Eight hundred feet above sea level, deep in the Makaleha mountain range of eastern Kaua`i, three springs release a steady flow of pure, cold water to an unnamed tributary of Makaleha Stream. The springs provide habitat to one of just five known populations of Newcomb’s snail (Erinna newcombi), a rare species of freshwater snail found only on Kaua`i. The koloa, or Hawaiian duck (Anas wyvilliana), a federally endangered species, also inhabits the area of the springs.
Three native gobies — o`opu nakea (Awaous stamineus), o`opu nopili (Sicyopterus stimpsoni), and o`opu alamo`o (Lentipes concolor), the rarest of all Hawaiian gobies — are found in Makaleha Stream, along with the `opae kala`ole (Atyoida bisculcata), an endemic species of shrimp.
According to the Fish and Wildlife Service, Makaleha Stream contains more species of native damselflies (Megalagrion) than any other locality yet surveyed in Hawai`i.
Were all this not enough, the area around the springs has been identified as a likely to support a community of aquatic organisms living within the flooded spaces beneath streams — what scientists call a hyporheic ecosystem.
Upper Makaleha Stream “supports one of the richest aquatic faunas in Hawai`i,” according to Brooks Harper of the Fish and Wildlife Service. The state Division of Aquatic Resources has said that the area “is by unanimous agreement among qualified biologists too valuable as habitat for native species to justify a development that would inevitably degrade the area.”
Devastation
That development (reported previously in the [url=/members_archives/archives_more.php?id=1292_0_30_0_C]July 1994 Conservation District column[/url] of Environment Hawai`i) consists of an outdated, taxpayer-financed project that the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Water and Land Development has had on its drawing board since 1984. DOWALD, in conjunction with Kaua`i County’s Department of Water, proposes to take all of the water that emerges from the springs — an amount DOWALD estimates to be one million gallons a day — and to pipe it 4,000 feet to a reservoir that supplies drinking water to the Kapa`a and Wailua areas. The water would be captured in a trench that is to be covered. By this means, DOWALD and the county hope to have the Department of Health agree that the water source is underground and, therefore, need not undergo the expensive purification process now required of surface water sources.
In June 1994, the Board of Land and Natural Resources approved a Conservation District Use Permit for the project. DOWALD’s application to the board was unusual in that it was presented not by the Office of Conservation and Environmental Affairs, which customarily prepares Conservation District applications for submittal to the board, but by DOWALD itself.
Now, DOWALD’s project is before the state Commission on Water Resource Management. Should the commission grant DOWALD its requests to construct a well and to amend the interim instream flow standards for Makaleha Stream, DOWALD will have obtained all the major requirements needed to move ahead on the project.
The project was placed on the agenda for the Water Commission’s meeting on Kaua`i, held February 15. However, the commission agreed with the staff’s recommendation to defer action, to allow for additional fact-finding. According to the staff submittal, “Because of the strong support by the applicant and the county to see the project completed, and an equally strong interest in preserving the ecosystem of the project area, it is important that as much information about the project be disclosed to the commission so that an informed and intelligent decision can be made.”
Focus on Listing
The environmental impact statement for the project was completed in 1994, after substantial revisions spanning four years. Biological surveys reported in the revised final EIS (RFEIS) did not disclose the presence of the snail, and no special attention was paid to the gobies and other stream fauna. Because none of the species identified was formally listed as endangered, DOWALD did not propose any means of mitigating the inevitable harm that would occur to these species were the project built as planned.
On June 6, 1994, the Fish and Wildlife Service sent to Manabu Tagomori, DOWALD’s chief engineer, notice of “updated status information” on Erinna newcombi, or Newcomb’s snail. The letter, signed by Brooks Harper, states: “Because Erinna newcombi actually occurs in the spring itself, and requires a fast flow in the main channel, the modifications proposed in the Makaleha Springs development would undoubtedly impact this species. Given our current understanding that Makaleha is one of only two extant populations of this species, our office is considering initiating conservation efforts for this species.”
Tagomori was not pleased at what he called the Fish and Wildlife Service’s “eleventh hour” effort to derail the project. In a September 16 letter to the service, Tagomori stated, “Through our EIS process we have determined that there are no threatened or endangered species nor critical habitat which will be affected by this project; therefore there is no impact and no requirement” under the federal Endangered Species Act. He also reminded the service that it had informed him it had no plans for “emergency listing” of the Newcomb’s snail and that, in addition, the period within which the state environmental impact statement could be legally challenged expired in July 1994, without action from any party.
Emergency listing under the federal Endangered Species Act is appropriate only when the sole known population of a species is threatened with extinction by a planned development. That condition does not apply to the Makaleha Springs population of snails. However, according to Adam Asquith of the Fish and Wildlife Service, the service is going ahead with preparation of the documents needed to place the snail on the Endangered Species List. Completion of the standard listing package was expected by the end of February, Asquith told Environment Hawai`i.
