Category: DMZ-Hawai’i / Aloha ‘Aina In the News

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Group challenges decision on Kulani

http://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/articles/2010/09/24/local_news/local04.txt

Group challenges decision on Kulani

by Peter Sur
Tribune-Herald Staff Writer

Published: Friday, September 24, 2010 10:44 AM HST

An advocacy group is challenging the state land board’s decision earlier this month transferring Kulani lands and the former Kulani Correctional Facility to the state Department of Defense.

Kat Brady, representing the Honolulu-based Community Alliance on Prisons, and two other individuals requested a contested case hearing during the Sept. 9 meeting of the Board of Land and Natural Resources.

At issue was a request by the state to “approve of and recommend to the governor” that she cancel the executive orders and transfer the lands so they could be used for the Youth ChalleNGe Academy (a program for at-risk teens and young adults) and also for the Hawaii Army National Guard for training purposes.
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Military trained at Kulani for more than 10 years

The Honolulu Star Advertiser published an article about the Board of Land and Natural Resources decision to transfer land to the State of Hawai’i Department of Defense for an Army National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Academy. The article is mostly a puff piece for the Youth ChallenNGe Academy. However, what the article reported about the military training is interesting:

The National Guard had proposed using a former boys school at Kulani for urban warfare training, building a pistol range, conducting company-size and lower-level training along roadways and in a pasture area, and developing helicopter landing zones in the pasture and near the camp, according to state documents.

However, some residents opposed what was termed the “militarization” of the land.

…

Hilo resident Cory Harden was among those who opposed the military training at Kulani.

“They are going to expand that natural area, the reserve, and military use is not compatible with trying to preserve these endangered animals,” Harden said.

The Guard’s Anthony said Hawaii Guard soldiers already had been using the Kulani grounds for more than a decade for urban training, but that will cease.

The land at Kulani was set aside by an executive order for the exclusive purpose of operating a prison. The admission that military training had gone on for more than ten years is evidence of violations of the executive order.

Three parties requested contested case hearings to challenge the BNLR’s decision, including DMZ-Hawai’i / Aloha ‘Aina.

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Military use of Kulani nixed

Last Thursday,  DMZ-Hawai’i / Aloha ‘Aina and allies testified at the Hawai’i State Board of Land and Natural Resources meeting against the transfer of the former Kulani prison land to the Hawaii National Guard for a Youth ChalleNGe Academy (YCA) and military training.

Testimony was overwhelmingly against the militarization of Kulani.

We scored two wins that day and had one setback.

First, the board approved protection for 6600 acres of pristine rain forest with the Natural Areas Reserve System designation, the highest level of protection for the environment.

Second, we  stopped the proposed military training in the 600 acre Kulani site.

The setback: the board still approved 600 acres of the Kulani site to be transferred to the Hawaii National Guard to establish a military school. There was no community participation in determining the best and highest use for the area.  Three people requested a contested case hearing.  Senator Kokubun also said he opposed the closing of Kulani prison and was going to seek legislative remedies to either reopen the prison or reject the set aside of the land to the military.

The state erroneously stated that there were no other users for the land.  But there are numerous programs that could utilize the facility and complement the conservation of the surrounding forest area in the culturally appropriate way.  For example ‘Ohana Ho’opakele has requested to use areas in Kulani for a pu’uhonua ( a cultural-based healing center for substance abusers as an alternative to incarceration).  Also, Native Hawaiian charter schools could align their curriculum with conservation efforts at a site in Kulani.  But these options were precluded when the governor unilaterally decided to close Kulani prison and hand the land over to the military.

The Youth ChalleNGe project would be required to obtain a conditional use permit for using conservation land and an environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act, since it is federally funded.

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http://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/articles/2010/09/11/local_news/local01.txt

Military use of Kulani nixed

by Jason Armstrong
Tribune-Herald Staff Writer
Published: Saturday, September 11, 2010 7:38 AM HST

State panel approves youth camp but not National Guard training

Military training should be prohibited on the former Kulani prison property, but a quasi-military program for at-risk teens and an expanded conservation area allowed.

Those are the recommendations the state Board of Land and Natural Resources made at its meeting Thursday in Honolulu.

The Hawaii Department of Defense had sought approval to operate a pistol range, conduct explosives and building-entry training, and perform helicopter evacuations involving up to 170 soldiers at one time. Those activities were to occur on approximately 600 acres of the old Kulani Correctional Facility site located about 20 miles south of Hilo.

