Testimony Needed on Friday, 9/24: EMI Water Lease EIS is Inadequate!

URGENT TESTIMONY ALERT! 

Maui Tomorrow believes that East Maui Irrigation’s Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) does not adequately disclose the negative impacts of their proposed 30-year water lease of East Maui stream water, and this FEIS may be approved this week. Please testify this Friday, Sept 24th at 9:00am at the State of Hawai’i Board of Land and Natural Resources (BLNR) online meeting, tell your story, and speak out for Maui’s water future! 

IMPORTANT: Please begin your comments by stating that the EIS is inadequate and should not be accepted. ALL COMMENTS NEED TO BE ABOUT WHETHER THE EIS MEETS LEGAL REQUIREMENTS TO CONSIDER IMPACTS AND ALTERNATIVES.

See below for information on how to submit testimony, for more background information,and for a list of issues that Maui Tomorrow’s members have found with the FEIS. The meeting agenda can be found here.

In 2019, a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for a 30-year lease of East Maui stream water to East Maui Irrigation was published. Maui Tomorrow held a public meeting to help people comment on the glaring deficiencies of that document, including its failure to fully disclose the impacts of diverting stream water to Central Maui. Now a final version of the EIS (FEIS) has been released, and unfortunately, it looks like the authors have adopted the usual approach of pursuing business as usual, while denying the evidence all around us that “business as usual” is not sustainable. It also does not adequately respond to the comments and questions submitted by Maui Tomorrow and many of our allies and supporters.

Please begin your comments by stating that the Final EIS is inadequate and should not be accepted. ALL COMMENTS NEED TO BE ABOUT WHETHER THE EIS MEETS LEGAL REQUIREMENTS TO CONSIDER IMPACTS AND ALTERNATIVES.Maui Tomorrow has identified the following issues with the FEIS*:

• MOVING WATER: FEIS needs to address the environmental and cultural impacts of moving and using water across aquifers and ahupuaʻa.
• WASTE AND SEEPAGE IN THE SYSTEM: FEIS needs more detailed discussion of decreasing waste and seepage as the water is transported and stored.
• WATERSHED RESTORATION: The FEIS does not discuss what more needs to be done to achieve watershed restoration.
• 30 YEARS: The proposed lease would be for 30 years, but the FEIS does not address the mitigation and plans to address possible major setbacks, changes to farming, climate change, increasing droughts, other environmental changes, and repair needs of the system over the next 30 years.
• NOT SHARING: The FEIS states that all water saved through conservation or better farming practices will be used by Mahi Pono to plant more acreage. The possibility of leaving more in the streams is not considered.

*Please refer to a detailed listing of some of the issues with the EIS at the end of this email.

Written testimony:
You can submit written testimony in advance, which will be distributed to BLNR board members prior to the meeting. Written testimony must be submitted no later than September 23rd at 9:00 am, in order to allow time for board members to review it. Late written testimony will be retained as part of the record, but board members may not have sufficient time to review it prior to decision-making. Submit written testimony to blnr.testimony@hawaii.gov. Please make sure to refer to the EMI Lease, and state that “The Final EIS is inadequate and needs to be rejected.”

Live online testimony:
To provide live oral/video testimony during the online meeting, email your request to blnr.testimony@hawaii.gov at least 24 hours in advance, with your name, phone number, email address, computer identification name (check your device settings), and the agenda item on which you would like to testify. Please make sure to state that “The Final EIS is inadequate and needs to be rejected.”

Mahalo for protecting Maui’s future!

Maui Tomorrow has identified the following issues with the Final EIS. For your testimony, It is best to choose one topic and focus your comments on that. Share any personal knowledge you have of the streams, but REMEMBER: comments need to be about the EIS, not the 30-year leases.

MOVING WATER:

• FEIS needs to address the environmental and cultural impacts of moving and using water across aquifers and ahupuaʻa.
• Our Maui Island Plan supports water management and sufficiency within each ahupua’a.
• EIS gives no consideration to ways EMI could seek more water self-sufficiency within the aquifers and ahupua’a where Mahi Pono crops are grown.

WASTE AND SEEPAGE IN THE SYSTEM:

• FEIS needs more detailed discussion of decreasing waste and seepage as the water is transported and stored.
• The EIS is required to discuss mitigation measures to reduce impacts and the timing for these mitigations to happen.
• The Hawaii Supreme Court has issued an opinion that decisions involving the use of stream water “must include provisions that encourage system repairs and limit losses.” Our Maui Island Plan set policies calling for reservoirs and water lines to be efficient and not waste our public trust waters.
• The Water Commission issued a decision in June 2021 that restricted Mahi Pono and Wailuku Water Company system from losing more than five percent of the water diverted from Nā Wai ‘Ehā streams. A similar goal should have been discussed in the East Maui EIS.
• An EIS that assumes over 20% system losses is acceptable, and gives no serious discussion or timeline for improvements is not adequate.

WATERSHED RESTORATION:

• The FEIS does not discuss what more needs to be done to reverse nearly a century of East Maui watershed being overrun by invasive plants and work towards watershed restoration.
• The EIS assumes that all discussion of a watershed restoration plan can be done AFTER a 30 year lease is issued.
• An EIS should discuss what mitigations the applicant EMI plans to improve the watershed, so decision makers can know if the leases will result in good stewardship of public trust resources.

30-YEAR LEASE IS TOO LONG:

• The proposed lease would be for 30 years, but the FEIS just assumes conditions will be the same over that time, when they are likely to be very different.
• EIS does not address mitigations and plans to adjust EMI water demand to major setbacks that could occur over that period: changes to farming, climate change, increasing droughts and other environmental changes.
• EIS dismisses any serious review of the benefits of a shorter lease period.
• EIS does not address or give a timetable for repair needs of the system over the next 30 years.

NOT SHARING:

• The FEIS states that all water saved through conservation or better farming practices will be used by Mahi Pono to plant more acreage.
• The possibility of leaving more in the streams is not considered.
• The needs of Upcountry or East Maui farmers along 12 streams where no flows were restored is not considered.