Senate Standing Committee on Agriculture and Environment

And good afternoon. Mahalo for joining us today for a quad hearing. It's Wednesday, March 19, 2025. We're convened in room 229 and video conferencing which includes the audio and video of remote participants. It's being streamed live on YouTube.

Like the event that this hearing is cut short, the Committee will reconvene, committees will reconvene to discuss any outstanding business. And a public notice will be posted on the Legislature's website. And because of our 90 minute time limit for hearings, there will be a one minute time limit for all testifiers.

And we'll have a virtual countdown timer on the Zoom screen. So for myself as Chair of AEN, Senator Richards as Vice Chair, I've got Senator Inouye for the Committee on Water and Land as Chair. And Senator Elefante on his way for the Committee on Economic Development and Tourism. Senator DeCoite is Chair with Senator Wakai as Vice Chair.

And for the Committee on Energy and Intergovernmental Affairs, Senator Wakai as well as Senator Chang as Vice Chair. We have one measure on the agenda. HB966HD2 relating to AG tourism. Establishes statewide uniform standards to promote agricultural tourism activities in the state. For all counties that have adopted an agricultural tourism ordinance.

Requires agricultural tourism activities to be registered by the County Planning Department. Requires ag tourism activities to coexist with an ag activity on a farming operation. And requires termination of the ag tourism activities upon cessation of the agricultural activity except under certain circumstances. And we'll start off the testimony with the Office of Planning and Sustainable Development.

Mary Alice Evans. Is she here in support? Wendy Gaty from ADC.

We know you're not.

Good afternoon. Chairs, Vice Chairs, Members of the joint committees. My name is Frank Giampeno Jr. I'm here on behalf of Executive Director Wendy Gaty of the Agribusiness Development Corporation. We send underwritten testimony and support.

Thank you. Department of Ag.

Good afternoon. Chairs, Vice Chairs, Members of the Committee, Cedric Gates here on behalf of the Department of Agriculture. The Department. Thank you. The Department stands on its written testimony offering comments and supporting the intent of this measure. We're here for any questions. Mahalo.

Thank you, Cedric. Next is Brian Miyamoto from the Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Good afternoon. Chairs, Vice chairs, Members of the committees, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau. You have a written testimony supporting the intent. We absolutely support agritourism. However, we want to ensure that there remains guardrails in there. And again, agriculture production needs to be the primary activity. Ag tourism is a secondary activity.

With that, we do have some comments. Again, we support minimal statewide standards. We believe details of agritourism should remain a home rule issue though. That's our our. We know that you need an ordinance in order for the county to adopt an ordinance for ag tourism that should remain.

It does remain, but we need to ensure that it remains because each county is unique. We also don't want additional burdens for farmers and ranchers that want to do ag tourism and ag tourism. Right now the problems is more an enforcement issue.

We've got to work enforcement and so we like to see in the departments of planning and to have Ag experts that can at least help those departments enforce the Ag tourism ordinances in the counties. We support Ag tourism. We want some guardrails, but we need better enforcement. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you. Brian Daniel from Hawaii Tourism Authority in supporting Taylor Kellerman from Kualoa Ranch.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chairs, Members of the Committee, I appreciate the opportunity to testify today. My name is Taylor Kellerman. I'm the Director of diversified agriculture and land stewardship for Kuloa Ranch, one of the state's largest agritourism businesses. Our business model is a symbiosis between the visitor industry, local food production, natural resource management, and sustainable land Management.

In 2024, we produced over 150,000 pounds of local food, actively stewarding 1500 acres of undeveloped conservation area and service thousands of local residents regarding local food purchasing through our on site market.

Agritourism provides a sustainable financial model for crew law and has the potential to be a key driver for Hawaii's quest for improved food security as well as serving as a platform for visitor education, particularly with the travel pono initiatives.

Currently there are already regulations at the county level for agritourism and while I understand the desire for consistency, I do ask that caution be taken to not overburden or negatively impact farmers and ranchers ability to diversify their business models.

As an example, Kuala Ranch is required by Hawaii, excuse me, Honolulu county regulations to have a conditional use permit as well as a special management area in. Order to operate your time zone. Thank you very much.

We have your written. Thank you. Thank you. Next is Nicole Galassi on zoom from the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you, Chairs, Vice Chairs, Members of the Committee, Nicole Galassi. On behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council, we submitted written testimony with comments as we also want to make sure that gentlemen farms are not misusing lands.

But we don't want this Bill to negatively impact farms and managers who use it appropriately for education, connecting people to where their food comes from and for diversified income. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. Mahalo.

Thank you, Nicole and the over on zoom.

Aloha, Senators. Aloha. The Italy has a very robust agritourism process. They always require the farm operation, have a minimum of 50% of the revenue and work work performed. That way they they ensure bonafide agriculture is occurring. And in lesser areas where they have economic challenges, they reduce the standard to 25.

It is my strong belief that you have to have an objective standard if you're going to create a stand, state standard that kind of overrides the county process. You've got to have a minimum standard and 25% should not be too bad if you compare it to the primary agriculture.

You can exclude filming and all the other things that cool Lorenz does, but stick to a minimum income standard. Secondly, the counties are directed to register their activities but there's no annual reporting or compliance tool. There should be. And finally, the termination exemption can be waived if there's a pestilence or some adverse impact.

But read that carefully because as it's written, once the hurricane blows through and they get the exemption from automatic termination, they'll never have to farm again as written. So be careful on that. Be careful with this. Please fix it or defer it because there already is a process. Thank you very much.

Anyone else wanting to testify on this measure either in person or online?Seeing none. Members, any questions? Yeah, go ahead.

All right, thank you. Farm, not Farm Bureau. I'm sorry, DOE. Okay, thank you. And thank you for being here as well. Okay. With the comments that we've read, including the earlier comments sent to the house when it was there as well. Thank you for that. However, it doesn't say anything about if the Department.

And this comment is also for dlnr. Are you going to allow tourism into farmlands managed by DOA as well as the ranch lands? That's under DLNR. But you can speak only on DOA. And here, here's what I'm my comment and my suggestion to Chair Gabbard. Was that my recommendation?

