Senate Standing Committee on Agriculture and Environment

Hello Mai Kakou and a como mai. Good afternoon. Mahalo for joining today's Senate Agriculture Environment Committee or AEN hearing. It's Wednesday January 28, 2026 and we are convened in room 224 and video conferencing which includes the audio and video of remote participants that's being streamed live on YouTube. I'm Mike Gabbard.

I'm starting my 10th year as the Chair of the AEN Committee and I represent districts 21 in West Oahu which includes Kapolei, Makakilo, Kalailoa, Honokahale and portions of Ewa and Ko'. Olina. And I'd like to have my Members introduce themselves and say with district they represent. I'll start on my right.

Karl Rhoads, District 13. And you're sitting in my district right. Now and I've been been on the AE in Committee. This is my 10th year on the Committee. Wow.

Makes me feel like a newcomer. You are. My name is Senator Tim Richards. I represent district 4 which is on the Big Island, basically the northern half of the Big Island stretching from Hilo, Hamakua, North South Kohala and down into Kona. This is my fourth session on the Committee and Vice Chair of AEN and.

I am Senator Lynn DeCoite. I represent Senate District 7 which is upcountry East Maui, Molkaila, Mokini and this is my fourth year here and my sixth year all together coming over from the House on AG. Thank you.

Thank you. So a few housekeeping items. In the unlikely event that this hearing gets cut short, the Committee will reconvene to discuss discuss any outstanding business on Monday February 2nd at 3:01pm here in room 224 during a time slot and a public notice will be posted on the legislature's website.

And because of our 90 minute time limit for our hearings, there will be a 2 minute time limit for all testifiers and we will have a virtual countdown timer on the Zoom screen. Okay, let's get started with SB874 relating to Veterinary medicine.

Requires veterinarians to provide a written prescription upon the request of a client for any animal patient of a client with whom the veterinarian has established an existing veterinarian client patient relationship. Allows pharmacies license in the state to dispense medications prescribed by veterinarians.

Authorizes the Hawaii Board of Veterinary Medicine to establish penalties which may include fines or suspension or revocation of a license. All right, so we have 27 who have testified in support, one in opposition and one with comments. And we'll start off with. Let's see. Marcela Chalk from DCCA is in support.

And we'll take Stephanie Kendrick from the Hawaiian Humane Society on Zoom. Stephanie, Aloha.

Aloha, Chair. Vice Chair. Members of the Committee, Stephanie Kendrick with the Hawaiian Humane Society. We're in strong support of this measure, and we're grateful to the Committee for hearing it.

Cost is one of the most challenge, most significant challenges facing pet owners and a bill that allows them to have some flexibility in where they get their prescriptions filled while enabling them to provide the best possible care for their pets is a great idea. And we're pleased that the Committee is considering this measure.

I'll also note that it's consistent with the guidelines and best practices of the American Veterinary Medical association association. And I hope that the bill will have your full support. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Thank you.

Thank you, Steph. And Members will take questions after all the testifiers have presented. Next is Nicole Galassi with the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council in support.

Aloha Chair Gabbard. Vice Chair Richards. Members of the Committee, this is Nicole Galassi. On behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council, we stand on our testimony in support. But I'd also like to add a comment that there may be a need to have some flex the veterinarian to be able to charge a small fee for writing prescriptions.

And that might be something that should go to the veterinary board rather than being put into law. Mahalo.

Thank you, Nicole. Next is Jill Yoshido with the Hawaii Veterinary Medical Association.

Not available on Zoom Chair.

Okay. Next is Austin Shiloh Martin with the Libertarian Party of Hawaii.

Also not available on Zoom Chair.

Austin's in opposition. Susan Smith with the Hawaii Humane Society, Support. Nancy Monden. Wait, excuse me. Winston Welch. Is Winston here? Here.

Lojas. Senator Gabbard. Committee Members, thank you for scheduling this hearing, which will lead to more consumer freedom and better pet outcomes and animal outcomes in Hawaii. I've been told by my vet, even last year that they could not email, fax, or call in a prescription to Costco because it would take too much time.

I offered them 50 bucks to do so, just knowing what was up. They said they couldn't. They wouldn't send it into Costco because they couldn't guarantee Costco's drug efficacy. Also ludicrous. I offered send. Could you mail it to me? Offering them again money. They said, no, we can't because someone might steal your mail.

I guess there's a lot of thieves desperate for monthly heartworm Prevention medication that are raiding mailboxes. So the reason I tell you this is that it's nonsense. But even if I know that this might be a best practice that's supposedly mandated by, you know, the principles of medical ethics, most people don't know this.

I've had many vets over the decades here in Hawaii. I've never once seen any notice that I could get a prescription that I could take somewhere else. It's ethical for the vets because they don't have a conflict of interest in this.

And even as the Hawaii Veterinary Medical Association did testify, they recommend that we add a short addition to this, which would be just saying in a conspicuous place. The law says that we must offer you a prescription if you would like one.

There's nothing in there that requires us to go to Costco, Safeway, or petmeds.com it's just that we have a freedom of choice because it comes down to money. And a lot of folks have to abandon their pets because they can't pay for it.

Sometimes I would use medicines from my vet, so sometimes I would prefer to go to Costco. If it's a lifetime heartworm medication, I'm probably going to go where the cost is lower so that I can spend different types of money, in fact at the vet or other places.

So it's with this that I ask you to support this bill and of course the amendment with it that would actually allow it to be effective. Otherwise it won't. No one will know about it and we can't do anything about it. So thank you.

Thank you, Winston.

Okay, anyone else wishing to testify on SB874 seeing none Members, are there any questions?

Yeah, Chair actually we just have. Winston, if you could come back up a little bit Latitude. Chair. Just being I'm a veterinarian practicing. I appreciate your comments and question. So this recently happened to you from your testimony, correct?

I have another vet now, yes.

And I've been in practice for 40 plus years. It's never been an issue in our practice or any of the colleagues that I have worked with throughout the state.

And so a little surprise, but I did dig into this again because of my professional interest and looking at it, it does align with the avma, American Vet Medical Association. I think the regulatory side when it comes to that, we have the DCCA and a lot should be pushed towards there.

However, that being said, my only, I think historically where this comes from is in the early days there was a lot of sort of gray area or gray marketing of pharmaceuticals and we were very, very hesitant at that point. So I know that that is where a lot of this started.

But fast forward to where we are today. It's very common in our practice to do exactly write the prescription we need to. I do have a concern on some of this, but I think we're going to be addressing that. Chair. With some of our amendments, the animal agriculture side, it's a little bit different. And it's a business.

We are always trying to save our clients money. That being said, we have to, when we write a prescription rather than running it through our books, if we can go through a pharmacist, that'll save our clients some money by doing it that way. But we still incur costs on that. And so we have to have some way.

And I find it interesting that you offer to pay for those costs. And so I just want to make sure we're going to be able to maintain that as we go forward. It does align with avma, and I believe it aligns with HVMA as well, with some little tweaks in that.

So I just wanted to put that out there. Interesting. Bringing it to me, because in my immediate world this has not been an issue, but I can appreciate that.

I think it may be that a lot of these things have been taken over by large corporations now, and so it's a profit center. And they realized that the $50 I was offering them would. Doesn't come close to how much they would make by selling me the medication from the doctor's office.

So I think that's where that comes from.

And, and, and I don't want to get into price setting because each practice handles things differently. But good policy comes from good information. So I appreciate that. Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Thank you

Mr. Chair, quick question for DOA. Okay, yeah, so, so are you guys aware, Director, of any problems related to veterinarians issuing or not issuing prescriptions?