The land board, however, amended the request to -explicitly prohibit military uses and training, said secretary Adaline Cummings.

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In another Hawaii Tribune Herald article, State Representative Faye Hanohano shares her opposition to the closing of Kulani prison and transfer to the military:

A retired corrections officer, Hanohano heads the House Public Safety Committee. Her bill to audit the Department of Public Safety — emphasizing the closure of Kulani correctional facility and the state’s contracts that send local inmates to privately-run mainland facilities — was vetoed by Gov. Lingle. That spurred the majority leadership of both the House and Senate to send a letter to Legislative Auditor Marion Higa directing her audit DPS, anyway.

“The closing of Kulani should never have happened, with the military trying to take it over under the guise of the Youth ChalleNGe program,” she said. “… Now, you look at the (Tribune-Herald), you see a story that they want to do a training base center. That’s really unacceptable, because the military has lands that they’ve leased from the state, and at Pohakuloa.”

The state Land Board on Thursday denied the National Guard’s proposal for military training at Kulani by a 6-1 vote.

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Student personal information will go to military recruiters unless they opt out

ALERT!   All secondary students and parents should know about the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) military recruitment list opt-out form and deadline for opting out!

AFSC Hawai’i’s CHOICES project, Truth2Youth, Maui Careers in Peacemaking, and the Kaua’i Alliance for Peace and Social Justice have worked for years to get the Hawai’i Department of Education to improve its “opt out” procedures for the military recruitment list created under the NCLB.  The forms were inaccessible and difficult to understand. Some schools did not notify students or notified students until after the deadline.  And there were cases where parents opted out and the names were still given to the military.

According to the Haleakala Times, when students were first allowed to opt out themselves in the 2006/2007 school year, the opt out roll jumped from 1,913 the previous year to 21,836, nearly a quarter of the secondary student body.

This year, we received reports that the opt-out forms were in the registration packets as we had recommended. A teacher at Farrington reported that he had a 4-inch high stack of student-completed opt-out forms.

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http://www.staradvertiser.com/news/breaking/101860428.html#axzz0yDAYbaqs

Students given chance to remove names from schools’ list given to military recruiters

By Star-Advertiser Staff

POSTED: 09:51 p.m. HST, Aug 30, 2010

Students and parents at state middle, intermediate and high schools have until Sept. 15 to remove their names from a national list given annually to military recruiters by the Department of Education under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

The DOE has developed an opt-out form for military recruiting for students and parents, available for download on the DOE website. Students or guardians that submit the forms will have their names and contact information removed from a list sent to Inter-Service Recruitment Council in mid-October. Requests filed between 2007 and 2010 will be honored until the students leave the DOE system.

Request forms are accepted year-round, but may take longer to process if submitted after the Sept. 15 deadline. For more information, students and parents can call the DOE at (808) 692-7290.

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In Search of Real Security

Earlier this month, I was honored to  be invited to Kaua’i by Kaua’i Alliance for Peace and Social Justice to participate in a forum on ‘real security’.  The forum was important because it was one of the first public discussions that questioned the premise of the ‘security’ discourse of the government and reframed the question from the point of view of communities.    Jon Letman wrote a two-part article on the forum for the Hawaii Independent. He writes:

Ours is a nation obsessed with security. Two months after the bitter sting of the 9/11 attacks, the federal government formed the Transportation Security Administration and, one year later, the Department of Homeland Security. In the decade that has followed we have been pounded with talk of security in every aspect of our lives: from computer security and private home security to food and energy security, national security, nuclear security, and global security.

Yet as we approach our ninth year of war and occupation in Afghanistan and our eighth in Iraq, Americans have seen security at home eroded by financial collapse, a neglected infrastructure, a hemorrhaging job market, anemic social services and public health care crisis, volatile energy and food markets, and the complex realities of climate change.

In the face of home foreclosures, bankruptcy, and unemployment with many Americans’ income flat or falling and funding for basic civil institutions like public schools, libraries, and parks in decline, the question screams: “What is real security?”

READ “IN SEARCH OF REAL SECURITY, PART 1” AND “IN SEARCH OF REAL SECURITY, PART 2”.

