On July 6, 1998, Edward Brodie of the Hilo office of the Division of Forestry and Wildlife conducted an inspection along the southwest boundary of the Hilo Forest Reserve. His written report noted two “cattle trespass areas, one small, one large and heavily used.”
The cattle were from Alfred J. “Freddy” Nobriga’s adjoining Pu`u O`o Ranch, which occupies 5,995 acres of state land in an area just north of the Saddle Road near the Mauna Kea turnoff. It took a while, but Nobriga eventually repaired his fences and roped in the wandering cattle.
The state hasn’t been as fortunate in enlisting Nobriga’s cooperation in containing his cattle on other areas he ranches: one of 5,290 acres on leased Hawaiian Home Lands along Keanakolu Road, another of more than 7,000 acres on adjacent Hawaiian Home Lands subleased from Parker Ranch, and on 400 acres of Parker Ranch land he leases in an area known as Waipunalei. On a total of about 19,000 acres, Nobriga has some 6,000 head of cattle at any given time, he told Environment Hawai`i.
– Freddy Nobriga, rancher
The most recent go-round began last September. Jon Giffin, branch manager of DOFAW for the Big Island, had received complaints from biologists with the U.S.G.S Biological Resources Division that cattle were inside state forest reserves in areas near Nobriga’s ranches. Giffin and Nobriga inspected fence lines. In a memo to his staff, Giffin said they saw cattle inside the reserves. “Fred admitted that his cattle were involved in the trespass, but indicated that he was unable to keep them out. He also requested that we provide fence materials to reinforce the boundary fence. I was dismayed to find that cattle were still in these forests and that we have not taken any substantial actions to remove them.”
As a follow-up, Steve Bergfeld of DOFAW conducted a more extensive inspection. In Laupahoehoe, sections of fence along the east side were stockproof, but along the mauka boundary, the fence was “old and in poor condition,” Bergfeld wrote in his inspection report. “Saw fresh cattle sign in several placesÉ Saw sign of cattle activity using one hole in the fence to enter the forest reserve.” Conditions were worse along the Piha section, he found, with cattle entering the forest reserve in at least five places.
Last November, Giffin told Nobriga he had until December 22 “to remove all cattle” from forest reserves. If cattle remained at that time, Giffin said, he would publish a notice of trespass as required by law and, 30 days after publication, the state would do whatever was required to stop the encroachment. The cattle stayed. On three days in February, Big Island newspapers carried the promised notice. And suddenly, Nobriga sprang into action.
He didn’t remove the cattle; he called his lawyer, Brian De Lima. In a letter to Giffin dated February 26, De Lima said Nobriga had been assured in 1993 by then-Land Board chair Bill Paty and then-DOFAW Big Island administrator Charlie Wakida that the DLNR “would clear the trees along the fence line.” Trees falling along the fence were responsible for creating the opportunities for cattle to stray into the forest reserve, Nobriga has claimed.
“The two purposes of this letter is [sic] to secure completion of the task that had been promised and committed to be completed long ago and that is clearing the fence line,” De Lima wrote. “The second purpose is to object to any destruction of any cattle in the forest reserve.”
Giffin met on March 5 with Freddy Nobriga, his wife Gaylyn Nobriga, De Lima, and the governor’s liaison in Hilo, Al “Butch” Castro. “What came out of that,” Giffin said, “was, we set some dates on when cattle control would occur. Mostly it was just discussion of why the cattle were there. “We talked about trees on the fence line, Freddy’s problems with drought and lack of feed on pasturesÉ,” Giffin said. “We said we’d send him letter with specific dates, but tentatively set Piha for the end of April.”
It turned out the earliest the state could arrange the shoot was May 4. Nobriga was notified of the date on March 19.
Five days before the scheduled shoot, De Lima filed a complaint in Third Circuit Court in Hilo. The planned operation was tantamount to an unconstitutional taking of Nobriga’s property without due process and compensation, De Lima claimed. Second, the state had conducted no environmental assessment of the impacts of the planned action, although, according to De Lima, it is required to do so. The threatened action, wrote De Lima, “poses an imminent risk of irreparable harm to the environment.” In an accompanying memorandum submitted to the court, this “harm” was described as the leaving of carcasses in the Conservation District.
