There is no physical asset of greater value in Hawaii than land. And when that land is owned by a state government that can ill afford to lose an ongoing source of revenue, enabling the sale of particularly valuable land would be penny wise and pound foolish, not an action to be taken lightly.

That becomes an immediate issue due to Senate Bill 176, concerning the future of Sand Island Industrial Park, which has been under a master lease by the state since 1992. The measure would enable the park’s sale to a lessee, and without the two-thirds vote in both chambers now required. SB 176 is now positioned for a Senate floor vote to send it to the House.

There are signs of robust opposition to the bill in the House, and it stalled for a time in one Senate committee, but its defeat should be cemented now, before there’s an opportunity to advance it further. The bill represents bad policy, and its progress through the Senate is also suspect, vaulting it past an important review step.

SB 176 was introduced at the request of the Sand Island Business Association, which pays nearly $9.3 million to the state to lease the 59 acres of public land at Sand Island. That revenue helps to support the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Land Division, Office of Conservation and Coastal Lands, and Dam Safety and Mineral Resources programs.

In turn, SIBA sublets lots to about 85 businesses. For the first 25 years, the association was allowed to pay below-market lease rents in a deal meant to help with infrastructure costs. The state has been accruing full-market rents only since 2017, not enough to recoup enough of the forgone revenue, said Suzanne Case, DLNR chairwoman.

Case gave the most full-throated opposition to SB 176 in testimony on Thursday before the Senate Ways and Means Committee, but she was joined by various groups and individuals and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, which posed a different line of criticism.

OHA routinely objects to the “sale or alienation” of the state’s ceded lands, the former kingdom and crown lands that was ceded to the U.S. after the annexation. Ceded lands revenue is owed to the Native Hawaiian trust managed by OHA, which asserts that these Sand Island parcels are ceded lands, although that’s in dispute.

One objection raised by opponents: The measure originally had been referred to the Senate’s Committee on Water and Land, which did not give the measure a hearing. State Sen. Donovan Dela Cruz, who chairs the powerful Ways and Means Committee, resuscitated the measure, re-referring it only to WAM so that it could move ahead. That irregularity did not give the bill the full airing it needed.

Milton Holt, the former lawmaker who is the SIBA’s executive director, testified for the bill, acknowledging that this was not the first time sale of the industrial park had been pursued. In 2011, the parcels were appraised at $97.2 million, Holt wrote in his testimony, but DLNR and SIBA were unable to reach terms on the sale.

He cited a more recent appraisal that estimated proceeds of the sale for the state at close to $200 million, money that he said would help address the state’s budgetary problems.

This is short-term thinking that the state should reject; the sacrifice of a continuing income stream would more than offset that over time. Also, in its current form, SB 176 aims to give SIBA a whopping 30% break on its lease rent to the state in the absence of a sale.

Further, Case rightly questioned why the state would limit the sale to a lessee, if generating maximum revenues were indeed the objective.

Instead, SB 176 should be stopped. It appears nothing more than a sweetheart deal, one that the public has no reason to love.