside for that purpose.

Balthazar isn’t against reforestation and said that he would willingly compromise by giving up about 1,700 acres of land the DLNR wants and are forested anyway — which would save him roughly 400 acres of pasture land — but said the state-managed land next to his farm hasn’t been cared for at all.

“The proof is in the pudding. This is not something you can’t see, this is not people just talking,” Balthazar told the Star-Advertiser. “You can come to my ranch and see what I did — you can see all the dried trees that I sprayed, you can see all the fireweed that’s gone. And you can walk literally next door and you literally cannot walk in a straight line. It’s just hordes of wattle trees … fireweed, just totally run over.”

Nicole Galase, managing director of the Hawaii Cattlemen’s Council, told the working group Aug. 23 that conservation measures can be worked into the DOA leases, allowing the goals for both departments to be accommodated, but lands currently being used for farming should be prioritized for that use.

“Lands in active production should be protected and stay in agricultural production,” she said. “The best way to do that is to transfer the leases to the Department of Agriculture.”