Not aware.

Not aware.

Are our veterinarians are the vets that we have are pretty much animal disease. And I, I have not discussed that, but I can get back to you.

Well, the reason why I asked is because, you know, like the prior test. Of fire. We normal veterinarians. So when, you know, most of the people that reach out to veterinarians, they have no problem paying because they want to address whether that animal needs antibiotics or so forth. And it is important.

It's hard to find veterinarians that will even come, which is why we use like the Moloka Humane Society and their veterinarians.

As you recall, our veterinarian was there and left.

Yeah.

So we continue to struggle with the hiring of vets, but we do have a program now, the license in a program to let them make more money. We have a program in place now, so we're trying to address that.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Okay.

We do have a late testifier, Jill Yoshicedo from Hawaii Veterinary Medical Association. Jill.

Hi. Thank you, Chair and Vice Chair. And I apologize for being late. I did submit written testimony on behalf of the Hawaii Veterinary Medical Association and we were suggesting several amendments to the bill. If included, we would be in support of this bill. You have those in front of you.

I'm happy to answer any questions if you have questions on those three amendments. And mostly just wanted to draw attention to the fact that veterinarians practicing in Hawaii are already required to supply written prescriptions at any client's request within the valid veterinary patient client relationship. But we are guided by the AVMA Veterinary Medical Ethics.

So they spell out that veterinarians are required to abide by a client's request for a written prescription. So this is how veterinarians at Hawaii should be practicing already.

Okay, thank you very much. All right. We'd also like to welcome our fifth Member of the Committee, ADN Committee Brenton. Oh, what district are you from, Brendan?

23.

Senate District 23. Okay. All right, moving on to the next measure. SB 2097 relating to sustainable food systems establishes a climate resilient food systems grant program within the Department of Ag and Biosecurity. Co creates funds and we have 57 in support, one opposed and no comments. So we'll start off with Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity.

Chair Gabbard, Vice Chair Richards, Members DeCoite, Rhoads, and Awa. Sharon Hurd, Department of Agriculture Chairperson, here to say that we stand in support of our written testimony. Available for questions. Thank you.

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

Good afternoon. Chair Gabbard, Vice Chair Richards, Senator DeCoite, Senator Awa, Senator Rhoads. Happy to be here. Happy New Year. Happy new session. And aloha, the Hawaii Farm Bureau. I'm Brian Miyamoto on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau. The Hawaii Farm Bureau is in support of this measure, this program.

You have a written testimony in front of you, so I won't go over it. Addressing the impacts of climate related factors is important, is affecting our farmers and ranchers. So a grant program like this is really great. We all know farmers lack access sometimes to capital and financing.

So providing grants so that they can invest in equipment, infrastructure, technology improve resilience and long term farm viability is extremely important. However, as this program or if this program is implemented, we do encourage close coordination.

We believe DAB will have that close coordination with farmers and ranchers and industry stakeholders so that the grants are accessible and flexible and focus on true needs of farmers and ranchers. We do have one suggestion, Chair sorry we didn't include it in our testimony for consideration as this Bill moves forward.

The Bill does reference food and resilience hubs, however, that term is not defined in the Bill. I'm not sure if that's defined somewhere else.

But in order to determine whether or not someone is eligible or organization is eligible, if they're a food hub or resilience hub, a definition somewhere, unless it's going to be worked out at the Department. But we just want to make sure that those who should be eligible for this program are indeed eligible for the program. Again, thank you for the opportunity to testify. Aloha.

Thank you, Brian. Next is Hunter Heaivilin from the Hawaii Farmers Union.

Thank you, Chair. Chair, Vice Chair. Members of the Committee, Hunter Heaivilin here on behalf of Hawaii Farmers Union. We stand on our written testimony in support of this measure and similar to the Farm Bureau have a couple of comments that I think would hopefully narrow in the focus as written.

The Bill is quite broad and doesn't do a whole lot to define what is meant by climate resilient food systems.

In the past the Department of Agriculture has, when presented with programs supporting, say, healthy soils, articulated that it did not have the capacity or the knowledge base internally to determine what that entailed with this much broader aperture supposedly to address production processing, maybe community needs.

I think it is important to ensure that this Bill focuses on addressing particular known concerns. The suggestion presented by Brian I think could be a good one by integrating agricultural operators in the determination of what that list is, should the Department not already have that delineated.

One other piece of note is that technical assistance provision is a common mechanism for producers to receive additional support to understand how to address the various issues they face.

So including the allowance of these funds to support technical assistance, as is done, say by the conservation programs administered by the Natural Resource Conservation Service and its legion of technical assistance providers nationwide.

I think adding a provision related to that could help alleviate some of the necessity that may otherwise arise for the Department to have in house all of the expertise required to determine whether a project is eligible or whether it fits under the ambit of the statute.

With that, happy to answer any questions and would love to see this type of a measure go forward as it is critical to support our producers across the state to adopt conservation agricultural practices that will ensure viability going forward.

Thank you, Hunter. Next, Nicole Galase for the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you Nicole Galase on behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council. Hawaii Cattlemen's Council stands on our testimony written in support. As we figure out the details as this Bill moves through the Legislature, I do want to just add that producers do have shovel ready projects.

We know this because we had the climate smart commodities projects that were underway and and this state program will help them to get these projects done and help food production while addressing climate resilience for the state. So heavily strong support for this Bill. Mahalo.

Thank you. Nicole, Austin Martin, the Libertarian Party of Hawaii.

Not available on Zoom Chair.

Robert Bence

Aloha Chair Vice Chair Robert Bence in strong support. Congratulations on a decade of awesome leadership and I stand on my testimony.

Thank you, Robert. And anyone else wishing to testify on this measure. SB2097. Members. Questions. I have a question for DAB. So what are some examples of requirements that farmers would need to meet to be eligible for these grants?

Okay. Well, one of the requirements is pretty much modeled after the Brazilian Food Infrastructure Program that the USDA had offered and is no longer after one year is not continuing. And one of the restrictions, one of the eligibilities is that you have to be in the middle of the supply chain.

You have to be a farmer, as Nicole pointed out, that has a shovel ready need. So you're between.

We've identified that as between $50,000 and $499,000 in reported revenue that we feel that if we supplied something that you need this thing that you need to take yourself to the next level, we'll have more farmers moving into the 500,000 plus revenue.

Okay. Anyone else?

I was just smiling, Chair, when the Director was referring to a farmer having shovel ready. Probably very appropriate termination.

Thank you, Sharon.

Thank you.

All right, moving on to the next measure. SB 2098 relating to agricultural production establishes a Clean Plant Program within the Department of Ag and Biosecurity to support the production, maintenance, and distribution of disease-free clean plant material to growers, nurseries, and other ag producers in the state. Appropriates funds.

First, we have 8 in support, 1 opposed, and DAB is first.

Okay. Chair and Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. Sharon Heard. Chair of the Department of Agriculture Biosecurity, standing on my written submitted testimony. Thank you.

Thank you, Sharon. Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Thank you, Chair, Vice Chair Members of the Committee, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Holy Farm Bureau. I promise, Chair, I'll start standing on some of the other ones. This one's very important. It's really important for a nursery industry. Again, this is a biosecurity bill. We appreciate the introducers of this Bill.

This program will support a farmer's ability to produce and distribute pest and disease-free plants and products. And this is going to give consumers confidence, give the legislature confidence, give the public confidence on our nursery industry, primarily our nursery industry. Again, this is a proactive measure.

