With this edition, Environment Hawai`i marks the publication of its 200th issue.
When the newsletter began, in July 1990, I had no inkling that the enterprise would last as long as it has. Frankly, I’m blown away at the thought that we’ve lasted this long.
The idea behind the newsletter came as Marjorie Ziegler, now executive director of the Conservation Council for Hawai`i, and I were bemoaning the poor coverage of environmental issues provided by the Honolulu newspapers during the 1990 legislative session.
It was as though the environmental bills didn’t exist. Anyone who wanted to know about what the Legislature was doing to protect Hawai`i’s land, water, air, or endangered species would have either had to be present at the Legislature or know someone who was. It was disgraceful.
Marjorie and I pooled our resources, with each of us contributing $1,000 in start-up funds. We obtained a mailing list by circulating a sign-up sheet at 1990 Earth Day festivals on O`ahu. When the first issue had its debut (with the subject, not surprisingly, what the 1990 Legislature had done – or not – to protect the environment), it was mailed to barely 200 people.
Today we’re regarded as a little heavy on text and light on graphics. But back then, we had no photos or graphics at all, plus our stories were printed in 9 point type. I think it reflected my own tendency to myopia.
In response to reader requests, by the start of the newsletters third year, type was increased a point size. There was no loss of editorial content, however, since at the same time, the newsletter grew to 12 pages, from 8.
Shifting Paradigms
The third year of publishing saw another important change: the transition from what had been a for-profit Subchapter S corporation to a non-profit.
When the newsletter started out, we had the idea that incorporating as a non-profit would have little benefit. It was the old chicken-and-egg story. You have to have a track record before foundations will support you, and you can’t get the track record if you don’t have the support. So we decided on organizing as a Subchapter S, in the belief that subscriber support alone would carry the newsletter through.
By the third year, I was still receiving virtually no salary at all, and it was becoming clearer that subscriptions alone would not support the publication. We didn’t want to accept advertising, so the only recourse left was to convert to a non-profit. We applied for standing as a non-profit in November 1992 and received IRS approval a couple of months later.
Since then, as a non-profit, Environment Hawai`i has been the happy beneficiary of a number of large grants as well as donations from a high proportion of subscribers. In recent years, donations and grants account for more than two-thirds of annual operating expenses, with subscriptions making up most of the remainder.
Help!
At the outset, the newsletter’s size was circumscribed by what I felt I could write without assistance. This obviated the need to hire additional help. I took no salary for the first couple of years, drawing down on a shrinking nest egg, thinking eventually the newsletter would grow to the point it could pay me a stipend. But I could not in good conscience ask anyone else to make the same sacrifice.
In March of 1993, I packed up and moved to Hilo, a refugee from the increasingly high rents of O`ahu. At the same time, Environment Hawai`i hired its first part-time help: Juliet Begley, who would tape meetings of the Board of Land and Natural Resources and ship the tapes to me. That worked until 1997, when Begley’s circumstances changed and she could no longer tape the board meetings.
Then out of the blue, I heard from a recent UH graduate in journalism, Teresa Dawson, whose professor had suggested she give me a call. We hit it off instantly. She agreed to work half-time for $500 a month. I thought I was incredibly lucky at the time, yet only in hindsight do I realize what a stroke of good fortune it was for both me and the newsletter. Teresa has been the only thing standing between me and burn-out on many occasions.
Lasting Impressions
Anyone who wants to see their words translated instantly into action would be well advised not to go into journalism. Even the most dramatic articles often will achieve results visible only from the distance of years or decades. And so it is with Environment Hawai`i. I think the work we do has great value, not because it throws monkey wrenches into the well-greased gears of corrupt government, or because it sheds such brilliant light on issues that wrong-headed policies will be reversed overnight. I think the value of our work lies rather in the slow, straw-by-straw, cumulative process of building a record – of explaining, not just to present readers, but future ones as well, how and why the state of affairs they confront came about. And while daily newspapers can give much of this background, the more thoughtful and detailed articles we provide will, in the long run, have as much or more explanatory impact.
Still, I think I can say with confidence that Environment Hawai`i has already left an indelible mark on the landscape of Hawai`i. In 1993, our articles on the state’s conflicted “space czar” helped seal the fate of plans for a controversial space-launch facility in Ka`u. Our disclosures, beginning in 1994, of the bycatch of endangered and threatened sea turtles by Hawai`i’s longline fleet played an important role in the eventual lawsuit that changed the way fishing is prosecuted here.
It was our disclosure of the ongoing use of heptachlor in Kunia pineapple fields that finally led Dole to abandon the use of this pesticide. It had been banned from further production in 1978 but Dole had quietly continued to use up its stockpiles of the chemical until our report appeared in June 1993.
More recently, our November 2004 report on the unconscionable and disastrous cuts to the state’s natural resources budget led to a quick turnaround the next year, followed by what is now a record budget for the Department of Land and Natural Resources proposed for the next fiscal year.
We get these stories through sheer doggedness. In a given year, we will file dozens of formal requests for information with state and federal agencies. We discount press releases, leaving those to the dailies, and turn our attention instead to those aspects of agency action that officials would just as soon keep under wraps. We sit for hours in meetings that would try the patience of Job, meetings that, by comparison, make drying paint look exciting.
The Next 200
Environment Hawai`i is no longer what I’d consider a marginal enterprise, lurching from one crisis to the next. For a while, after the end of a generous grant from the Hewlett Foundation, I was not at all certain that we’d find the wherewithal to keep going. To be sure, it was touch-and-go for a while.
But over the last couple of years, I have been amazed and gratified at the outpouring of support the newsletter has received. Our readers may be small in number, but they pack a wallop when it comes to expressing their appreciation for what we do in tangible ways.
As I look ahead to the next 17 years, I am hopeful that the work of Environment Hawai`i will continue, even after I bow out. Over the next few months and years, our board will begin looking for ways in which to ensure the newsletter’s health and longevity. If you have ideas and would like to participate in the process, please drop a line or give a call. I look forward to hearing from you.
— Patricia Tummons
Volume 17, Number 8 February 2007
Leave a Reply