But it's something that we all have to decide if we want this activity on DOA lands and DLNR agriculture lands. Reason is, I'll give you an example. We're a farmer. My husband had 30 to 35 acres of anthuriums.

Now when the anthurium blight happened in 1986 while I was on the council and I have 10 acres but not connected with the I mean, not connected with my husband's interest in his farms. We got hit by the anthurium blight. And what happens was, and of course, there was an anthurium that was named Sweet Lorraine.

So that also died. It died. So anyway, Sweet Lorraine was. Yes. Anyway, nonetheless, what happened was here's what the protocol ended up, because it affected all of the anthurium farms, okay? So most of them, I mean, the industry just started to go down.

We connected with ctar, saved the industry, but not to the protocol that we grew anthuriums before, because the growing anthuriums we used to use the medium, which included cinder and everything else. So that's why other counties couldn't actually.

Didn't have the protocol to actually grow ethereums, because the only place you can have the cinders was from the Big Island. Nonetheless, that was part of the problem. Okay, so CTR's recommendation, the industry, the old style and protocol of growing anthurium died. Okay? So they said, no, it's best not to.

So what ended up was CTAHR developed all of the anthuriums, and it's all o1f anthuriums, no matter what colors, no matter what. But it was done by tissue culture. That meant that the farmers ended up had to go buy the tissue culture. Can you imagine the impact and the cost that had put on so that anthurium survived?

With that said, because DOA are agriculture farms, my personal feeling is to exempt DOA and DLNR from getting involved in tourism. Secondly, we already hear, and my colleague and I and our colleague over there, who are farmers and ranchers, are debating now the amount of lands that we have under DLNR that affects our, our cattle industry.

Is that part of it going into forestry? And I my understanding, and I may be wrong, but I heard recently that maybe the forestry will start ending up where you have the acreage that's going to be divided between the ranchers and the forestry.

They're going to end up having trails set up so people can go up and go do some hiking. And to that effect, personally, I ask if DOA would like to allow tourism and DLNR the same.

The protocol that we had to combat the diseases and use the tissue culture was that if the farmers are going to continue because the cost of buying tissue culture anthuriums, some couldn't afford it. So they went with the old style, growing their anthuriums with using the medium of cinders now.

So most of them did, but there was a protocol, no visitors, so they only allowed people into the farms were the owners and the workers. Even for the workers, they had to clean up their boots before they even enter a particular farm or greenhouse.

Then you had to make sure that all of your equipment, like we do with a nail, are. They all had to sanitize. So that's the issue before us. And that's why I personally feel the lands under the state that we protect agriculture.

And I agree with Kualoa Ranch's testimony as well, and the one that they did at the house hearing, because we want to grow agriculture whether it's. Whether it's flowers or food sustainability. But we have to make sure that's our goal and that we have to just make sure that we're heading into the direction.

So with that said, can I hear if you'd like to exempt DOA lands from visitor industry?

Let me put that to Brian. Call. Okay, good.

I know we've worked with Brian for many, many years and appreciate the support that DOE. Because another thing, too many of the farms are all on. You know, we survive by egg loans, and so we all need to survive.

Brian Kyle, Department of Agriculture. So the department's current two land programs take slightly different positions on the ag tourism issue with our ag parks. Because of its sole focus on production, production agriculture. There's no allowance for ag tourism on. The ag park lands and which we're on. Ag park lands. Yes.

For the Non Ag Park Lands, otherwise known as agnight, there is a provision that allows certain types of activity. We don't come out and call it tourism, but we do say certain amounts of associated or definitely related activity to take place on the farm with some provisions.

And the provisions are that the revenue cannot exceed more than half.

Oh, yeah, that I agree.

And that whatever it is that they're doing has to have a direct tie to the farm. For instance, if they want to sell smoothies, then the ingredients from the smoothies must have been grown on the farm if they want to do so.

What that means though, is also is if, say, they want to sell souvenir shirts, that kind of starts to get into this gray area. Because unless the shirt was made of hemp from the farm, for instance, then the actual shirt itself, probably imported, whatever, may not qualify.

But you know, another thing too is when you have visitor industry activity, and I think part of that is identified in this as well. And I think an enforcement from the counties you must have. If you're going to invite visitors to come in, you're going to have. You need restrooms. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

And most of the farms that I know with ag farms, you don't have water supplies. You have water supplies. And most of the farmers, if there's no water there, where paying for the regular water from the counties. And so. So do you guys want to do ag tourism?

Well, because you have to, you have to make sure that you have accommodations for those visitors.

Part of the requirement is that they must meet all the requirements from the county. So they have to have all the health things. They have the restaurants, adequate parking, the whole thing. So it's, it's not just a blanket. Okay. You know, they. They are.

They are required to meet all of the standards that are in place for any business that is accepting public.

And that's true for all of the counties regarding the request from DOA, any.

Non AG park parcel. So if it belongs to the Department of Agriculture under Non Ag Park, otherwise known as AG90, then yes. Yes.

Okay. Okay. So do you guys want to be exempted from this or you guys will accept activity on DOA lands or should it be recognized that all DOA lands under the DOA Ag parks program be exempted?

I think I would appreciate that. If the ag park program itself would be exempted, that would be fine.

And then as far as a non agpark program goes, if there could be language that essentially differs to the rules and statutes of the non agpark program to implement as it currently is, that would probably be preferable also, because what we don't want to do is set up any kind of conflict between what we know we are able to do now versus what somebody thinks they may be allowed under this Bill.

If you're. Are you allowing already then visitors on some in any county and reason I ask is are you also enforcing it?

We generally do our visits. So if we're seeing activity outside of what we have, what they've told us that they're doing, then we will ask for, you know, the paperwork on all of the things that have happened. I think one of the most successful examples that we can use is like Kahupu Farms, the KFA.

They do have a component of agricultural tourism and they are part of the non agricultural park program. It's a legitimate thing, you know, private and public.

So that that particular farm is both under DOA lands.

And yeah, they. They have their own lot, right? That's b. And then they also lease acreage from us in. So they have their. They have two. Two locations, I guess. But not connected. They're not connected, no. So we are only concerned with the part that is on. But you guys are doing enforcement? Yeah.

As much as we can, yes.

Okay.