We believe prevention is way more effective and economical than responding to an outbreak, as we know what's going on here in Hawaii.

So, providing this pest-free, disease-free material is going to be extremely helpful to growing our ag sector, especially our nursery sector, but also to hopefully address our invasive species crisis that we're currently in. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you. Next is Hunter Hevelin. Hawaii Farmers Union.

Thank you, Chair. Hunter Hevelin on behalf of Hawaii Farmers Union. We'll send our written testimony in support.

Okay. Next is Nicole Galassi from the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Aloha. Nicole Galassi on behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council. I'll stand on our written testimony in support because this will help us decrease imports, and that's invasive species prevention. Mahalo.

Thanks, Nicole. Austin Shiloh Martin from the Libertarian Party.

Not available on Zoom, Chair.

And Robert Bentz on Zoom. Robert.

Aloha. I stand on my written testimony in support. Thank you.

Thank you, Robert. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? Members, any questions?

So I have one question for DAB.

After you, Chair.

Okay, Sharon, what mechanisms would be needed to protect ag producers from pests and plant diseases?

Well, it's to use the tested products that are out there. Now, CTAHR has created a banana bungee, top tolerant. And the, the thing they teach you is not only having the plant, but how to maintain it. So proper maintenance, knowing a banana plant, you can have it for in perpetuity. Right?

The keikis come out, you do the same management, that is one thing, but that's actually the main thing is to have the seeds available. Like our papaya industry, right? Now, we know that the papaya ring spot virus seed is the one to use. That's the one that's resistant to the virus.

And seeds are hard to come by and they're expensive not to compete with those that are producing the seed. We will be producing seeds and giving them to the, distributing to the farmers at a discount.

But we want, in exchange for the discount, we want the data from that the tree produced, X number of the area, the water, the weather, so that we can scrape from that data and create an AI warehouse of information for other farmers to make planting decisions.

So that's basically the idea is to create a program with clean stock, distribute it out to create a database of information for hopefully in perpetuity.

Okay, thank you, Director.

Yeah, Director, how fast can you ramp up?

I know, 1.7 million.

I didn't say how much, I said how fast.

If you give me them. Okay. We have identified a tissue culture facility on your island. Two of them. There's another facility coming up, I think on Maui, and we have one here. So we can tap into them right away. Sitar has one too, I think.

Then once we have the tissue culture produced, the very labor intensive, we can use a FFA, we can use people to do the work and then you grow it out. So I'm going to say one year after the tissue culture. Bananas take nine months to produce. Not bananas, papayas are nine months.

So once we get the seedlings out to the community, it just depends on the data collection.

Okay. So it dawned on me that this is truly biosecurity by producing clean as opposed to trying to clean up dirty. So I need a legislative pinky promise of how fast you're going to get this done. Two years?

Two years.

Pinky promise.

Pinky promise. You got it.

Thank you, Chair. Yes.

So, Director, isn't that why we have CTAHR that has done a lot of tests and would it be better to just like add on versus creating a whole separate. I mean they do a lot of the tests to get the data.

And I'm just like taking aback that all that data they have is not in one place where we get access to.

CTAHR has been a strong partner in this and if CTAHR takes it on, wonderful. We just need to get it started. They were very instrumental in giving us the number, what we need, the number of tissue culture labs out there. So CTAHR will be an important partner. They will do a lot of the grow out for us.

Whether or not they manage the data, we can do that. But the data is important. We need to get this collected and out to the farmers.

So of the existing data that they have, have you guys looked at that versus what you guys looking to collect further? Because, you know, often we got overlap of information, but it's not organized or put in a place that I can just easily access or anybody for that matter.

When we try to encourage more growing, whether it be organic, whether it be conventional, I think it just, you know, we double dipping again and there's no clear sight of how the two agencies interact with other.

Well, Senator, I'm finally catching up to your question and I understand now what the question is. And the all those items on that I've listed on the Bill, the okra and the legumes and the sweet potatoes on there, the data, the reason they're on the list is CTAHR has actually developed the varieties that are clean.

They did the hard work, they did the field test. They have the data of the varieties. I could add green onion and cilantro and garlic. They have the data and they know what seed does well in what area.

So what we're doing is we're giving the farmers the seeds and we're saying, is it true that it will grow in your microclimate? So the partnership, it's really not an overlap.

So I'll be clear with you. They've had a lot of data for a lot of a long time and they've given a lot of those out.

They have.

They've given it to Big island, they've given it to Kawaii Bananas. Right. And you talk about banana, papaya, Sweet Potato. It's happened. So what I saying is we're doing this again without fine tuning something that already exists there.

Okay.

Just something for you to think of.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Anyone else? Moving on to SB 2126 relating to agricultural grants. Establishes a conventional farming grant program to be administered by the Department of AG and Biosecurity to provide grants to small and mid-sized farmers who practice conventional farming appropriates funds. We have five in support, four opposed, and one with comments. We'll start off with dab.

Chair Vice Chair Members of the Committee, Sharon Hurd, Department of Agriculture standing in strong support of the submitted testimony. Thank you.

Thank you, Sharon. Brian Miyamoto from Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Thank you, Chair. The Hawaii Farm Bureau will stand on this in support.

Hunter Heavilin, Hawaii Farmers Union.

Thank you Chair Hunter Heavilin on behalf of Hawaii Farmers Union we stand we offer comments on this measure while recognizing the myriad viability hurdles that farmers across the islands face.

We note that the preamble of this Bill doesn't specify what these grant funds are supposed to be allocated towards and also note that it explicitly prohibits organic producers from participation should they be using organic seeds.

Which to me seems to fly in the face of the intent outlined in our state constitution as well as some of the recent goals we've set in the state for climate action environmental management.

Part of what the market intended to support an increased costs paid for organic products is because of the internalization of the environmental effects of agricultural production by producers who adopt conservation agriculture, regenerative agriculture, organic agriculture, whatever term is in vogue this year for good environmental management that goes beyond just generally accepted agricultural practices.

So we would support a measure that would advocate that would enable any producer across the islands to have access support. Though we would still recommend that we specify what is this grant for if it is just an allocation that seems better suited for something like a gia.

That being said, we of course recognize all producers face hurdles to viability and we support addressing those hurdles. But I think making it a little bit more clear what this is intending to accomplish, what issue this is intending to address could help better better delineate why some producers are being included while others are not.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify and happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Hunter. Nicole Galase, Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you. Nicole Galase on behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council. We stand on our written testimony in support. Mahalo.

Thank you. Austin Martin, Libertarian Party of Hawaii.

Not available on Zoom, Chair. Robert Bence.

Aloha. Robert Bence Farmer I'm in opposition to this Bill unless it was amended to include organic farmers. The organic farming is more expensive. We have to pay to get certified in the national reimbursement. They don't even reimburse us anymore. So we're out that money. I don't know of any grants that Is specifically only for organic.

This grant excluding organic, that seems unfair. But if it was for all farmers that are small mid size, that would be awesome. So thank you.

Thank you, Robert. Anyone else wishing to testify on SB 2126 Members? Questions?

Question Department of AG. Hi, Director, we've been clear. Didn't we have a Bill last year that was pertaining just to organic grants?

Well, good question because.

So yes or no?

Yes, that was a no.

I said didn't we have a Bill that came in that provided organic grants for organic farming?

Well, yes.

Okay, so why was conventional left out?

