The staff of the Commission on Water Resource Management is too nice. That was the general consensus of commissioners at a May 16 meeting where, in one violation case after another, fine recommendations were minimal, to say the least.<\/p>\n
In the first case, involving unauthorized well construction and pump installation on the Big Island, staff recommended a fine of $400 for landowner John Pataye and $500 each for the contractors who drilled the well in 2007 and installed the pump in 2008.<\/p>\n
Pataye discovered the violations as he was preparing to sell his Kona property and submitted an application in March 2011 for an after-the-fact permit.<\/p>\n
Commission staff recommended that he be granted a permit after he pays his fine. Should the contractors fail to pay their fines, CWRM staff would not process any future permit applications until they were paid.<\/p>\n
When it came time to vote, commissioner William Balfour said he was troubled by what had been proposed, given the fact that the commission has the ability to impose daily fines of up to $5,000 per violation. As far as he was concerned, the contractors should have known better.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomehow, with all these after-the-fact permits, we\u2019ve got to stop saying, \u2018Oh, naughty, naughty,\u2019 and slap them on the wrist,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Outgoing commissioner Lawrence Miike, attending his last meeting, agreed.<\/p>\n
Despite an amendment to statutes increasing the possible maximum fine from $1,000 to $5,000 a day, \u201cwe\u2019re still with a $250 minimum a day and we never extend it for more than a day,\u201d he said. (Under the commission\u2019s internal penalty policy, $250 is the minimum fine, although mitigative factors — i.e., good faith efforts to remedy violations or self-reporting in a timely manner — can reduce the amount.)<\/p>\n
Because the general contractor, Metzler Contracting, had informed Pataye that no permits were needed for the well, Miike didn\u2019t think Pataye should be fined a similar amount as the contractors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re probably going to get a profit on this more than the fine,\u201d he said. Unless CWRM revises its guidelines for fines, \u201cit\u2019s worth it to try to get away with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Craig Mickelson of Metzler Contracting, which installed the pump, said the company accepted responsibility for \u201cthis first and presumably only error of this nature on our part.\u201d<\/p>\n
No one from Delima Drilling, which drilled the well without having a license, attended the meeting.<\/p>\n
Miike suggested voting on Pataye\u2019s fine now and dealing with the contractors\u2019 fine at a later meeting.<\/p>\n
During public testimony, independent consultant Jonathan Scheuer, who tracks water issues, pointed out that one of the reasons why the commission can\u2019t do more to meet its duties is a lack of funds.<\/p>\n
Applying the maximum possible fine to the maximum number of days of potential violation in this case would net a fine of around $18 million, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cA $900 fine is one 2,000th of the possible fine. The house is being sold for $15 million. It\u2019s not a not a question of whether you\u2019re going against a small grandma farmer who doesn\u2019t have the resources,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
In the end, the commission voted to approve a fine of $400 to Pataye and hold off on fining the contractors.<\/p>\n
Later in the meeting, the commission approved two after-the-fact stream channel alteration permits (SCAP) and imposed fines of just $50 in each case.<\/p>\n
The first related to an unauthorized rock retaining wall built along a branch of Ainako Stream in Hilo on property owned by state Sen. Malama Solomon. CWRM staff discovered the wall while conducting a field investigation for a contested case hearing over a stream diversion in the area.<\/p>\n
With approval from the County of Hawai`i, the wall was built in 2008 to prevent flooding. Solomon, however, failed to get permission from the Water Commission.<\/p>\n
Starting with a minimum fine of $250, CWRM recommended reducing the fine to $50 for two reasons: the wall was an insignificant impact on the resource and Solomon made a good faith effort to remedy the violation once it was discovered.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy only issue is what we talked about at the very beginning. I agree with the analysis, but in the future, I\u2019d like to see those fines being more. My problem is a generic one about the fine levels across the board,\u201d Miike said.<\/p>\n
Balfour noted that Solomon had submitted and received a grading and building permit from the county for the work.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt seems to me, if we\u2019re going to fine somebody, we should fine the County of Hawai`i. They approved everything. Quite frankly, the $50 fine should be waived,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
In the end, however, the commission approved staff\u2019s recommendation.<\/p>\n
\u201cSenator Solomon, you cannot have dinner one night at a nice restaurant,\u201d Miike joked.<\/p>\n
The final violation case involved the installation of a 30-inch metal pipe across an unnamed Waioli Stream channel in Hanalei, Kaua`i, some 20 years ago. The commission applied the same fine structure as the one used in Solomon\u2019s case, coming up with a total fine of $50.<\/p>\n
Ted Yamamura, the commission\u2019s newest member, again stressed the need to revisit the fine issue. \u201cThere\u2019s no teeth in this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow about $50.50? … These [fines] are not even a slap on the wrist,\u201d Miike added.<\/p>\n
— Teresa Dawson<\/p>\n
Volume 22, Number 11 June 2012<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The staff of the Commission on Water Resource Management is too nice. That was the general consensus of commissioners at a May 16 meeting where, in one violation case after another, fine recommendations were minimal, to say the least. In … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-june-2012","category-water"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=502"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}