Okay. Can you do me a favor, just for us, for the deliberation for our chairs, come up with some language short to probably exempt the portion of the ag farm parcels?

Yes, we'll get it to you.

Will you give it to the chair? Thank you so much. Anybody from DLNR?

Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. You're one. So. So what do you consider when farm tourism? Well, what is your definition of farm tourism? If we want to talk about what Senator just said, in an ag park.

We don't really have a formal definition of farm tourism. We just call it ancillary activity. So I cannot answer your question because, like, we don't have a definition in our rules or statutes of farm tourism.

Well, I guess because the Bill is about agritourism, and I'm well aware of agritourism in your ag park, which if we want to color this and say ancillary, I need to know what the definition of agritourism is within the Department of Agriculture's rules.

The way that the business activity is defined is, again, it just, it has to be related to the production of whatever their agricultural product is. It has to be. So, I'm, this, this is just unhypothetical. For instance, if there was a rancher, I guess they could.

If they would break their beef and stuff, they could sell it off right off of the farm. They potentially could have, I guess, people coming on and I don't know. I guess it would be very.

I'm trying to figure out how you measure that, Jeff. So if I am doing the growing here, right? Growing produce, but yet I have a farm store that brings tourism. But now I've incorporated all cattle, venison. I got all these other produce that now is not from my farm.

How you measure the percentage to be within the criteria? Because I think a lot of the farms have struggled with diversification and to stay alive today because of the tools that have been removed, which is why they've resorted to agritourism.

So, you know, that's going to help better decide on whether or not this Bill is supportive or are we carving out the people that have struggled all these years to diversify their farms and not be.

Yeah, that's an excellent question. It's very, very difficult for the Department to discern what is, how the income is coming in. Quite honestly, what we'll do is we ask the farmer if they could provide that breakdown to us. But it's very, very difficult for us to figure that out without doing like an audit of their own books.

So we, we haven't taken that step yet. We do not have the expertise or personnel in order to do a business audit on a farm.

Thank you. Okay, just to follow up, if, if we have loans from DOA, and I know that we always have to do an annual report to you, the expenditures of the farm because it's part of your data that you collect and that's mandatory. And I think part of the farm that we register annually also gives the.

I'm not, I'm not sure if it's all that. The cost or the amount of production that we have that we grew. How do you separate or do we have to register then the visitor industry income portion to that loan report? It's kind of complicated, but for farmers, this is a very. Yeah, come, come, come, come.

We just want to make sure that agriculture, the real agriculture production lands are protected, particularly when the discussion is inviting other entities into farming. Okay. Sorry about that. oh, no, no.

Well, yeah, basically ag loans just takes the total too. I mean, gross income.

Oh.

So the gross income we're asking for. Tax returns or your financial statements.

Oh, okay. And then so the total amount registered includes all the income that's, that has been produced on, on the site.

So most of the times they'll have like cost of good breakdowns that we could kind of tell maybe was bought and resold.

Okay, but that is only. Sorry, that is only based on the loans that you guys make, not on the leases that you guys do that you guys track. Also, the gross revenue is correct. So how. So my question is, how do you guys not say you guys at that point?

Because the Bill calls for the counties and our county has not done a great job at all. So that's, that's the challenge, you know, and this is a huge challenge with this Bill as it's written.

So I have problem with this Bill.

No, I, I agree.

And that's why the question is, does DOA want to stay within this, this Bill or you want to be exempted on certain portions of land? Because, you know, we're talking about agriculture and we're supposed to survive with agriculture, aside from tourism. So that's a concern we have.

I think from the Division's perspective, we would be comfortable being cut out from the Bill, especially on the ag park, the regular. I agree, I agree.

The non ag park. Maybe we need a little bit more flexibility.

Well, even then though if, if, because if the Department is cut out completely, we already have rules in place that currently govern the non agbarb side. So it's not like there would be a void. Right? This would be kind of a duplicative thing, which actually might create a problem later on.

But it still would hurt you more than helps you.

I think it would generate a little bit of confusion.

Yeah. So if you cut us out, it be fine.

Can you help us with some language and then we can deliberate if it's in agreeable.

One other question on the you so on. Just be clear on ag parks, no tourism now, right? Correct. Okay, so it's got to be a non ag park. So what is percentage of ag parks versus non ag parks?

Most of our land by acreage is non ag park. Most of, we have more, we have more lots on the ag park side because they're smaller. We have more acreage on the non ag park side because they're much larger.

For everybody's concerned, can you explain to all of us what's your non ag lots? Yeah, because it can be cattle. Right. Because we're making ag 90. You're getting some cattle in Europe.

Okay. So non ag park is anything that. This is so ridiculous, I'm sorry. Because we, it ended up coming out this way back in.

That's why this Bill is confusing for all of us.

It's anything that', that the Department has that isn't an ag park or an agricultural enterprise. And I do understand how kind of silly that title is, but it unfortunately came up in a discussion and somebody was asking, what is it? And I said it's not an ag park and they wrote it in that way.

So to answer chair Gabbard's question, how much of the portion of your ag lands that are not the farm?

Like I said, on an acreage perspective, it's probably close to. Well, especially with the ranchers that are coming over because they really will overwhelm the acreage in ag park.

I can speak for the ranchers.

They don't want the cattle guys don't want visitors. Yeah.

Wait a second. Okay. Okay, so. All right. There's been a lot of statements and I've been being patient here.

Good. Let's hear it. Okay, so you said a percentage.

I would say about 90. After the ranchers come over, I would say probably between 90 and 95% of the acreage would be represented in the non ag park program.

Okay, good. So just correction. There is activity of tourism in your ag park. I'm going to say that chair, just for the record,

We'll work with you and definitely get it inspected.

Thank you.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah, I got a lot more questions. Okay. So I appreciate what we're saying here, but we got some. The. I think we're losing sight of what the intent of this Bill is. This isn't about to help DOA. This is supposed to help agriculture.

And I got a few questions for you, then I'd like to bring Taylor up, have a few questions there. We all know agriculture is tough to begin with. And with these cycles of agriculture, maintaining a cash flow is exceedingly difficult.