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U.S. plans to leave behind private military forces in Iraq

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/world/middleeast/19withdrawal.html?_r=1&th&emc=th

Civilians to Take U.S. Lead After Military Leaves Iraq

By MICHAEL R. GORDON

Published: August 18, 2010

WASHINGTON — As the United States military prepares to leave Iraq by the end of 2011, the Obama administration is planning a remarkable civilian effort, buttressed by a small army of contractors, to fill the void.

By October 2011, the State Department will assume responsibility for training the Iraqi police, a task that will largely be carried out by contractors. With no American soldiers to defuse sectarian tensions in northern Iraq, it will be up to American diplomats in two new $100 million outposts to head off potential confrontations between the Iraqi Army and Kurdish pesh merga forces.

To protect the civilians in a country that is still home to insurgents with Al Qaeda and Iranian-backed militias, the State Department is planning to more than double its private security guards, up to as many as 7,000, according to administration officials who disclosed new details of the plan. Defending five fortified compounds across the country, the security contractors would operate radars to warn of enemy rocket attacks, search for roadside bombs, fly reconnaissance drones and even staff quick reaction forces to aid civilians in distress, the officials said.

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Army invited to PUBLIC community forum on Depleted Uranium Monday Aug. 30th in Keaau

Aug 14, 2010

Press Release:

Army invited to PUBLIC community forum on Depleted Uranium Monday Aug. 30th in Keaau

further contact: Jim Albertini 966-7622 ja@interpac.net

Below is a copy of a letter of invitation mailed today to Pohakuloa Commander Lt. Col. Rolland C. Niles from Malu ‘Aina.

Email versions were sent to Celso Tadeo at Pohakuloa (celso.tadeo@us.army.mil) and Mike Egami, Army Public Affairs officer on Oahu (Mike.Egami@us.army.mil) with a request that the invitation be extended up the chain of command to Col. Douglas S. Mulbury. Commander, US Army Garrison – Hawaii. The Aug. 30th DU forum will go on whether or not the Army accepts Malu ‘Aina’s invitation to participate. “The Army promised transparency. We’re still waiting,” said Jim Albertini.

Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O. Box AB Ola’a (Kurtistown), Hawai`i 96760

Phone 808-966-7622 email ja@interpac.net

Visit us on the web at www.malu-aina.org

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August 14, 2010

Lieutenant Colonel Rolland C. Niles

Commander, US Army Garrison – Pohakuloa

P.O. Box 4607

Hilo, Hawaii 96720-0607

Dear Lieutenant Colonel Niles:

Aloha and welcome to our Island home.

We invite the Army to participate in a BALANCED PUBLIC FORUM on Deleted Uranium Health Risk Assessment. Monday, Aug. 30th from 7-9PM at the Keaau Community Center. The Army is invited to start the evening off with a 30 minute presentation followed by a 30 minute presentation from community representatives. Public testimony and Moderated Q & A will follow. The event is free and THE PUBLIC IS INVITED.

Please R.S.V.P. by August 23 to our organization which is the sponsor of the event. Contact information is listed below.

We are aware that the Army has scheduled a presentation on the Depleted Uranium Health Risk Assessment for PTA to be held Tuesday, Aug. 31st at 2PM at Pohakuloa Training Area.

We object that this presentation is:

1. “By invitation only”

2. Not balanced with community representatives being given equal time

3. Held at PTA instead of in the community (preferably forums in Hilo, Kona, Waimea and Na’alehu). The winds, dust devils, and vehicles that travel through Pohakuloa travel around this island. Everyone on this island is potentially at risk from military radiation contamination at Pohakuloa.

We appeal to you to come out of your bunker, your “Green Zone” on Hawaii Island, and meet and treat the people of this island with respect. Democracy is not by invitation only. Furthermore, it is we civilians who are paying for the military budget, including your salaries.

Mahalo for your consideration.

Jim Albertini

President

—

Jim Albertini

Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action

P.O.Box AB

Kurtistown, Hawai’i 96760

phone: 808-966-7622

email: JA@interpac.net

Visit us on the web at: www.malu-aina.org

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“Area Unsafe”: Depleted Uranium in Hawai’i ranges

http://www.bigislandweekly.com/articles/2010/08/11/read/news/news02.txt

Report: Area unsafe

PTA visitors speak up about having to sign a safety waiver

By Alan D. Mcnarie

Wednesday, August 11, 2010 10:38 AM HST

U. S. Army sources have often contended that the depleted uranium left by spent shells on its firing ranges at O’ahu’s Schofield Barracks and Hawai’i Island’s Pohakuloa Training Area pose no danger to the public.