That was not intentional. I think it was to mimic something that was going on. But your point is well taken. Organic farming has been supported through tax credits for three years consecutive. And if there was a Bill last year, I'm sorry, I can't recall what it was, but it's time conventional farming, there's merit to supporting all agriculture.

And that's the point, was to support all agriculture, to give them a lift up. It was to grow food. It was to double food production.

Yeah. I agree.

And I think that's what the Department of AG stands for.

We support all agriculture. Conventional farming is responsible for most of the agriculture in the state. Definitely more productive, more doubling of food in that sector.

So in regards to organic farming. Organic farming, I guess there's two classifications at the level that there's organic where you certify, you certify and there's organic where you're uncertified at a value or revenue, annual revenue of less than $5,000. In other words, I can slap on stick on this organic product with no certification based on federal law.

I'm not familiar with the federal law that other than the organic certified program.

But you should check because there is one. And the reason why it costs more is because they get paid more. Well, there's a demand. Well, but the reason why they cost more is because they get paid more.

Okay.

Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Any other questions? So hang on, Sharon. So why not? You heard the testimony. Why not just a farming grant program which would include conventional and organics?

We would support that. I think the point of the Bill though is to recognize that conventional farming has been excluded in the past from the grant programs. We had a three year organic farming tax credit that was quite, quite generous. It was a $50,000 maximum tax credit for three years.

And while that was in place, you know, a lot of farmers took advantage. But there was that nag that why not all farmers. Yeah.

Sure. Yes.

Just to follow up. So going forward, can we anticipate that when we have farming programs, it's all farming? Because this is a question that I know I've raised previously. Why do we discriminate?

There is merit to that. And I know the reason for organic is because organic carries more pests than conventional, because conventional uses the traditional pesticides. So we have to inspect organic. And the demand was so great that we importing more and more and more with the potential of introducing more pests.

So if we could encourage organic farming locally, the idea was to reduce the amount of imports that would have to come in to meet the demand. And that was the idea at that time. But yes, organic. Let's help everybody.

All agriculture. Thank you, Chair.

All right, moving on to the next measure. SB 2154 relating to AG. Requires DAB to conduct a study of ag markets for Hawaii farmers. Requires a report to the Legislature. Appropriates funds for the one-year study of ag markets for Hawaii farmers.

Appropriates funds to establish two full-time equivalent positions to collect ag data and conduct data analysis for public consumption. There are six who testified in favor, one opposed. And with no comments, we will start off with DAB.

Thank you, Chair. The Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity stands on its written testimony, strong support of this measure.

Thank you. Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Thank you, Chair. The Hawaii Farm Bureau has written testimony in support.

Thank you. Hunter Haviland, Hawaii Farmers Union.

Thank you, Chair. Will stand on our written testimony in support.

Thank you. Nicole Galase over at Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you, Chair. The Hawaii Cattlemen's Council will stand on our written testimony in support because we get a lot of questions asking for data that we don't collect. But it will help people to make informed decisions. We know there's a strong need for this. Mahalo.

Okay. And then I don't think he's here still. Austin Martin from Libertarian Party of Hawaii.

You got him.

Oh, there he is. Austin. Aloha.

Hey, guys. I am so sorry that I got some of my bills mixed up in testimony. And so, I want to apologize if some of my written testimonies today did not match the Bill. Oops. Today, we're looking at a problem called central planning.

And basically, it's like a planned regulation scheme that we're going to study how to regulate these markets more. So, as an actual farmer and not a farm union or somebody who wants big government to control agriculture, this really is not what we want to see. You guys could give like 1% of the budget to agriculture.

I've heard this suggested as an idea, you know, but the problem is anything that the government does with that 1% is going to probably make the problem worse, not better. And that's where we're at with this.

This is just funding future regulation and future market restrictions on people like me who actually want to farm and aren't just grifting off of farmers. So, for all these people who supposedly represent farmers, I have to say I'm really frustrated that we want to spend all this money to figure out how to better straightjacket folks like me.

It's already illegal to farm, illegal to build, illegal to develop. Everything is illegal unless we ask government permission. You want to fix agriculture, legalize farming, legalize building. And let's fix the overregulation of the average person. This is doing nothing to prevent corporate capture and corporate abuse. I yield. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? Members, any questions?

I do.

Yes.

Apartment of Ag.

Yes Sir.

Data.

Data.

It's all about data.

Absolutely.

How fast?

We have the mechanism which are surveys and the personnel. It would depend on what you want us to measure. Like, if you wanted to measure cucumbers, we can do that.

But if you wanted to measure the number of the percentage of food that's being imported into the state, that nebulous number, that's going to be tougher. So, if you want one commodity, we can probably do it in six months? Six months.

We want more than one commodity.

That's okay.

And so I'm not going to make you give me a picky promise now. But I want you to be thinking about this because this is going to come back.

Okay. So that nebulous number is tough. But if you give us a range of products like the whole, you know, whatever's, give us something, and we can give you a number.

I have my list in my head. We'll get together and talk story. But the data is important if we're true about food security.

I know, it is, especially with AI now that scrapes data, right? Without the data, you can't get a real good analysis.

And with AI I'm not exactly sure the data is accurate. So?

Give it.

Okay.

Okay. Sharon, the bill's asking for two full-time equivalent employees, right? To facilitate the one-year study. Are you anticipating any additional funds, or is that going to be it?

Well, of course, the two came because the two of staff that we lost in 2008 when the market analysis and news branch was abolished. So bringing back that would only bring us back to where we were in 2008. So yes, please anticipate additional staff as the number grows.

But to the point we made earlier, technology can do wonders. So maybe the staff that we have would be a GI, a technology data analyst, something like that. It'll be a different type of position, so we don't know.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next. SB 2153 relating to agriculture requires the Board of AG and biosecurity to develop and adopt a multi-tiered matrix-based assessment framework to develop definitions for the terms quote unquote bonafide farmer and quote unquote bonafide AG.

Activity requires the board to collaborate with stakeholders to draft the terms bonafide farmer and bonafide AG activity, requires a report to the Legislature. We have three in support, one opposed and one comment. First up, DAB

Aloha Chair of the Department stands on its written testimony offering comments on this measure.

Thank you, Cedric. Brian Miyamoto Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Aloha, Chair Members of the Committee, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau. The Hawaii Farm Bureau supports the intent of this measure. We absolutely support policies, land use decisions, agricultural benefits going to bonafide farmers and bona fide farming operations. The challenge is we haven't been able to properly define that.

So again, there are many programs and policies and we want them to be utilized by bona fide farmers, bona fide farming activities. But people have their own definitions. Maui County uses income threshold, I think the loan division and that has their definition.

But I don't think in statute there is a consistent definition that the state, state and ideally the counties can use. So everybody has their definition of what a farmer is or isn't and sometimes somebody who we believe should be able to take advantage of the policies aren't being able to. So we appreciate the intent of the measure.

It's an uphill battle. It's been attempted in the past with Office of Planning, with Department of Agriculture, with the Hawaii Farm Bureau and many others. But what we do appreciate about this Bill is that it's it doesn't immediately attempt to codify this in statute.

It's going to allow us some time and not have a rigid one size fits all definition and allow stakeholders to provide input to ultimately come up with the best definitions that we can that will support true farmers and ranchers. And again, data is important to make informed decisions.

So we appreciate the intent of the measure and we appreciate being able to provide input and hopefully participate in the discussion as we attempt to define bonafide agriculture. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you, Brian. Next is Nicole Galase, Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you, Chair Nicole Galase on behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council, we stand on our written testimony in support because defining a bona fide farmer will help the legitimate farmers and ranchers to get the support they need. But it is complicated. We haven't figured it out yet. So this multi tier approach is likely the way to go.