And the intent of this Bill, as I read it, is to help agricultural entities maintain a cash flow so you can stay in business when things are bad, but then accelerate when things are good. That being said, there's also, and this is a, a selfish side from agriculture, specifically meaning that right now less than.

It's probably less than 1.5% of our entire nation comes from agriculture. Thereby they have no understanding of agriculture. So when we ask for policy supporting agriculture, they don't know anything about it. So they're going to listen to people and since agriculture doesn't talk very much, they're going to listen to a side that doesn't support agriculture.

This is part of our problem. What tourism and agriculture and I don't know if you want to call it agritourism or tourism and agriculture, the idea is to help educate the public of where food comes from because as we all know, it's amazing what people believe when it comes to.

So the point on that, and we have a glaring example of this in Department of Agriculture right now. We disallow rodeos on agricultural land. This is a cultural deal. This supports our industries, but for whatever reason we disallow that. We are trying to take measures to change that.

But the intent, again, I understand what you're saying and I don't disagree with some of the comments that were made, but the intent is to support agriculture. It's not just figure out the nuances of that. So that being said, same questions, but just briefly. I don't want to dig into it, Brian, but the.

From that standpoint, supporting agriculture, I have farms in Hamakua that are trying to get up to speed, but they can't cash flow yet. So they use a little bit of tourism dogma to build that. I agree with the, the ag parks. I think that's a good idea.

But in all agriculture land, we're shooting ourselves in the foot. People like to see ongoing managed, token green spaces and agriculture affords that to us, which helps the tourism side. With that, can you support from the agricultural standpoint, DOA, recognizing that the intent is agriculture, it's not tourism, but it's to augment.

Can you support that if we come up with a policy that supports that? And I agree this is confusing.

I think the short answer, at least for the lands at the Department of Agriculture controls is yes, it is the primary reason though that there is this difference between the agricultural park program and the non agricultural program. That's the exact reason.

Because we recognized that any income stream that assists agriculturalists, whether it be rancher or farmer, is good. However, because of the intent of the state ag lands and their production lands, we wanted to ensure that there was always a tie back to the production of whatever it is on the land. And that's why there is.

He's asking about ag overall.

And I don't disagree. Having a tie back to the land for whatever we're doing. And we have to figure out what that definition is, which is why we have this Bill and why we're having this discussion. We got to figure this out. Doing nothing is the wrong thing.

But trying to shackle agriculture, gets shackled enough, we need to figure out how to support it. So I appreciate that. Chair, I'd like to ask Taylor to come up. Identify for the record.

Taylor Kellerman, Kulo Ranch.

Okay, thanks Taylor. And this is a conversation we've had for probably over a decade. Just how do we put this together? Can you describe from, from your side what you do? Yes, it's tourism, but it's also the educational side. I'd like you to focus in on that with what you are showcasing to the public.

Yeah, so when we bring people on site and I'm trying to explain our business model, I use an analogy that likens it to the difference between us and Disneyland. So I'd like to kind of go with that angle.

Disneyland being 5 acres or whatever it is flat ground with a bunch of stuff on it that's meant to entertain people. What we do at the ranch is we maintain 99.5% or whatever it is of the footprint of our property in conservation and agriculture.

And the agritourism itself is when we take visitors, we bring them on site, we have the amenities that Senator mentioned and then we allow them to have some choice of, I mean vehicle, not as a vehicle term, it can be an ebike, it can be anything like that, but a way to experience the agriculture and the conservation that we're conducting.

And so really what we're showing them is how we are using our business model as a sustainable model for that food production and for conservation. Whereas we are funding everything in house through what we do. From a visitor standpoint, that's how we educate them.

We find that if you're taking them out, you're putting them in nature, you're putting them in the middle of our farms. There is a visceral and sensory way to impact indelible memories that allow people to really understand what we're trying to give off.

Now, from a local standpoint, what we are also able to do is there's a multi pronged approach. Those same assets can be used to educate school kids. Through our education program, we service over 15,000 DOE kids a year.

But then we also utilize our ability to be financially sound to take that even further and do paid internships both through CTE Windward DOE program as well as, uh, programming as well as private universities as well.

So I think one of the things that I really implore is that I do feel that having the ability to have some sort of regulation so that you prevent bad actors. Understanding. Agreed. And so for me, it's really kind of more of a how do you do that where you're not negatively impacting people?

And my main concern is trying to create a standardized metric because I feel that every time we've seen that, you know, what is legitimate agriculture, you tend to run into situations where you have somebody that gets left out in the cold or even multi people that get left out of the cold. And this year with Bill.

Excuse me. Last year with Bill. Bill 10, that became Bill 64, we. At the county level, we were at. A very similar situation. Excuse me, Senator Elefante was part of that.

And I think that what we were able to kind of do is have a very good and productive conversation between the ag industry with ag representatives to kind of figure out what that would look like where it doesn't have that negative impact that I think creating standardizations leads to. I switched, kind of combined two subjects.

Okay. So. And I'm thinking I'm getting an idea chair. What I'd like to do is let other people ask Taylor questions. But I'm thinking Taylor's volunteering to work on a working group of some sort to get this for the state. That's just my expectation.

I have since Kelly is here. Okay.

Senator Kim will start with.

You.

Generate income from educating tourists.

Yeah, thanks.

Yeah. How do you generate income? Because that's part of the reason why, right, farmers need this. So how would you generate that?

So our formal education program, because we do have a legitimate education Department that is really an at cost type of thing because we're trying to do it as a community service versus true revenue stream in the sense of we'll basically charge DOe kids in that cost amount $7 a day or something like that.

From a standpoint of the visitor industry, that's where the primary revenue stream comes from. And it's through essentially creating a cost basis for when you do come on and you do partake in one of our tours. Every one of our tours has an agricultural component. As an example.

I'm not going to make any secret about the fact that Hollywood is our sell in and how people really kind of get to know us. If you go on our movie site tour, I'd say 50 to 60% of it is agricultural content and I'd say 95% of it is agricultural environment surrounding while you go through it.

So what we're doing is we're using the visitor industry portion to basically fund everything else that we're doing.

And that's what I thought it was. So in order to bring in any kind of income that means a lot that you have to give some kind of really exciting, exciting tours. Which at some point I'm wondering how do we enforce this? Because at some point it becomes more lucrative than on, than do farming.

