D. PRESERVING THE ENVIRONMENT

The human race can live in harmony with the earth, and not continue destroying it for short-term profits. We can protect our natural resource heritage for future generations and have a healthy economy. This requires that we adopt "true-cost" pricing in energy and 'resource management, because market price s fail to accurately reflect the impact on our environment of destructive and inefficient industrial practices.

D1. Energy

Hawai'i imports 90% of its energy, in the form of fossil fuels. To reduce Hawaii's dependence on coal and oil, we would:

  • Reduce Hawaii's current energy consumption by 50%, by use of proven , reason ably priced efficiency measures
  • Substitute renewable energy sources such as solar, hydroelectric, biomass, wind, OTEC, and hydrogen for fossil fuels used to generate electricity and for transportation
  • Support County governments in enacting the Hawaii Residential Model Energy Code
  • Encourage the State to allocate significantly more Research & Development resources for innovative, small-scale, diverse and dispersible technologies, rather than large scale, centralized, capital-intensive projects
  • Support legislation mandating solar water heating, where feasible, in all .new construction
  • Promote competition for operation and/or ownership of all or parts of the electric grid by community non-profits or for-profit enterprises

Support legislation to phase out existing geothermal programs immediately. The current projects have proven to harm humans and the environment, and government has proven itself unwilling to enforce rules and regulations. In addition, they have been insensitive to traditional ' Hawaiian cultural values

  • Phase out the O'ahu H-POWER plant as recycling grows
  • Support a nuclear-free Pacific

D2. Atmosphere

Greens would protect air quality, and reduce C02 emissions and slow global warming by:

  • Reducing auto traffic and thus motor vehicle exhaust contaminates (see D9)
  • Phasing out our oil, coal and garbage burning power plants
  • Reducing industrial emissions
  • Supporting efforts to save or restore forests, such as debt-for-nature swaps, tax incentives, and replanting projects
  • Increasing efforts to protect the ozone layer

D3. Water

Hawai'i must live within its water budget, using only water that can be spared without destroying streams or depleting aquifers. Greens would:

  • Increase efficiency of agricultural water use, through techniques such as drip irrigation
  • Redesign residential and county water codes and systems to separate gray water (bathwater, dishwater, etc.) from sewage. Graywater could then be used for irrigation with minimal treatment
  • Increase use of surface water (rainwater runoff) and decrease reliance on well water
  • Restrict drawdown on freshwater aquifers (over pumping causes irreversible damage)
  • Protect water supplies from pollution by fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, farm animal waste runoff and other non-point source pollution
  • Eliminate the use of herbicides on our parks, roadsides, and school grounds
  • Promote integrated pest management and composting
  • Vigorously promote residential and commercial water conservation
  • Advocate democratic, locally based control over water supplies and waste management practices that affect surface and sub-surface waters
  • Encourage xeriscaping (plants using little or no water) in dry areas

D4. Oceans and Fisheries

We are appalled by the waste of life and ocean resources caused by driftnet and long line fishing in Hawaiian waters and elsewhere. We would:

  • Impose economic sanctions upon countries that allow drift-netting
  • Strongly enforce the international ban on drift netting

We would also:

  • Impose economic sanctions upon countries that defy the International Whaling Commission ban on whaling
  • Ban imports of tuna caught by methods that kill dolphins
  • Oppose sea strip-mining and refining of minerals in Hawaiian waters
  • Enforce and expand anti-pollution laws to include strict limitations on the introduction of harmful noise into the marine environment
  • Set and enforce rules prohibiting discharge of untreated sewage into streams or coastal waters, and require secondary treatment of sewage where appropriate
  • Fund programs to protect wetlands threatened by development
  • Encourage fish pond development where applicable
  • Prohibit long-line fishing in Isle waters by out-of-state boats
  • Limit fishing in depleted areas until local fisheries recover; establish and enforce sustainable yields
  • Severely restrict commercial reef fish collecting to allow this resource to recover

D5. Wilderness

Hawai'i is home to more endangered species than any other place in the United States. We must protect our unique flora and fauna; we must preserve our remaining wilderness as places of solace, refuge from modern life, and spiritual regeneration. We would:

  • Increase Hawai'i's Department of Land and Natural Resources funds, and strengthen the department's programs that protect and preserve the Islands' oceans and land

Enforce equal access laws for Hawai'i's citizens who are increasingly being shut out from the Islands' ocean and forests by private owners

  • Work closely with private groups which buy and preserve native habitats since adequate space is needed for our flora and fauna

D6. Land Use

We view with concern the present concentration of land ownership in Hawai'i; today most land is owned by the government or the large estates, with only a small portion divided among individual landowners. Land must be used for the long-term well-being of Hawai'i's residents and Hawai'i's environment. Planning boards dominated by development interests do not best serve the 'aina and the people. Greens therefore:

  • Call for elected land-use boards , with minimum qualifications for board members, open meetings, and public scrutiny of planning decisions to ensure proactive public participation
  • Will work for the right of initiative to rescind inappropriate decisions

We support comprehensive anticipatory land use planning that would:

  • Limit development of historically or ecologically significant areas
  • Preserve our coastline and scenic wonders for public enjoyment
  • Establish greenbelts as buffers to urban development