And the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council looks forward to collaborating on this. Mahalo.

Thank you, Nicole. Austin Martin.

Aloha. Thanks again, everybody. Austin Martin, Chairman of the Libertarian Party of Hawaii, also a farmer. And I don't use government assistance to farm, which is, you know, its own thing. If I applied though, it really helps to know somebody.

Unfortunately, when the government gets involved between the farmer and the funding and what we call an actual farm, we end up with a situation where the government gets to pick the winners in the market who has the advantage. And these definitions could apply more broadly than just in grant approval.

The problem here is that nobody's actually asking the farmers what we think about this, Right? Because there's all kinds of situations where we can innovate and we can change things. You guys, defining what farming is and what constitutes that takes away that innovation. It takes away that freedom. It's necessary for us to be able to do that.

And so I just, I'm cautioning that there is kind of a power grab happening in agriculture and it's being sold as if it's what we the people want. It is not. It's not what we want. We want hands the hell off our land. That's what we want.

We want to be able to do things like build sheds without permission. Right? We want to be able to have and use our own private property. We don't want to be regulated and have to report to the government. We don't want to have to register our goods.

We want to just be free to participate in our local economy. And people are failing to realize that the government is the problem, not the solution. And the more that you try to regulate and fix agriculture with the government, the more you need government.

Because all that you can really do is take money from one group of people and give it to another. It's a one trick pony. That's what government is. And so the private market can do this way more efficiently. And everything that we're doing right now is enabling mal investment that will hurt Hawaii farmers.

So that's why I'm basically against all of this today. I love the idea of doing good things for agriculture. I just don't think this is the right way to do it.

Thank you, Austin. Next is Robert Bence.

Although I share in Members, Senators, thank you very much. I strongly support this Bill. Anything that we can do to get rid of what is happening in Kula and a lot of other areas where these farms are no longer farms. They're just giant mansions and people don't even pretend to farm. And then they complain about real farming.

So any, like Farm Bureau said, it's tricky, but we can definitely figure them out. USDA has percentages of your income and like you said. But I think this is a great step forward and strongly support this Bill. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Robert. Any questions, Members? Yes. Yeah, go ahead.

On behalf of Hawaii Farmers Union, apologize. We did not get our written testimony, in part because I was reaching out to compatriots in other states, learning about some of their regulatory processes. This is an issue in agriculture nationwide and certainly across the islands here.

How we delineate what meets the threshold of sufficient or active agricultural use, as the preamble to this Bill notes, is particularly important for county zoning. The framework proposed here, I think, is an interesting one. And Hawaii Farmers Union would very much be interested in participating in determining what exactly this comes to be in law.

The state is in a unique position of having an onus to Native Hawaiian producers and supporting practices that perpetuate cultural activity, conserve our land through our state constitutional mandates, as well as supporting the interests that we have in seeing a thriving agricultural sector.

How we balance all of those is something that every county zoning entity has been grappling with for quite some time. And as you know, for those of us that have been sitting in this room for the better part of a decade, it's something we continue to battle.

I think that, contrary to at least one testifier, this is actually partially about making agriculture legible to state government. The benefits of that, I think, are also some of what should be considered in terms of how this has been delineated so far.

It is to ensure that we are keeping bad actors from making the consumptive use of productive land through residential uses, per se. However, if the state can actually see, the Department of Agriculture knows who is out there, who is engaged.

These types of data collection processes can also be a mechanism for distributing benefits that farmers may be interested in, like any number of the grant programs that we've discussed.

And there are a few jurisdictions, Guam, Vermont, elsewhere, that have implemented registration programs that are then a requirement for the participation in any of the manifold forms of state subsidy that are out there. This could be land leases, this could be state procurement processes. This be could this could be access to state facilities that do say processing.

So I think taking a broader view of not just trying to address gentlemen farming estates, but how can we actually turn this into a tool that will be of more direct benefit, not this down the line benefit by potentially shifting land prices, but thinking about this as a broader effort of what do we want the Department of Agriculture to do with information that it ideally would have on hand about producers in the state.

Happy to attempt to summarize this in some written testimony and would look forward to the farmers union participating in these discussions going forward. Happy to answer any questions.

Thanks. Okay, Members, any questions?

Thank you, Hunter, I'll take you up on that. If you could summarize that in your testimony. I think I appreciate all the comments that have been made. We have worked really hard to try and determine what agriculture isn't while we're trying to figure out what it is.

So let's focus on defining what it is and all the different levels because you do bring up a point. Subsistence farming, that's bona fide agriculture, but we can't measure it with a dollars. So but that doesn't mean it's unimportant. It's probably equal if sometimes not more important.

So and that's where it is because as was stated, counties struggle with this, jurisdictions struggle with this and where it comes to tax rates, etc. And all that. So I will take you up on that and this is the start of the conversation to try and get that. Thank you, Chair.

Okay, anyone else? Question for Brian Miyamoto. So Brian, you know, some have argued that complexity and added bureaucracy that they may have unintended impacts on small farmers. So how would you counter that?

Thank you, Chair. Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau, Hawaii Farm Bureau generally, as opposed to over regulation we are but again as discussed by other testifiers, policymakers create policy and benefits for farmers with intended, I think a proposed intended target. Right, for farmers. And I agree with you Senator, that includes all farms.

And agreeing in our testimony we do reference Guam. I think Guam may be a good example to use. They utilize tears and it does result in who gets what percentage of funding based on your registration. And it's a good way to really have a better grasp on agriculture may not be the best example.

But this is, as previous testifiers said, a start. We think this will support small farmers, should support all farmers should support all bonafide farmers. But that's what we're trying to define. So I'm not going to sit here and tell you what is that's been the problem.

Farmers that should be maybe including in some policies aren't and some that shouldn't be are actually taking advantage of some of the policies. Property tax benefits, maybe reduced ag water, different policies that for whatever reason they're able to find some loopholes in whatever law or ordinance there is. So we're hoping this will tight.

This is not going to be a solution, a complete solution, but we think this will tighten. Who gets some of these policies with limited resources? You've heard testify someone before, say Department of Agriculture. I believe it is 0.03. I heard Cedric say 0.03. I thought it was 0.04 of the state budget.

So limited resources that the state has and the county, especially for agriculture, we want to make sure those resources, those policies go to bona fide farmers. And we want to define that it will be broad, it is multi tiered as suggested in the Bill.

And that's what we look like and we like that there's going to be input stakeholders, many that are here today, many that are sitting across the table there, many that aren't here today I think can contribute.

I don't think it's going to be a quick definition or creation of definition, but it's the matrix that they're going to create that's going to be including many to help ultimate define right with different tier levels. It's not all. Again, our testimony says it's not a one size fits all.

And I think in the past that may have been in what was trying to be accomplished and that's why it's not successful.

Thank you, Brian. Okay, moving on. Next measure, SB 2160, relating to beekeeping. Clarifies the registration process for beekeepers with the Department of Ag and Biosecurity. Requires DAB to provide a guidance and support to registered beekeepers to help beekeepers adhere to certain industry standards and best management practices.

Establishes a limitation on liability for any registered beekeeper who follows industry standards and best practices. Okay, 2160. First up is DAB.

Hello, Chair. Cedric Gates here for DAB. We stand on our support of this.

Thank you, Cedric. And there are 10 in support, two opposed, and one comment. Next is.