And so responsible farmers I'm sure will abide by it. But how do we then enforce others? Because we have so many leases that we have so called they're farming, they've got a couple of macadamia nut trees and they got huge houses on it. They're not really growing anything.

They grow a couple of nice trees and they're saying, you know, they're using it for ag.

And these leases keep going out and I don't know how we're enforcing those leases but I hate to see that we have more and more as farming becomes harder and harder and not as lucrative that it'll move towards, you know, very Hollywood type tours.

Because tourists not going to pay unless they're getting, you know, they don't want to learn about ag.

So what we have found is that tourists want to learn about, they want to learn about things like tropical agriculture, chocolate, things like that they really want.

To pay the high dollar or that, I mean you're gonna have some of them but I don't know if enough that's gonna make it worthwhile.

And, and I do agree Senator, that regulation is necessary. I think my primary argument is that the, the regulation exists at the county level and it is in my opinion if we're going to.

You know the confusion that was stated earlier, it seems to me that a lot of it really kind of comes down to having the ability to case by case basis regulate the entities, including ourselves.

I've been this long enough that enforcement of these rules and regulations do not happen on a regular basis or on any large scale basis. And then these leases just keep going and it's hard to get them off the property to give it to legitimate farmers. Right, thank you.

My question would be if you didn't have the tourists attraction or whatever you have on your property, how much of that would be sustainable for you to do agriculture? Because you're talking about a lot of trees, you call them agriculture. How much of that is 95 is edible on your property?

Because it seems like we get opposite because back in the day tourists came for pineapple and sugar. Never come for cocoa or chocolate or whatever. They come into your place because of Hollywood and that's the main thing.

So I want to know what, what, what is if you're going to have Hollywood attraction, you don't have the tourism, how sustainable would you be a cool little ranch offering these things to the kids and the public to come into your property just for ag?

So I think really when you look at what caused agritourism to be part of our business model, it was basically the loss of financial solvency just being agriculture. So when we entered into the agritourism side, we were able to then find that additional income to grow our agriculture. So I've been with Kula Ranch for 10 years.

We started off, we now have six farms on site. Each farm's about 15 acres. We grow about 60 different products and then about 1500 acres of our properties also in pasture for cattle management as well.

So from a standpoint of what would happen if tourists went away, we would see a very big reduction in our ability to do all of that agriculture. But on top of that we would pretty much lose all of our ability to steward our Dutch resource conservation, which we have 15 full time personnel.

We would lose all of our ability to educate all the kids that we do every year. And we would greatly reduce our workforce. And being one of the largest employers on our side of the island, that would be a major loss.

That's what we were just talking about this Bill on the percentage of agriculture. So if your, your business is just depending on tourism coming to there, that's not a balance of agriculture. So everybody was talking about today is about agriculture.

We'll never get to that level because we're not seeing the future of how agriculture can reverse not just tourism. Tourism is great. Without tourism, we cannot do stuff. Without tourism, cannot do agriculture. Agriculture cannot survive in our Hawaii because we kill it. We kill it ourselves.

Right here in this building right here out there, we kill it ourselves. You know why? We buy from everybody else, subsidize Hawaii and we don't. We don't even do it for ourselves.

Yeah.

What you're telling to me doesn't pan out and I understand you will get your conditional use permit. Is your conditional permit is a major or a minor .

Right now? It is a major, I believe.

Okay. So how much time to the neighborhood board did you go and the community education that you let them know that you continue to get. Is this a yearly thing? 10 year.

I attend every neighborhood board meeting on our side.

Your conditional permit, is it a yearly thing? 10 years? How long is your conditional use?

It's when you are basically asked to reup is my understanding. Again, I oversee all of the agriculture, so I don't know the exact details.

Okay. Because that's, that's the kind of stuff too. Because in my community we get plenty ag land to ask if they use it for ag. No, they're not right. Calling solo farms and train a few cattle on there is not ag land. And that's what this thing right now bothers me because I understand that. What?

So you made it clear. Without tourism you cannot survive. Why?

Well, I'd like to for just for the record. 11 per sign street. So I have a degree from UH, Hilo in agriculture. I work plantation, I work seed industries. I've worked regular farms. All of those things died because of financial solvency.

I now work for a company where I get to feed my community based on the money that's brought in by the larger business model. So I agree with what you're saying on numerous levels. However, I do contest the fact that incorporating tourism is a bad thing.

Because what I know is that I get to feed a lot of people. But it's because of the tourism. So I think it's kind of how you look at it. Yeah.

Okay. So that's the problem I have though. That's the model that we going to set that we don't want tourism. We cannot feed our people. Maybe if we grow the right crops and the stores and the consumers buy the products from the farmers.

Like we shortage of Ulu, we flying in Ulu, we flying in all of these other things. But how much Ulu trees the do you have on your property?

550.

500. How much do you produce per year?

Right now we're at about 20,000 pounds.

So you know that we're shortage in that, we shortage in tarot. That's the reason why they're flying them in from different countries, especially Samoa and other areas to. To bring in for me poi and all these other things.

So that's the thing I'm trying to say so that we educate our people, say okay, tourism is good for now. But then later on we should diverse into growing more crops so we can sell more of our agriculture stuff than just less. Again because what you're saying, I like your model I ain't going to get your model.

But that model shouldn't be forever.

Yeah. And I'd also, you know, this is our model and I don't mean to speak for the whole industry. I do know that every ounce of growth we've had is due to that model. So I think.

But that's what I'm saying though. But you just told me without tourism you guys cannot survive. What I'm saying is when is that going to diverse that we need to grow more, start downsizing tourism. Because it seems like your guys area, you guys are expanding more tourism attraction. Okay. Not too much expecting you guys the farms.

What I'm trying to say is that how long that we in this square building will say how much land we need for ag. And then I've been here for seven years and guess what? We still don't know.

Right?

So that's the thing. So that, that's my, my issue right now is that when are we going to diverse to downsize tourism on these lands start growing more sustainable food for feed the community like you said and be more sustainable instead. Because if we lose tourism, you guys gone, the work is gone.

