More than 30,000 online public comments have already poured into the U.S. Department of Interior’s web-based docket system since the agency opened a review of more than two dozen federally protected areas, including the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument and Pacific Remote Islands, at the direction of President Donald Trump.
The official public comment period that began Friday will extend through July 10. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke is subsequently expected to recommend to Trump whether any of the monument designations protecting natural resources should have their boundaries amended or even rescinded altogether.
Trump suggested in an April press conference announcing the review that the monument designations signified government overreach.
The vast majority of public comments so far, including those specifically written in regard to Papahanaumokuakea, urge the Trump administration to keep the protections in place. Most of the comments have been submitted anonymously.
The review is reopening a political battle in Hawaii that was believed to be settled after former President Barack Obama made the decision last year to expand the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument by hundreds of thousands of square miles, protecting coral reefs and marine habitats from activities such as commercial fishing and mineral mining.
Prior to the decision, a parade of local political leaders, including former U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka and some members of the state Legislature, staged a rally to question the expanded environmental protections. Hawaii’s longline industry and the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, a quasi-governmental agency charged with helping manage Pacific fisheries, led efforts to prevent the expansion.
Since Trump’s election, Wespac has been pushing in recent months to have commercial fishing restored in the area, and supporters of the environmental protections are gearing up for a renewed fight.
“We are showing the rationale and evidence of the expanded protections for both Papahanaumokuakea and the Pacific Remote Islands, and we are also, during this public comment period, going to generate more public support comments,” said Sheila Sarhangi, Hawaii campaign director for the expansion of the two monuments.
Local leaders are also expected to send a letter to Zinke and U.S. Department of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross expressing support for maintaining the current monument boundaries for both Papahanaumokuakea and the Pacific Remote Islands. The letter, signed by Sen. Laura Thielen (D, Hawaii Kai-
Waimanalo-Kailua), Rep. Chris Lee (Kailua-Lanikai-
Waimanalo) and a number of local scientists and Native Hawaiian leaders, lays out a scientific rationale for the designations and the public processes that they went through.
Meanwhile it’s not clear where all members of Hawaii’s solidly Democratic congressional delegation stand on the issue. U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz was a major supporter of expanding Papahanaumokuakea. Earlier this month he was awarded the 2017 Peter Benchley Ocean Award for his efforts.
“I have no doubt that Papahanaumokuakea will endure,” Schatz said in his acceptance speech earlier this month. “Because when we expanded the monument, we didn’t just do the right thing. We also did it the right way.”
However, U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa, who has been critical of the expansion, hasn’t made up her mind on the issue, according to her chief of staff, Mike Formby.
Formby told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser this week that she has been meeting with interested parties in recent weeks to understand the facts, including the science, behind the designations.
U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono voiced support for the designation following Obama’s announcement last year, while U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard has remained largely silent on the issue.
The Trump administrations’s review includes three other marine monuments, in addition to the Pacific Remote Islands and Papahanaumokuakea — both of which where originally designated by former President George W. Bush and expanded under Obama. There are also 21 other monuments that are being reviewed, including Mojave Trails in California and Bears Ears in Utah.
As part of the review process, the Interior Department is expected to look at whether the designations, which can be made unilaterally by U.S. presidents under the 1906 Antiquities Act, comply with the original intent and parameters of the law and whether the designations have hampered economic development, among other things.
As ocean-based protected areas, Papahanaumokuakea and the Pacific Remote Islands will also undergo an additional review under Trump’s executive order called “Implementing an America-
First Offshore Energy Strategy.”
That review will, in part, look at any lost opportunities for energy and mineral exploration associated with the environmental protections.
Trump referred to the monument designations in April as a “massive federal land grab.” The review applies only to large monuments designated or expanded since 1996.