We also had Han Lau, also from DAB. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Han. Also, Stacy Chun. Stacy here from DAB on Zoom.

Stacy is available on Zoom Chair.

She is say is him. Oh, standing on test. Okay, good. Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Thank you, Chair. Members of the Committee, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau, the ever written testimony supporting the intent. I think we all know here how important bees are and do understand their importance.

However, as I said previously, Farm Bureau generally has concerns about new or increased regulations, particularly when they can place burdens on farmers and ranchers or in this instance, beekeepers.

Our support is based on ensuring that the program is implemented in a practical way and remains accessible to small scale and hobbyist beekeepers, avoids unnecessary bureaucracy and emphasizes collaboration over enforcement. As long as implementation remains balanced and flexible. We believe that this Bill can strengthen the beekeeping industry without creating undue regulatory burdens.

Again, we don't want undue regulatory burdens hampering our beekeepers. But this Bill emphasizes guidance, education, best management practices for beekeepers and it does emphasize emphasizes that more like education rather than enforcement or punitive regulations. Again, we don't like unnecessary regulations, but we do want to protect our bees. Thank you for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you. Next is Katie Metzger with Hanae Hives. Katie with us on Zoom.

Katie is available on Zoom Chair.

Okay. Is it down? She said is right. Okay. You there, Katie? There she is. Hey, Katie. Aloha.

Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Aloha. Oh, great. Aloha. Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, my name is Katie Metzger. I'm a full time beekeeper on Oahu. I'm the founder of Hanai Hives. It's a beekeeping education and host to hive program. We have 52 families of adopted beehives and we mentor them at our four apiaries on the North Shore.

I support SB 2160 and appreciate this bill's acknowledgment that bees and pollinators play a critically important role in Hawaii's food system, agriculture, ecosystem health. As someone who works with honeybees year round, I believe this measure will help to protect and strengthen Hawaii's beekeeping industry. I actually submitted testimony, but I have a short amount of time.

So I'm just going to say the most important thing here for me is that biosecurity. We used to have a great apiary unit years ago. Three beekeepers had, you know, swarm traps at all the ports around the island and they would euthanize actually swarms that came in.

I'm all about saving the bees, but when we have invasive species come in, like the African ISB and other pathogens that have decimated, you know, the beekeeping industry in the past, we don't want that.

And so I think that's really important to have an apiary unit once again, we did have it, and it was successful and to provide some support, support for beekeepers on the island. I see. If it was like, if they're proposing, what was the registry that we had before? It was voluntary, but it was supportive.

And there wasn't a strong regulatory kind of arm. It was more about supporting beekeepers. And there was a lot of trust and a lot of collaboration, a lot of community building that happened because of it. So I welcome that back.

And in addition to that, I think that a registry would help with University of Hawaii that's been trying to collect data regarding the varroa mite and other pathogens that come in. And it's really hard for those researchers to be able to reach beekeepers to collect that data without a registry. So mahalo for your time.

I appreciate the opportunity to speak, and I am in favor of SB2160.

Thank you, Katie. Austin Martin, Libertarian Party Hawaii.

Aloha. Thank you, Chair. Austin Martin, Libertarian Party of Hawaii I actually really appreciate the intent of this bill, and I'll clarify with some comments on my written testimony that the attempt to keep things voluntary and to create a supportive, positive approach that's less straitjacketing. I really do appreciate that.

I still generally, on principle oppose this because I worry about the unintended consequences downstream that can result from the laws that we pass today that seem very voluntary and end up becoming less so later when future sessions add on to the codes.

So that would be my, my, where my opposition comes from, though I really do appreciate where they're coming from. I think private market solutions ultimately will do a better job if we let them.

Thank you, Austin. Anyone else wishing to testify on SB 2160 Members, any questions? Sure. Yes, Director.

I might be calling myself a better expert on this one.

It's a data question.

Oh, okay.

How much data do we have on our bee industry?

May I call on my subject matter?

Absolutely.

Did I have a question for him, too?

Okay.

Question.

Well, good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Han Lo Plan Pest Control Branch Manager.

How much data do we have on our bee industries statewide?

We only have data on the inspections that we have conducted at the apiaries, and we don't have, as far as I know, we don't have any more than that.

May I send you the data that NASA has collected over the years? I mean, there is data, it's just not specifically local.

And I'm the author of this Bill and I'll walk you into this. This goes back from my county days trying to get our arms around our apiary industries specifically, or additionally our queen bee production, because we are big time, big time.

And I don't think there's a single person would even attempt to argue the importance of the bee industry. Not here or not the bee industry, the bee itself, across the world. But again, data. How do we help something we don't understand?

Specific data for the queen bee production. We know where we send it because we have shipping records. And it is incredible the amount of queen bees that we send. I think we supply Canada with 60% of their queen bees. So that kind of data we can certainly collect.

Currently, I don't have access to that database.

What I appreciate is one of our testifiers, Katie Metzger, brought up some interesting information about the whole biosecurity side swarms. We need to be managing this. And so my interest in this is to. And I appreciate the voluntary side of this, but to get our arms around it. The thing is the Varro mite, that is problematic.

We need to understand this. And that's where the data is so important, getting this. So as we go forward, same question. How quick?

Zero, gosh, I. Quick as I can give you the data that we can put together from the NASS reports and then you can supplement that with what we're lacking, what you need, and I can do that right away. But local data.

Only the inspection data that. Only the inspection data that we have conducted.

Okay, so let's start with getting that data and if you could get. Get it to chair and he could distribute it to the Committee.

One week, two weeks, A month.

A week. A week. A week.

So thank you for a week. We'll give you a couple, three weeks because we understand start. So thank you for that. Thank you, Chair.

And one question. How might this bill impact your backyard hobby beekeepers?

I think what was said earlier is how this bill will impact, and that is we need to increase the biosecurity at the ports because I don't know much about the Africanized honeybee, but they are indistinguishable from the good honeybee, and they are. They would be really, really bad.

So the biosecurity piece is just kill every bee that comes in that we find in a box or a Container, let the stevedores know, just kill them. Right. We don't want to have to do a DNA test or anything. What do you say?

I mean, that. That'll be a safe 100% safeguard. Yeah. I mean, to prevent anything that comes in. I see.

Okay, sure.

Yes, Senator, how come you sending the queen bees on when we have a lack of beehives? Why are you guys sending the queens on?

Because we have more than we need here. Really? And there's. Yeah, and the demand is so great. I mean, I guess Canada is so cold and the bees haven't. I haven't quite adopted and they die and so they need a continuous replenishment during their growing season. But yeah, we do. It's a lucrative business, first of all.

And then we have enough of the.

Data on the beehives. Anything on neonic residue we don't have.

The inspection we did was just on. The health of the apiaries. We have not done, as far as. I know, on the neonics effects.

Yeah, I would like to see that.

Data if we have it.

No, we have not done studying, so.

Maybe that's the data we collect.

That would be on important data for us. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you.

One other quick comment. I actually kept a beehive for about 10 years, so I can tell you all the good, the bad and the ugly about making mistakes when you're handling a lot of bees. I got stung a lot, but I did manage it.

So I have a more than vested interest in this deal just because I think it's something we need to help and protect. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Next is SB 2123 relating to farm dwellings. Prohibits residing on AG park lots unless with any farm dwelling permitted by the Board of Ag and by biosecurity. Authorizes Department of AG and Biosecurity to conduct inspections of AG park plots for unpermitted farm dwellings during fiscal year 2026 and 2027. First up is DAB.