How are you going to sustain yourself? Because what you should do is have a plan that if tourism do go, you still can keep the people employed because you're going to have enough crops. So that's just my suggestion Chair.

We have to take a brief recess here.

Reconvening the 1 o' clock join quad.

Okay. We had a very intense discussion, with the Chairs and Committee Members. And the decision has been made to we will be deferring this measure indefinitely. And I'd like my other chairs if they would like to make a comment.

Sure. Thank you very much, Chair Gabbard. And I believe this is a very intensive decision making process giving to us at this short time that we have here at the Capitol that we believe that this is issue needs to continue.

We'd like all of those involved between the House and the Senate come up with a working group through this years, work with DOA and DLNR and the industry folks and come to an agreement that we all can live with going forward. And that's the decision from the Waterland Committee.

On behalf of the Economic Development Tourism Committee. I believe we all support agriculture, we all support ranching in some shape or form along with the agritourism. But you know the details that are there is not enough.

It should be strategically planned that the tourism takes second to agriculture in growing food in the supply of water and the demand. Because as you see the tourism grow within there the lack of water and the water conservation measures that we fall behind because we are in a drought situation every year needs to be addressed.

I would like to think that at this point that DNR will again continue to consider the transfer of those Act 90 lands ASAP to the Department of Ag so we can truly do agriculture. We can plot out why those lands that are under production, successful production that also addresses invasive species, fire mitigation and they grow food.

This is the problem we have is that DLNR is holding out on the transfer of those lands that can truly produce local food that has been asked to be put in the schools affordably to feed our kids.

So this is where I stand on this measure and I look forward to seeing where you guys come up with that roadmap piece to bring back to us with that.

Thank you for your patience. Yes, please.

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you Chair. I have to echo chairs our spirited conversation while we're trying to come up with the direction forward. The thing I like about that is the fact that people are actually very passionate about this.

I think every Senator weighed in on this because this means a lot to all of us from different perspectives going forward to come up with a reasonable and sound policy that will benefit agriculture while we're taking care of the community, because that's the nexus we're looking forward.

So yes, I do agree with the deferment and that working on a, we will be calling together a group. Taylor, don't go far because you're going to be getting a phone call from us to work on this in the interim to come with a sound recommendation next year. Thank you, Chair.

Okay. And with that we will adjourn the meeting.

Good afternoon folks.

I was going to say this is Aloha Friday, but it's not. It's Aloha Wednesday. We are on a Joint Hearing for the Committee on Water and Land and the Committee on Agriculture and Environment. Our hearing notice of Wednesday March 19th at 1:01pm and it's 2:09pm at the moment in room 229.

With regards to HB 299 House Trap 1 relating to the Hawaii Invasive Species Council appropriates funds for the Native Resources and Fire Protection Program and Hawaii Invasive Species Council to ensure their long term viability and continue to control and eradicate invasive species in the state. Okay. Department of AG.

Good afternoon Chairs, Vice Chairs. And center.

Thank you so much. I'm so sorry. We're supposed to introduce ourselves and the protocol. Sorry. Just to say that we're. Because we're tight for time on our hearing. Normally Waterland allows two minutes. We're going to allow one minute as well. Particularly those on Zoom. And we stand. We'd like to ask that you stand on your written testimony.

However it doesn't apply to those of our Committee Members who wants to address the agencies. And you can watch the video stream of this hearing on the Senate's YouTube channel. Thank you so much. DOA. Okay. Kapai invasive Council. Chelsea has been busy this year. Thank you so much.

It's a good busy. Chelsea Arnon. On behalf of the Hawaii Invasive Species Council we'll stand on our written testimony and support. And you know our chairs here today are representatives of our council. So really happy for that and just want to talk about. It is a competitive grant process when we get funding.

So it really helps us identify what the priorities are each year with invasive species. And that competitive process is really with the team of evaluators that are designated by our Council Department representatives. So I'm available for any questions. Mahalo.

Thank you so much. Department of Health. And you can stand on your testimony if you wish. Thank you.

Thank you.

And if it's all good, that's great. Okay. Okay. Mahalo. Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Okay. In support. Okay. He's been sitting there all the time and long time and our old friend as well the water. Water supply. Ernie Lau. We stand in support of this thank you. And you're just as patient as well. Cgaps Stephanie.

Thank you so much.

Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau, Sierra Club on Zoom. Not present Chair Wayne.

I beg your pardon. I didn't hear you.

It not present on Zoom Chair.

Okay, communication in Support and this HB 299. Oh my God, I'm glad we're not going to call everybody. However everyone else has been sending communication in support. 64 of all of you, no opposition. Is there anyone else wishes to speak to HP299 hearing? None. That's an aloha. We'll say aloha as well on the welcome side.

HB 505 questions for 299. Oh, okay. Department of questions, Department of AG.

Do you guys have a coordinated effort or plan that spells out what you guys need to combat invasive species statewide?

So Jonathan Ho, Plant Quarantine Branch Manager, Department of Agriculture. So we have an MOU with DLNR and UH and we're right now working to kind of finalize it for the, I guess the, the big three realistically CRB, LFA and Koki.

So that, that's what we're doing now I think from the, from the coordinated standpoint and I think those are kind of the starting points of I think a broader um, coordinated effort I think on what we're going to do.

I think as it relates to um, biosecurity, you know the Legislature has been providing a lot of interest and support towards that and I think because of that infusion of support, I think the way that we manage all of.

So Jonathan, does the support come with funding and if so how much?

So I think when you look at I think some of the past, I think assessments, they're talking like $80 million something like that for I think a pretty comprehensive biosecurity plan depending on I think the scope of the things that are going to be regulated.

I think you know there's some, some bills that are talking about potentially inspecting everything and then you know, getting into Inter Island those numbers could fluctuate. But I think a lot of it I think is about 8. They're talking about 80 million collectively. Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Hearing None. Let's proceed to HB 505 house just one relating to Red Hill establishes a by policy coordinator for coordination of Red Hill by Initiatives. It also creates a radio remediation special fund DLNR. I have Ryan Deputy here. Nonetheless we have communication in support, budget and finance comments, University of Hawaii System Basilisimos.

Okay. In Support. Office of Hawaiian affairs in support. Mr. Lau. Attorney Lau.