Third, De Lima alleged that the state has no rules to govern eradication operations. These rules are “required because such an eradication program would affect the rights of the public to public access to the state lands,” he claimed. “The public interest is not served by having riflemen shoot cattle from hovering helicopters and then having the carcasses rot in our conservation lands,” De Lima wrote in the supporting memorandum. “The public interest supports the granting of the injunction.”
On May 3, Judge Greg K. Nakamura heard the complaint. The record of the hearing suggests Nakamura was swayed by De Lima’s argument that Nobriga would suffer irreparable harm should the shoot proceed as planned and issued an injunction.
At this point, the state awaits scheduling of a court date. And Nobriga’s cattle continue to enjoy access to state forest reserves.
“This week we’ve had cattle in the Keanakolu orchard,” Giffin told Environment Hawai`i in mid-May. Keanakolu is perhaps the only place in the state where apples and other temperate fruit trees grow. Young trees have been destroyed by the grazing cattle and older trees damaged.
Cattle trespass in the Mauna Kea Forest Reserve, which Giffin said is another big problem. Nobriga’s ranch is “grazed to the dirt” adjoining the Mauna Kea reserve, he said, and cattle will be expected to attempt to break through fences when forage is limited. In Nobriga’s case, he said, those fences are old and, for the most part, in poor repair, except at Pu`u O`o.
Nobriga readily acknowledges the problems, but the responsibility for the trees on the fenceline rests squarely with the state, he claims. “All the time I try to keep my cattle out of the forest,” he said in an interview. “Trees in the forest [reserve] is falling all over the fence, all the time, all the time.” He said Bill Paty took a helicopter tour of his boundaries and agreed that the state should remove trees near the fence, but nothing was ever done. The picture that the state has of trees from his ranch falling on the fence is an exception. “Just one tree on my side fell on the fence,” he said. “We have to be fair” – and fairness, he said, is not what the state is giving him.
Recently, he said, he talked with Fred Holschuh, the new Land Board member from the Big Island. According to Nobriga, Holschuh told him, “Fred, we’re all behind you.” And if that support isn’t sufficient, Nobriga has other friends in even higher places: “Gore and Clinton were two little rats,” he said as he denounced their failure to intervene in the federal court decision to eradicate sheep on Mauna Kea or the Fish and Wildlife Service’s policy of snaring pigs. “But I’m a good friend of President Bush’s father.”
A History of Problems
In the 14 years Nobriga has held the DLNR lease for Pu`u O`o Ranch, his tenancy has been troubled by repeated infractions.
One of the first was his construction of a house on the ranch, even though the lease, when auctioned, clearly said no house was permitted. Through an oversight, the Board of Land and Natural Resources approved the house, which was built in 1989, but when Nobriga requested an easement, further investigation occurred, which resulted in the determination that the house was a violation of lease terms. In 1996, the house burned to the ground and has not been rebuilt. (The house was occupied at the time, but not by Nobriga, who lives in Hilo.) Even though Nobriga had been informed several years earlier that the pasture lease prohibited a house, in 1997, he told a Hawai`i District Land Office agent that he would rebuild the house, unless the Land Board specifically rescinded its earlier erroneous grant of an easement for the house. This was done on August 8, 1997.
A year later, and Nobriga’s cattle from the Pu`u O`o Ranch were crossing into the Hilo Forest Reserve at two different breaks in the fence along the ranch’s makai boundary. The lease specifically requires the boundary fences to be maintained by the lessee – i.e., Nobriga.
On top of that has been a string of delinquencies in rent (currently set at $13,600 a year), insurance, and performance bond requirements. Eight notices of delinquency were issued to Nobriga by the Hilo land office between March of 1996 and September of 1999. At various times, Nobriga refused to accept certified letters, resulting in the state having to pay for hand delivery or send him mail in envelopes with no return address.
Despite the problems, Nobriga, at age 77, is seeking a 20-year extension of his lease, which otherwise would expire in 2011. The extension is a condition of a mortgage from the Farm Credit Services of Hawai`i. Although Nobriga said he’s not personally planning on ranching that much longer – “I want to get out of this soon,” he said – his son, Alfred P. Nobriga, will be taking over.
In a letter April 16, 2001, requesting the extension, the elder Nobriga wrote: “We have been good tenants in the past and look forward to working with DLNR in the future.”
The matter has yet to come before the Land Board for a decision.
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Pigs in Park Dine on Nene
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