Thank you, Chair Cedric Gates, on behalf of DAB, we stand on our written comments on this measure here.

For any questions and thank on this Bill, we have one in support, one in opposition and two comments. Next is Hawaii Farm Bureau with some comments.

Thank you, Chair. Members of the Committee, Brian Miyamoto here on behalf of the Hawaii Farm Bureau. I know online we click comments, but we do appreciate the intent of the measure. Again, we've talked many times about farm dwellings and the parts of farm dwellings, but also some of the abuses.

We don't believe that this Bill is particularly addressing that. Our testimony does reference that because that's a continued discussion that we need to have that again, farm dwellings and AG work for housing should be for legitimate or bona fide farming.

We understand that there may be some challenges with some of the dwellings on and this is specifically, I believe, Chapter 166. So Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity's AG parks, again, there are important tools, farm dwellings for security, for incentives for farmers to continue to farm. Many reasons of farm dwellings.

We do just suggest that I think what the Bill is trying to address is consistent lease enforcement that can help address some potential misuse on agricultural parks as far as farm dwellings are concerned.

And we believe the Department of Agriculture, again it is their program that they should be the enforcement arm and should be enforcing so that their potential disputes between lessees do not occur and that actual farming and correct farming practices are done on AG Park leases as far as when there are farm dwellings there.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments.

Thank you. Brian. Austin Martin, Libertarian Party.

Aloha, Mr. Chair and Committee. I owe you guys an apology for my written testimony because while doing an analysis on this Bill I made a fundamental misunderstanding about its application.

And so I misunderstood it as being basically a way to get around the Fourth Amendment and enforce building codes on small farmers, not realizing the park lot language excludes that. So my apologies for the strongly worded written response. I'd like to clarify on that.

I think that the problem that they're trying to address does not require such a radical solution. I think this is too heavy handed. It's not the same problem because the government would have the right to regulate what's going on on land that it's facilitating as part of a public program. So I don't think that's the issue.

But here's the thing. I don't think this Legislature needs to act in order to deal with that. I think the Department of Agriculture and the judiciary maybe should take responsibility for not putting in the proper mechanisms in the leases or whichever agency is responsible for governing those terms.

It's hard for me to understand how the things like bona fide farming and other things couldn't be put into those contracts and dealt with at the contractual level, rather than trying to get the people to pass new legislation that could potentially have far reaching consequences and negatively impact people who don't deserve it.

The Kula situation sounds like, if I understand correctly, I'm shooting from the hips. It sounds like they are not enforcing the terms of the lease or not building in proper terms in the lease.

And it just seems like a shame if we have to create a one-size-fits-all policy in order to deal with something that really might come down to a failure in Administration. So again, I apologize for my strongly worded comment.

Again, I thought we were talking about eliminating the fourth amendment here, and obviously I misunderstood the intent of the Bill. So thank you for allowing me the chance to clarify that for you guys. And thank you.

Thank you, Austin. Okay, Members, any questions? Yes.

Sharon, do you have any estimate of how many unpermitted farm dwellings is this exist in the AG parks?

Unpermitted? I would say zero.

Okay, you need to go back and check because you're absolutely wrong. Okay. I can tell you that you have unpermitted dwellings.

And of those unpermitted dwellings, as you know, those farms that are there have asked to set back buffers. So the Bill was created really and I kind of and I agree. So first of all, I'm going to agree with the last testifier that the Bill was done because you guys weren't enforcing.

And what makes it even harder is that when the ask of a buffer is asked to be sent back, will the Department entertain the idea that the rent that the individuals pay also be removed for unusable land now no longer under cultivation?

I'm going to ask my SME to respond to that.

Senator Brian Kau, Department of AG. First of all, we did undertake a what I thought. Apologies if it wasn't a relatively thorough review of all structures in all of our fan holdings. And if we missed one or two, I am very, very sorry about that.

And we will go back and revisit that, and if you can help us with where that might be.

So, Brian, I've pointed it out several times. This is way back from Scott Enright's time, and it's just been blindsided, overlooked. The problem you guys get is that the individuals that are in that unpermitted dwelling is now subjected to all the dust, all the noise, and everything else that impacts the farms around it.

You know, unless there's an understanding that that dwelling or the person residing in there agrees that they don't get dust out, they're gonna get noise on Saturday mornings, then the farm's not gonna have a problem.

But I think the intent of the AG parks was to get people to grow food, but it's impacting those farms, which is why the language was they maybe check with the surrounding neighbors, but it shouldn't be the neighbors to make the complaint. You guys go out and you guys do all the site visits.

You send out guys out, just site visit, and the structure is right there. So I don't believe that farm or the adjacent farmer should have to make the complaint.

The bigger question is asking the person you guys pay to go out and do the site visit to see that this structure is visibly there and somebody's living in it.

Understood. Thank you again. We'll take that very, very seriously. If you could help us with your example, we would be more than happy to go out and take.

Brian. I already did. Okay. I helped you guys with it. I pointed it out to Linda, and then the comment was, oh, yeah, but we don't see nobody. You know, you think they're gonna come there while they see you?

We'll go back and check our records then for that, even though retired last year. So we've been really low on managers, but we're starting to fill back in, and we'll go back and check our records on that, and we will get back to you on it.

Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Okay, thank you. And then moving on to the final measure. Today's agenda, SB 2110 relating to AG, establishes a conservation AG and soil health incentive program within the Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Commission, requires an annual report to the Legislature. We have 60 in support, one opposed and no comments.

We'll start off with DAB.

Thank you, Chair Cedric Gates here on behalf of DAB. We stand on our written testimony supporting the intent of this bill. Mahalo

Thank you. Leah Laramee from the Climate Change Commission.

Aloha Gabbard. Vice Chair Richards. Members of the Committee, mahalo for the opportunity to testify. My name is Leah Laramee with the Hawaii State Climate Change Mitigation Adaptation Commission. We stand on our testimony in support of the Bill and available for any questions. Mahalo.

Thank you. Hunter Heavilin, Hawaii Farmers Union.

Thank you, Chair. Hunter Heavilin on behalf of Hawaii Farmers Union, we stand in strong support of this measure. This is an evolution of an effort we have been pursuing for a number of years to establish something akin to the support for conservation agriculture practice adoption across the islands. In many other states, these efforts have been termed healthy soils programs.

We view this as an important mechanism to provide further support for the adoption of good land management practices by any producer around the islands in a way that to some degree mimics some of the programs that have been offered at the federal level, but in many cases are, I could say, frustrated by their own Administration and in many ways not necessarily tailored to small, diversified and specialty crop producers, of which most of Hawaii's farms are.

So we view this as an important opportunity to support good land management, farm viability, and ideally work with the Climate Commission to ensure that the distribution of these subsidies really benefits the variety of farms that we have across the islands. Their previous pilot program, the Climate Smart effort, really took a swing at a lot of larger producers.

But there are a variety of farm sizes that that we're interested and we see that while there are many forms of subsidy across the islands for various sizes of agriculture, we believe that ensuring that the support in part goes to those producers who have already taken it upon themselves to internalize the environmental effects of agricultural production.

And we hope to see further support for these smallholders and family farm operations as they continue to participate and our farm economy. Happy to answer any questions. Mahalo for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you, Hunter. Brian Miyamoto, Hawaii Farm Bureau.

Thank you, Chair. The Hawaii Farm Bureau was down on his written testimony and support, and we like to adopt the words of the previous testifier as if they were our own, except for the answering questions part.