In 2008, Army officials told the Hawaii County Council that DU did not pose a health risk to the public, even though the Saddle Road passes through Pohakuloa Training Area, where DU shell fragments had been found. In a recent letter to Rep. Mazie Hirono, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army Addison Davis, IV, wrote that “Many independent scientific studies of uranium in the environment show that DU presents no significant ‘environmental health or safety hazard,’ especially at soil concentration of the DU on Hawaii’s ranges.”

“Based on data gathered and careful analysis of the current situation, there is no immediate or imminent health risk to people who work at Schofield Barracks or Pohakuloa Training Area (PTA) or live in communities adjacent to these military facilities from the DU present in the impact areas… Studies conducted by numerous non-military agencies, including the World Health Organization and the Department of Health and Human Services, have not found credible evidence linking DU to radiation-induced illnesses Studies conducted by numerous non-military agencies, including the World Health Organization and the Department of Health and Human Services, have not found credible evidence linking DU to radiation-induced illnesses,” claims the Army’s DU information website, http://www.imcom.pac.army.mil/du.

But the Army took a different position when representatives from several Native Hawaiian groups requested access to the West Range at Schofield Barracks on O’ahu on May 27. Before being allowed into Schofield, all were asked to sign a waiver of responsibility acknowledging, among other things, that they knew DU was potentially hazardous to their health.”

“I fully understand and by my signature acknowledge that I understand, West Range at Schofield Barracks is currently constructing the Battle Area Complex (BAX) which includes clean up of unexploded ordnance (UXO) including potential chemical warfare munitions (CWM) and depleted uranium (DU)…,” the waiver read, in part. “I understand that the ENTIRE RESERVATION IS DANGEROUS AND UNSAFE due to the presence of surface and subsurface UNEXPLODED ORDNANCE and DEPLETED URANIUM; that there may be hazardous conditions and ordnance on or under the surface of the Reservation; and that unexploded ordnance may explode nearby causing serious bodily harm, injury and death and that depleted uranium particles can be ingested from the soil or inhaled by airborne dust that may cause adverse health effects.” [Words capitalized as in original.]

“I signed that form twice,” said Hawaiian activist Terri Mullins, who has made two trips to Schofield because ancient Hawaiian remains had been uncovered during construction of a new training area for the army’s new Stryker attack force — the same force for which rangeland has been purchased for a new training area at Pohakuloa, whose firing range has also been contaminated by DU spotting rounds fired by the so-called ‘Davy Crockett,” a Cold-War-era nuclear artillery piece. Mullins, who represents a Hawaiian group called Kipuka said that on the May 27 trip, she was accompanied by members from the O’ahu Island Burial Council, Hui Malama I Na Kupuna, the Wahiawa Hawaiian Civic Club, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, the American Friends Service Committee, Aha Kukuniloko and Hui Pu. All, she said, were asked to sign waivers. Big Island Weekly confirmed that at least one other activist who had been on that trip had signed an identical waiver.

The reference to the hazards of “inhaled by airborne dust” containing DU appears to echo concerns expressed by opponents who think fine airborne particles of DU, called “aerosols,” could cause cancer and other diseases. The Army in the past has scoffed at such risks. Its application to the NRC to legally possess the DU at Pohakuloa, for instance, states that “available information indicates that depleted uranium metal generally remains in the immediate vicinity where initially deposited, with limited migration over the period that the materials are present.

But critics such as Dr. Mike Reimer, a geologist and radiation expert who lives in Kona, disagree.

“It is an alloy and a study by the U.S. Air Force revealed that various DU alloys, not quite the same as claimed to have been used at Pohakuloa, are 100 percent effective in producing tumors in mice that then metastasize the lungs,” wrote Reimer, in an e-mail to Sierra Club researcher Cory Harden. “Solid (or alloyed) U[ranium] as a respirable absorbed particle in your lung will produce a radiation dose much greater than the same size particle of oceanic basaltic rock containing 0.t par per million [of] uranium [In other words, naturally occurring uranium found in Hawai’i’s rocks].”