Thank you, Madam Chair in strong support.

Okay, mahalo. Huy Malama Pono, Hawaii. Okay. In support. Sierra Club was in earlier on zoom in support as well. Environmental Caucus of the Democratic Party in support. Coalition Earth in support. Kalahui Hawaii in support. And Shinmachu Wai Protectors in support. We have many individuals as well that joined the group in the supportive part. We have 27 in support. No opposition on HB 505. Any discussions, Members?

Quick one for Dylan. Yes.

Senate yes. Senator Decoite Dylan oh, no.

There's seeing in action again. Thank you. Okay.

All right. That's a note, right? Okay. Any further discussions? Hearing None. Let's proceed with HB 778 relating to integrated land use. Requires Office of Planning and Sustainable Development to conduct an integrated land use study for the use of lands within the agricultural districts and submit interim and final reports to the Legislature.

And this is HB 778, Department of Ag.

Hello Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee Cedric Gates here on behalf of the Department of Agriculture. The Department stands on its written testimony offering comments. Any questions? Mahalo.

Thank you. OPSD.

Aloha Chairs, Vice Chair of the committee. My name is Danielle Bass, Sustainability Corner, the Office of Client Sustainable Development. We stand on our testimony in strong support of this measure. Mahalo.

Mahalo. Brian Miyamoto, Farm Bureau.

Thank you to the Hoy Farm that will stand on its written testimony in support.

Okay, mahalo. And we have, let's see. Sherry Polak, 350 Hawaii in support. Testifying for Hawaii Food and Policy Group, Julian Tiavu in support as well as Ted Boland in support. Anyone else wishes to speak to HB 778 hearing none comments? OPSD please. OPSD.

Thanks Danielle. So the lands you guys look at in this study for agriculture, lands that are in in use or not in use. How can the state tell the landowners what they should use their lands for if the lands are zoned for agriculture?

I don't believe that the intent of this measure is to dictate landowners of use. This is a met, this, the intent behind this measure is to to fulfill a pilot project which DBED and OPSD are currently under is currently performing with the of Oahu in which shortly to to speak shortly.

There are 21 mandates of, you know, doubling food production, making 30% local food production by 2030, et cetera, having 100% clean renewable energy, recycling water in all state facilities. Regarding all of these these 21 statutory sustainability and climate mandates that have been codified in law. This is a question about land use.

How will the State of Hawaii fulfill these types of requirements in with our very scarce amount of 4 million acres of land?

So what we hope to do is really just take a look at this, evaluate the land uses for the agricultural district to see if there are ways we can maximize dual use, multiple uses on that ag land so that we can fulfill and meet these statutory targets as well as meet our energy goals and the affordable housing goals codified in law.

Nicely defined. I hope you can help DLNR to figure out how to use their lands. Thank you.

And Members thank you because in their testifying to they gave us a data report that was included in their message. That's very interesting. Thank you so much. Anyone else wishes to speak on HB 778? Okay. Going once. Going twice. Okay. We're getting there. HB 1220 House Draft 1 relating to invasive species.

And this is the appropriation funds to support the efforts of the division of Aquatic Resources of DLNR in the removal of. I never heard this before, but it sounds like Mahano Anemone. Am I correct in the pronunciation? Okay. From Kane Ohipe. All right. DLNR, David Sakura. Okay. Okay. Somebody here? Oh, okay. Come. All right. Yeah.

You don't look like a David.

I'm here to answer questions. That you Madam?

Yeah. Oh, okay. Thank you so much. And you're whom? Sorry?

Dar.

Yeah. I'm with Jesse. I'm Jesse. Board with dar.

Dar.

Jesse. Oh, okay. With the DAR agency. Yes. Thank you so much. All right.

DOE well Chair the Department stands on a certain testimony in support.

Okay. Thank you. Chelsea.

Chelsea Arnold on behalf of the Hawaiian Bas Council stand on our written testimony and support.

Okay. Mahalo. University of Vice Sista Megan Donahue. Okay. In support as well. CGAPS. Thank you so much. Okay. Testifying for the Ohana Unity party and the Kingdom of the Hawaii Islands. Is that Pikachu? Pikachu. Anzu I not present on zoom Chair. Okay. Follow sense communication support. And we do have other communications of supporters 9 in support.

No opposition of this measure. Okay. Any discussions on HB 1220? Okay. Hearing none. Okay. Agriculture, you're the lead.

Okay. On HB 1365 relating to the Department of Ag appropriates funds Department of Ag for a non potable water wells pilot program to prepare an environmental impact statement or environmental assessment drill non potable water wells on individual parcels of P. Ag park and Pineva farm lots under the Department of Ag. First up is Department of Ag.

The Department stands on the testimony part of this measure. Here for any questions.

Thank you, Cedric. Next. Department of Hawaiian Homelands. Thank you. Next is W Farm Bureau.

Hello Chair Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, for on behalf of the Hoy Farm Bureau will stand on a written testimony in support.

Thank you. Okay, thank you. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure in person or online? Seeing none. Members, are there any questions? DOA.

Department of Agriculture.

Thanks Brand, on this one, can you just give a brief summary of what you want to get done with this or maybe what someone wants you to get done.

I can try. It's not our Bill so I can try. Okay. Briefly I guess from the the preamble. I guess there's farmers in the Pontiabag who are interested in developing their own source potentially maybe for economic purposes or something like that from the Department of Water Supply.

So essentially this would be replacing Department of Water potable water for ag water.

I think again not our Bill. So I don't want to speak for them incorrectly but I believe that is the intent. I believe that is the intent is to eventually get there, you know, see if it's feasible and cost stuff.

Okay. And are you I know it's not your Bill but are you aware of approximate volume that what we're looking at? I do not. I don't. All right. I won't push you too hard. Okay. Thank you. All right. Appreciate it. Thank you Chair.

And I'd like to add comments on Chair, if you don't mind and reason why DHHL is asking to be on this measure as well or have concerns. Is not concerns but they are this measure Panieva Ag park is on the agriculture side outside of the HHL lands and so and the Panayeva farmlands.

However, the HHL lands on the is is part of the so called Panaeva and so this would be a benefit to them as well if this is successful. So just wanted to add that Chair.