Thank you, Brian. Let's see here. Next is why. Nicole Galase Hawaii Cattlemen's Council.

Thank you, Chair. Nicole Galase on behalf of the Hawaii Cattlemen's Council, we stand on our written testimony in support and want to add that like I said earlier, there are shovel ready projects that are available of all sizes of producers. There is a strong need for this. Mahalo.

Thank you. Austin Martin Libertarian Party.

Aloha. Thank you Chair and Committee Austin Martin, Libertarian Party of Hawaii we need deregulation, not subsidies. And as small farmers, we need to get permission slips and compete under an economic disadvantage with the favors of the state, which too often always go to benefit insiders and they benefit the big companies.

Even with the best of intentions, this happens, right? And I want to just commend the intention to make agriculture awesome in Hawaii. It should be. This is a great perfect thing.

But again, we're dooming ourselves by putting it under a centrally command and control style economy where the state basically picks the winners and losers and that's what we have.

And every Bill adds to that structure and makes it more and more suffocating for anyone who's not operating, operating under the government, you know, with government dependency and all that goes with that. And so that's very frustrating for the free market that wants to be able to really develop.

And remember, these subsidies are coming at the cost of the taxpayers and the productive people who aren't operating with subsidies. Right. So I'm just, I'm just really concerned. You know, we produce a lot of beef. Right. We produce a lot of different good things on my island.

And we don't really see the benefit of the industry like we could because a lot of that money, a lot of the activity is straight jacketed by the state. And unfortunately the state is just not efficient at distributing capital. That is just a problem.

So I just warn of the unintended consequences and blowback of even the most well intentioned ideas. We want agriculture. It'd be better to just take 1% of the state budget and literally just give it to farmers. That would be more efficient, way more efficient than anything that I think is proposed this session personally yield.

Thank you, Austin. Robert Bence is next.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair Members, I stand on my written testimony and strong support, but I do agree with that last part about giving the money directly to farmers, that we would be good with them.

Thank you, Robert. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? Members, Questions? Yes.

So what are conservation, agriculture and soil health incentive programs?

It's a well, the program itself provides the incentives and the actions. Is that the question? What type of actions would they include? So everything from intensive grazing, cover crops, wind breaks, planting trees for soil conservation. So there's a variety of different practices. That can be.

So do you guys have current staff to develop the programs?

Yeah, so we had an existing program and we have Emily Perry. So we had a pilot program that operated for two or three years from 2022 to 2025. And that was so we have currently one staff that operated that program.

So this is kind of building off of that and expanding a bit more to look at soil health.

So I guess the intent would be to try and get pretty much everybody on board to try and look towards more soil health and cover crops and so forth.

Yeah, the intent is really to ensure the longevity of our agricultural lands, to make sure that in the long run we have healthy soils that can continue to produce food and.

So shouldn't it, I mean, just to be consistent because it goes with equitable access for small and socially disadvantaged farmers. I mean, I would think we would want everybody on board to start doing it. Shouldn't we be like inclusive of everybody now so that everybody participate in soil health?

I don't think it. Oh, you mean like as large farmers.

As well, incentivize them because then you would get more of them doing healthier soil and addressing climate change issues and practices.

Yeah, the thought behind focusing on smaller land managers is that the larger ones have more access to those federal funds and have more capacity to access those federal funds that are available.

I think the smaller ones do as well. If you go to Farm Service Agency and NRCS, I think they're given. I mean, sure, Director could answer that question, but the opportunity, when you go to Farm Service Agency, USDA, you're given the same opportunity as a small farmer or small rancher as well.

The requirements for the smaller farmers are usually limited by the size of their plots. They're usually not as competitive because they'll have smaller acreage. They usually don't have the capacity to do all of the reporting that's required on the federal side. So even with that additional support, they're not. And also, land tenancy is also a limiting factor.

Often the federal programs will require like 5, 10, 15 year agreements, which they just can't do because their land tenancy is limited. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you Chair.

Okay. Is that it? You guys want to go decision making? Do you want discussion? Recession? If you want. Yeah.

Recess. I don't need to recess.

Yeah, we're still unpacking. Okay. So we're going to go right into decision making. Start off with 874 relating to veterinary medicine. The Chair's recommendation will be to pass with amendments including the Hawaii Veterinary Medical association proposed amendments clarifying client notification, prescription standards and liability, and removing the provision regarding written prescription fees. Chair votes I at any discussion.

Vice Chair.

Chair passing with amendments. Sorry, a little rusty on this. Passing with the amendments on Senate Bill 874. [Roll Call] Chair, you have five in favor. Motion as adopted.

Thank you. Members. Next is related to sustainable food systems.

Establishing the Climate Resilient Food Systems grant program within DAB Chair's recommendation on this one will be to pass with amendments offered by the Hawaii Farmers Union specifying the definitions for climate adaptation, unquote, quote, unquote and resiliency strategies, quote, unquote as well as defecting the date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion? Chair votes Aye.

Vice Chair on Senate Bill 2097 passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Charity of 5 in favor.

Motion SB2098 Establishing the Clean Plant Program within DAB Chair's recommendation will be to pass with technical amendments, including defecting the date of July 1, 2050 and any discussion? Chair votes Aye.

Vice Chair on Senate Bill 2098, passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair, you have five in favor. Motion adopted.

Thank you. SB2126 establishing the conventional farming grant program. Chair's recommendation will be to pass with amendments offered by the Hawaii Farmers Union which exceeds expands eligibility to include organic and sustainable farms and clarify allowable uses of grant funds as well as technical amendments, including defecting the date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion? Chair votes Aye. Vice Chair.

On Senate Bill 2126, passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair they're five in favor. Motion adopted.

Moving on to SB 2154, requiring DAB to conduct a study of ag markets for Hawaii farmers. Chair's recommendation will be to pass with amendment defecting the date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion? Chair votes Aye. Vice Chair.

On Senate Bill 2154, chair votes. Passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair you have five in favor. Adopted.

Thank you. And then to SB 2153 regarding bonafide farmers. The Chair's recommendation will be to pass with technical amendments, including defecting the date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion? Chairs votes Aye.

On Senate Bill 2153, passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair, you have four in favor. Motion is adopted.

Thank you, Members. And then to SB2160 on beekeeping. The Chair's recommendation would be to pass with amendments offered by the Hawaii Food Policy, including, number one, changing the language from swarm prevention, quote, unquote, to swarm management, quote, unquote.

Number two, clarifying that requeening practices should consider additional genetic traits such as natural pest and disease resistance and hygienic behaviors in addition to temperament. And then technical amendments for clarity, including deferring the effective date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion?

Yeah, just a quick note. Sure. Reached out to a couple beekeepers I know. Hi. Honey and Manoa. Honey. Both were against this. They didn't submit testimony. I just want to say it for the record.

Thank you. Chair votes Aye. Vice Chair.

On Senate Bill 2160, passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair you have four in favor. Motion is adopted.

Okay. Moving on to SB2123 relating to farm dwellings. We need some more time to talk story on this one. So the chair's recommendation will be to defer decision making till Monday, February 2 and 301P here in room 224 and moving the final measure, SB2110, on healthy soils.

Chair's recommendation would be to pass with technical amendments, blanking the appropriation and inserting it into the Committee report for consideration and defecting the date to July 1, 2050. Any discussion? Chair votes Aye.

On Senate Bill 2110, passing with amendments. [Roll Call] Chair you have five in favor. Motion adopted.

Thank you. Members that adjourns the A&E