D7. Food and Farming

Hawai'i now imports at least 80% of its food. Greens call for sustainable agriculture and food self-reliance. We would:

  • Encourage intelligent farming practices to conserve topsoil
  • Discourage the use of non-organic pesticides, chemical fertilizers , and genetically altered seeds
  • Support alternative sustainable crop production
  • Support small-scale, family owned diversified farming
  • End tax policies, crop subsidies and State lease regulations that favor big plantations and factory farms , at the expense of smaller growers
  • Set up land trusts to shelter productive farmland from development pressures
  • Encourage aquaculture, thus reducing overfishing of Island waters, as well as reducing reliance on imported fish

Animal husbandry must also be reformed. Meat animals are now confined in feedlots and fed on grain. It takes several pounds of grain to produce one pound of meat -which is a waste of food. Moreover, feedlot waste pollutes water supplies. We support:

  • Small-scale homestead livestock raising, or ranching, on marginal land not suitable for other crops
  • Small feedlots dispersed on all islands, as grass-fed, organic animal feeding methods are preferable to large industrialized feedlots

We believe that these goals will be best achieved by consumer education. For health, environmental, and social justice reasons, we urge consumers to avoid feedlot meat and eat lower on the food chain.

D8. Manufacturing

Greens would encourage manufacturers to produce goods that are durable, repairable, reusable, recyclable, and energy efficient, with a goal of zero emissions in their manufacture. We would also:

  • Discourage over-consumption; encourage consumers to share, repair and live better with less
  • Enact and enforce laws controlling industrial pollution by assessing its "true cost"
  • Assess "true cost" fees to products in relation to the environmental cost caused by their production, use, and disposal

D9. Transportation

Private cars pollute the air, clog cities and waste energy reserves. We would:

  • Reduce auto traffic with energy efficient, non-polluting mass transit closely linked with park-and-ride stations, buses, jitneys, and other alternatives to cars
  • Promote the use of bicycles, by creating bike paths, providing free bicycle carriage on mass transit, and providing bicycle storage lockers
  • Encourage energy efficiency in cars by raising gas taxes gradually but significantly
  • Set and enforce strict emission standards
  • Encourage manufacturers to produce cars that run on renewable energy

D10. Cities and Housing

Greens envision an alternative to the suburb: the cluster project. A cluster would consist of townhouses or row houses, surrounded by green space. It would be built on a mass transit line, so those residents could manage without cars. Each cluster could have its own meeting area, convenience store, and day-care. They would foster a sense of community, use land efficiently, and reduce the environmental costs of commuting. We need to begin redesigning cities and communities around mass transit hubs and a mix of reasonably priced housing, work, and shopping areas. New housing could be built to these specifications; old housing could be retrofitted. We would promote this transformation of Hawai'i's community by:

  • Funding model sustainable cities projects
  • Providing low-cost loans for retrofitting existing housing stocks
  • Rewriting housing and tax codes to encourage mixed land uses
  • Integrating commercial and residential areas to reduce commuting
  • Opening the land planning process to community input (see Section D6)
  • Redesigning the planning and inspection process to eliminate unnecessary delays
  • Changing tax and building codes to promote energy and water efficiency in old buildings as well as all new construction

Greens believe that we must house all of Hawai'i's citizens, including the poor. Hawai'i urgently needs adequate, reasonably-priced housing for lower and middle-income residents. Current government housing policies are ineffective. The State forces developers to build a few "affordable" houses for the lucky and the politically connected: this random bonanza for a few families does little to ease the overall housing crisis. Greens would:

  • Help nonprofit groups build reasonably priced rentals and form rental housing trusts the $100 million level
  • Promote cluster housing where supported by local communities
  • Fund a state-guaranteed loan program for inexpensive, self-help housing

D11. Waste Management

We can prevent waste by buying less and using less (source reduction), reusing, and refurbishing. What waste we do produce must be recycled to the greatest extent possible. Greens would:

  • Encourage local industries to use locally collected recyclables as raw materials; this would reduce transportation costs and make recycling more cost effective
  • Encourage use of products made from recycled materials
  • Provide curb-side pickup of recyclable materials
  • Bale and store sorted materials in balefills for easy recovery with future recycling technologies
  • Charge fees for unsorted wastes
  • Impose fines for illegal dumping
  • Set up facilities to compost yard and kitchen waste
  • Phase out the O'ahu garbage to energy plant as recycling grows

D12. Population

None of the previous proposals will save the environment if the human population continues to grow at the current rate. Greens support worldwide zero population growth. We would promote contraception research, distribution, and education at home and overseas.

Though we have experienced a temporary diminishing of the population in Hawai'i during the 1990s, it has not been the norm. Hawaii's population has grown quickly-2.4% annually during the period 1970-1986. This was three times as fast as the overall U.S. population growth. Only a small part of this was due to natural increase (the surplus of births over deaths). Most population growth here is due to migration from foreign countries, and from the Mainland. This migration was spurred by the growth of the tourist industry, which traditionally creates more low-paying menial jobs than local residents can fill.

Population growth must cease. We need carrying capacity studies for all counties to determine development limits. (See Section B)