HB2168

Report Title:

Waiahole Water System

Description:

Makes an appropriation of $200,000 to the Waiahole Water System Revolving Fund to enable the Agribusiness Development Corporation to make necessary improvements to the Waiahole Water System as required by the Commission on Water Resource Management.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.B. NO.	2168
TWENTY-FIRST LEGISLATURE, 2002
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

making an appropriation for the waiahole water system.

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. Act 264, Session Laws of Hawaii (SLH) 1994, created the agribusiness development corporation (ADC), a public corporation, to facilitate and coordinate the development and expansion of Hawaii's agriculture industry by directly participating in the shift from a dual crop (sugar and pineapple) industry, to a diversified agriculture industry, and by evaluating and funding research and agribusiness development projects.

Act 111, SLH 1998, appropriated funds for ADC to acquire, administer, operate, and maintain the Waihole water system to ensure the continuation and expansion of diversified agriculture on Oahu. Meanwhile, distribution of water from the Waihaole water system had become a major dispute among various competing interests. Several windward Oahu groups petitioned the commission on water resource management (CWRM) to restore flows in windward streams and the dispute culminated in a contested case hearing. CWRM's initial decision and order was appealed to the Hawaii supreme court, which remanded the case to CWRM for additional findings and conclusions, with further hearings if necessary.

On December 28, 2001, after the remanded contested case hearing, CWRM issued the commission's legal framework, findings of fact, and decision and order, which ordered, among other things, ADC to release more water into the various streams. Currently, gates exist to divert water from the tunnel system into Waiahole and Waianu streams, but no gate exists for diversions into Waikane stream. CWRM ordered ADC to assess how tunnel water could be diverted into Waikane stream and to develop a plan for accomplishing diversion. The assessment and plan is due within ninety days of the decision and order, and the diversion from the tunnel system into Waikane stream is due within one hundred eighty days after the assessment and plan are complete.

In addition, ADC is required to provide CWRM, among other things, daily records of the amount of water diverted from the windward tunnels into Waikane stream. Currently, there is no metering device that can measure the water diverted into the Waikane and Waianu streams. Therefore, in addition to providing the assessment and plan to divert water into Waikane and Waianu streams and the actual diversion of water, ADC is required to install and calibrate a metering device to provide specified records of releases of the amount of water diverted into the Waikane and Waianu streams.

The purpose of this Act is to make an appropriation to ADC to provide all improvements to the Waiahole water system as required by CWRM.

SECTION 2. There is appropriated out of the general revenues of the State of Hawaii the sum of $200,000 or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2001-2002 to be deposited into the Waiahole water system revolving fund to carry out the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 3. There is appropriated out of the Waiahole water system revolving fund the sum of $200,000 or so much thereof as may be necessary for fiscal year 2001-2002 to allow the agribusiness development corporation to carry out the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 4. The sums appropriated shall be expended by the agribusiness development corporation for the purposes of this Act.

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

INTRODUCED BY:

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