Move ‘Em Out
In the face of growing concerns about the snail, Tagomori has grabbed onto an idea for protecting the population at Makaleha Springs by transporting it elsewhere. Fish and Wildlife Service staff “discussed the possibility of USFWS ‘transplanting’ the snails to an area that would have the habitat that would support its growth,” Tagomori told Harper in the letter cited above. “Your staff indicated that it would take about six months to find such an area and accomplish the transplant. This appears to us to be a reasonable mitigating measure if it will not delay the project more than six months.”
In testimony before the Water Commission, Kaua`i Mayor Maryanne Kusaka added her support to the idea. But as later testimony brought out, long after Kusaka and other county officials left the meeting, the Newcomb’s snail requires rather specialized conditions — as seen in the very fact of its rarity. Asquith, of the Fish and Wildlife Service, pointed out that scientists still do not know enough about the snail to figure out what, precisely, it requires of its habitat. “Some place, with a nice waterfall, might look good to us,” he said in a recent telephone interview, “but it might be missing something essential for the snail.”
Given the lack of knowledge, he added, “there’s no way the Service would support” a snail round-up at Makaleha.
‘Biologically Foolish’
Tagomori’s proposed mitigation is hardly satisfying to biologists familiar with the biological wealth of the area. Asquith and others stress that to focus on the narrow question of whether one or another affected species is on the federal list of endangered or threatened animals and plants misses the point. “The presence of the snail is an indicator of a high-quality native ecosystem,” Asquith said.
Bill Devick, with the Division of Aquatic Resources, put the matter more directly: “In some ways I wish the question of an endangered snail had never arisen with regard to Makaleha, because the discovery of the snail blurs the need to deny the application” on the sole basis of the area’s “value as important habitat supporting a diverse and unique native community,” he told Environment Hawai`i. “The discovery of the snail underscores the fact that unique, important habitat can be identified without the crutch of threatened or endangered species.”
In testimony to the Water Commission delivered February 15, Devick elaborated on this point. “We are … concerned about the process that has led to the current situation,” he stated. “The EIS did not disclose the biological significance of the area or the related impacts of the project. Recent discoveries, in particular the existence of Newcomb’s snail, have been ignored.
“There appears to be no mechanism to ensure protection of biological diversity in an ecosystem context, and that deficiency necessarily will lead to inefficient and costly single-species protection and management. The considerable effort by the Stream Protection and Management Task Force (SPAM) during 1993-94 to define a plan to protect significant stream areas seems to have been for naught. Makaleha Stream would have qualified for absolute protection as a Heritage Segment under the Water Commission staff criteria, based on the SPAM report.
“The result is that development planning or mitigation is limited to consideration of the presence or absence of threatened or endangered species. This is biologically foolish and is a sure formula for further environmental degradation, including creation of more endangered species, at a time when sustainability of our natural environment should be the generally accepted goal.
“We should not be in a position where everything seems to be hinged to a federal endangered species listing for a snail. There is no question on our part that the snail warrants listing, or that it will in fact be listed. But protection of unique habitats and ecosystems should be of even higher priority… That would not only protect species deemed to be threatened or endangered, but it would prevent others from declining into the same category, or even extinction. It is also the only way to protect the future quality of human life in Hawai`i.”
What’s More…
Apart from the Newcomb’s snail, DOWALD’s project faces additional hurdles. In recent years, new federal rules concerning drinking water standards have come into effect. Should the water source be found to be subject to surface influences, it will require treatment at such expense as to make other alternatives, rejected in the EIS, at least as desirable as the project proposed. Estimates of the cost of building a treatment plant able to handle up to 1 million gallons a day run around $3.5 million; operational costs would be $1 million a year, DOWALD has said. (Confronted with the prospect that the Makaleha Springs system may indeed require treatment, DOWALD and the Kaua`i Department of Water have retreated from these estimates. At the Water Commission meeting, officials from those agencies said the cost would be far less — although no specifics were offered.)
Among the alternatives considered was promotion of water conservation in the Kapa`a-Wailua area. This alternative was endorsed by the Kaua`i Planning Department, which offered the view that the EIS underestimated the impact that water conservation programs could have. The cost of this measure was stated in the EIS to be $100,000 a year, as opposed to the $1 million cost of building the Makaleha Springs project. Unlike the water development project, water conservation has no adverse environmental impacts and, the Planning Department goes on to note, “would also contribute to energy savings for the county in reduced water pumping costs, the single largest energy expense to the county.”
The Kaua`i Department of Water, the Kaua`i County Council, the Kaua`i Housing Development Corporation and the Kaua`i County Housing Agency all support DOWALD’s project. Growth of the Kapa`a-Wailua area would not be possible without it, they told the Water Commission — and, in addition, some noted that if the project did not go forward, state funds might be lost to the county.
What Next?
The Water Commission deferred action without setting any schedule for taking the matter up again. The Fish and Wildlife Service announced at the February commission meeting that its listing package would probably be ready for forwarding to Washington in early March. The listing process takes from 12 to 18 months.
As a result of a formal request by James Anthony of the Hawai`i-La`ieikawai Association, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is reviewing the conditional approval it gave to the project in 1993.
Meanwhile, DOWALD has already signed a contract for the first phase of the project.
— Patricia Tummons
Volume 5, Number 9 March 1995
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