And Senator, I also wanted to ask what is the requested appropriation amount for this measure?

I again I'm not sure. I've heard it's in the order of one and a half million. Maybe maybe Farm Bureau might be Farm.

Bureau you have a record requested appropriation.

Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bill thank you Chair. Yes, we do. We believe the ceiling is going to be $1.5 million. It is one aquifer, the YK Aquifer to include the Panava ag park and the Panava farm lots. So just and if I may address Senator Vice chairs to qualify what we are asking for.

This is a Farm Bureau priority. It is to drill well so that the farmers have access to their own water, take them off of the county water supply free of more potable water, and they can use this water for irrigation. So the ceiling is 1.5 for the EIS.

Okay, thank you very much.

And to confirm, this is drilling the non portable water wells, correct? Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Chair.

Chair, question DOA. Brian, please. Brian. Brian, when irrigation water under your Department, do you guys normally pay for the irrigation water that's delivered to your properties? So your ag parks. Who pays? Who pays to do the drilling? Is it your Department that is in control of that land or is it the.

And you guys take it from revenues brought in or you guys come in for appropriation?

So whenever we request capital improvement project funds, it does come through the Legislature. This is a unique case, I think because it's not an irrigation district. Right. So our. Whenever we request CIP funds for our irrigation systems, it's a Department of Agriculture program, but a different program than this.

So in this case it's still Department of Agriculture land. And. And I guess that that's kind of the tie.

Thank you.

Thank you. Sure. Yeah. And just for historical purposes, this farm area by DOA started oh, years and years ago and this was during the Ariyoshi time, so waters were not really available, but they created ag lots for agriculture for farmers as well. Okay.

I just wanted to add with this measure, there were 12 in support, zero opposed and zero comments.

Okay, thank you very much. I think that's it for me. That's it for you. We already have recommendations, so we don't need to go into recess. Okay. We got, I'm reminded, 2:45 we get out of here. It's 30. I think we're doing well, okay, fair. Everything is almost all right. Okay.

For the committees on water and land and the Committee on Agriculture and Environment, it's going into decision making on the notice of hearing of 101. Hearing notice. Chair's recommendation on HB 299 House Draft 1 is this is to pass just with technical and non substantive amendments. Any discussions? Hearing None. For the Committee on Water and Land.

Vice Chair for the vote. Chair goals aye.

Chair recommendations to pass House Bill 299 House Draft 1 with amendments. Chair and Vice Chair vote aye. Senator Chang. He's excused. Senator McKelvey. He's excused. Senator Decoite. Madam Chair, recommendations adopted.

Thank you. Same recommendation for AEN. Any discussion? Chair votes aye Vice Chair on House.

Bill 299 House Draft 1. Chair votes aye. Vice Chair votes aye. Senator decoy aye. Senator Rhodes aye. Senator Awa Chair 5 in favorites adopted. Thank you, Members.

Thank you. HB 505 House Draft 1 relating to red Hill chair's recommendation. Actually these are good bills as well. And we'll just pass with technical. It's with recommendations to pass with technical and non substantive amendments. Any discussions hearing none. Vice Chair for the vote for the Committee on Water and Land Chair Goals Aye.

Church recommendations to pass House Bill 505 House draft 1 with amendments. Of the three Members present any no votes or votes or reservations? Hearing none. Madam Chair. Recommendations adopted.

Thank you. Same recommendation for AEN Chair.

Chair.

Just. Just a comment on this Bill. You know, this Bill in regards to Red Hill should warrant on representative from DLNR to be here to voice their concern because at the end of the day DNR in regards to this Bill we have powers with the policy coordinator and I have a big problem with this Bill.

Yes.

That's with regards to the division of cwm. Yeah, the water Commission.

Well, it's going to be a policy coordinator that can get power on this. Thank you. A Red Hill issue.

All right. Good. Thank you. Thank you. Chair votes aye, Vice Chair.

On House Bill 505 House Draft 1 with five Members in attendance passing with amendments. Are there any no votes or reservations? Reservations, Senator Decoite is with reservations. Chair you have five in favor. Motions adopted.

Thank you, Members.

Okay. HB778 House Draft 2 relating to integrated land use. Chairs recommendation is to pass this measure as is any discussion hearing none. Water and land Vice Chair for the vote Chair goes aye.

Chair's recommendation is to pass House Bill 778 House draft two unamended. Of the three Members present any no votes or votes or reservations? Hearing none. Madam Chair recommendations adopted.

Same recommendation for AEN Chair Votes aye.

On House Bill 778 House draft two of the five Members in attendance passing unamended. Are there any reservations or nos hearing none. Chariot 5 in favor motion adopted.

Okay. On HB 1220 House Draft 1 this is relating to invasive species regarding Kane Ohipe. Chair's recommendation is to pass this measure as is or unamended. Take any discussions Committee on water and land for the vote. Vice Chair. Chair votes aye.

Chairs recommendation is to pass House Bill 1220 House Draft 1 unamended. Of the three Members present any no votes or votes or reservations? Hearing none. Madam Chair recommendations adopted. Same recommendation for AEN. Chair votes aye. Vice Chair.

On House Bill 1220 House draft one of the five Members in attendance Any with no vote or reservations? Hearing none. Chair 5 favor motion adopted okay and.

Thank you and on the final measure this agenda HB 1365 HD2 relating to the Department of Ag chair's recommendation be the passive amendments from DHHL and then we will also note the requested appropriation amount from the Hawaii Farm Bureau in the Committee report. Any discussion? Chair votes aye.

On House Bill 1365 House Draft 2, the five Members in attendance, are there any with no votes or reservations? Hearing none. You have five in favor Chair motion. Thank you Members thank you.

For the Committee on Water and Land same recommendation Is to pass HB 1365 House Draft 2 with amendments any discussions hearing none Vice Chair for the vote. Chair votes aye.

Chair's recommendations to pass House Bill 1365 House Draft 2 with amendments of the three Members present any no votes or votes or reservations? Hearing none Madam Chair recommendations adopted.

Thank you so much and thank you everybody for today's attendance. This concludes the Water, Land and Agriculture and Environment Committee.