The most probable vector for exposure to DU on the Big Island, maintained Reimer, was the inhalation of tiny, windborne particles, or “aerosols”: “As long as bombs drop and winds blow in the spotting round test area, there will be aerosol production and transport of DU. Aerosols may form and drop nearby, but they can be remobilized by constant bombing.

“Any DU residue present is limited to impact areas well within the perimeter of operational ranges,” the Army’s DU website maintains. “These areas are not publicly accessible. Very few range and safety personnel access the impact areas of our operational ranges. Those people that work in these areas are trained to recognize potential hazards associated with military munitions.”

Why, if the danger of DU is limited to impact areas, Native Hawaiians visiting a construction site would be warned about it or told that “THE ENTIRE RESERVATION IS DANGEROUS AND UNSAFE,” remains an interesting question.

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Strykers: Following public outcry, OHA calls on Army to honor 2008 agreement

The Hawaii Independent published another piece on the Army’s failure to conduct cultural surveys for the areas affected by its Stryker brigade expansion and the follow up action by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs calling on the Army to honor terms of a 2008 settlement agreement. The Hawaii Independent reports: “According to the settlement, OHA does have the option, if the two parties cannot come to a consensus on the identification of historic properties eligible for the Register, of seeking an injunction to halt construction should attempts at mediation prove unsuccessful.”

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http://thehawaiiindependent.com/story/stryker-update/

Strykers: Following public outcry, OHA calls on Army to honor 2008 agreement

Aug 08, 2010 – 02:06 PM | by Samson Kaala Reiny

HONOLULU—Amid public outcry, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) has requested that the U.S. Army honors a 2008 agreement that helps identify and protect cultural sites.

A week after OHA officials met face-to-face with concerned members of the Hawaiian community over a damning archaeological report the organization sat on for almost a year, a letter was sent to the Army on Friday, August 6, requesting that the military “promptly evaluate the historic properties” discovered.

READ MORE

Download OHA’s letter to Army Garrison_8-6-10

Download the 2008 settlement agreement between OHA and the Army.

Christopher Monahan’s full report on the Stryker vehicles and cultural sites can be viewed at http://www.scribd.com/doc/48829377/09-Monahan-Report.

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OHA ‘drops the ball’ in protecting cultural sites from Stryker brigade

The Hawaii Independent has published an exclusive article about a formerly secret archaeological and cultural report contracted jointly by the Army and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA) for areas affected by the Army’s Stryker Brigade expansion. The article states:

The report, written by independently contracted archaeologist Christopher Monahan, comments on the Army’s numerous shortcomings in its attempts at documenting cultural sites, which, if included on the National Register of Historic Places, offers them various protections from being disturbed.

The report was the end result of a lawsuit OHA filed against the Army in November 2006 alleging violations against the NHPA and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Cultural monitors claimed that numerous sites were being mistreated or were endangered, including Haleauau heiau near Schofield Barracks, whose protective buffers were razed by bulldozers in July of that year.

In October 2008, a settlement was reached where OHA would drop its lawsuit based on its then knowledge of the existing surveys and reports. In return, the Army allowed the independently contracted archaeologist, Monahan, as well as OHA staff, access to Stryker Brigade sites for a total of 50 days in order to draw up an objective second opinion. OHA had the option then to proceed with mediation or litigation based on the new findings.

The article describes some of the findings and conclusions in the archaeologist’s report:

Monahan is critical of the methods used in the previous surveys conducted by the military and its hired firms, recognizing there are issues with the competency of the field personnel involved. It also notes a general lack of subsurface testing, or excavating, to locate such sites. Instead, there are “mere guesses … and based on relatively little scientific data.”

At some locations, Monahan’s findings more than doubled the number of known features the Army had previously reported.

There is also concern regarding numerous earlier reports—ones that evaluated surveys taken of impacted areas—that were not made available to him because they were in draft form. Most problematic was a major report on the Kahuku Training Area, which was completed six years ago but is still not available.

The Army is systematically erasing the history and sacred places in Lihu’e, Kahuku, Pohakuloa and the other areas impacted by its Stryker Brigade expansion. The report by an independent archaeologist blasts the Army for numerous violations and failings and calls for protection of the vast and important cultural site complex in Lihu’e, O’ahu, once the ancient seat of government for O’ahu chiefs. Meanwhile OHA sat on this urgent information.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE

DOWNLOAD THE MONAHAN REPORT HERE

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