Take Action on Four Important Food Systems Bills: Protect Ag & Conservation Lands, Support Community Co-Management, Expand Free School Meals and Support Healthy Soils!
Take Action on Four Important Food Systems Bills:
Protect Ag & Conservation Lands, Support Community Co-Management, Expand Free School Meals and Support Healthy Soils!
Four important bills to protect and restore our local food systems have been scheduled for hearings early this week!
A hearing in the House Committees on Water and Land will be held to hear two bills: one bad bill (to oppose) which will fast track the conversion of agricultural and conservation lands for development; and one good bill (to support) that will support ongoing community-led ahupua’a restoration and co-management. The hearing for these bills will be on Tuesday, Feb. 10th at 9:00am in Conference Room 411 (and virtually). Please take a moment to submit testimony where possible. Both testimony are due on Monday by 9:00am (late testimony is accepted up until the hearing).
A hearing in the House Committee on Education will be hearing a bill to support the expansion of free school meal coverage for charter schools on Tuesday, Feb. 10th at 2:15pm in Conference Room 309 (and virtually). Please take a moment to submit testimony in support of increasing school meal coverage. Testimony is due by Monday by 2:15pm. (late testimony is accepted up until the hearing).
A joint hearing of the Senate Committees on Agriculture and Environment and Water, Land, Arts and Culture will be held to hear a bill to raise funds to support the Healthy Soils Program. The joint hearing for this bill will be on Wednesday, Feb. 11th at 3:00pm in Conference Room 224 (and virtually). Please take a moment to submit testimony in support. Testimony is due on Tuesday by 3:00pm. (late testimony is accepted up until the hearing).
Oppose HB1844: to Protect Ag & Conservation Lands
Support HB2218: Community Co-Management Agreements
Support HB1561: Expand Free School Meals for Charter Schools
Support SB2334: Support Healthy Soils
Please take a moment to submit as many testimonies in support as you are able!
If you have not done so already you will need to create an account with the Hawaii State Legislature website to submit testimony.
Oppose HB1844 : to Protect Ag & Conservation Lands
What Does This Bill Do?
Would require the Land Use Commission to urbanize lands at the request of the counties, without any opportunity to consider the testimonies and evidence provided by farmers, cultural practitioners, climate scientists, and other experts and stakeholders, much less make written findings of fact and conclusions of law to address impacts to our food security, cultural integrity, and other public interests.
Why Is This Important? Sample Testimony:
Aloha Chair Hashem, Vice Chair Morikawa and Members of the House Committee,
Please oppose HB1844 which seeks to fast track the reclassification of lands to an urban district for development, by side stepping the current evidence-based process currently required by the Land Use Commissions (LUC). The process by which the LUC would modify and update land use classifications would be predicated upon the county submitting to the commission a request to amend the urban district boundary regardless of potential impacts to food security, sensitive ecosystems or native and public trust rights.
By forgoing the process of the LUC’s “quasi-judicial proceedings” and removing the due diligence in the process of issuing decisions long-term ramifications may not be adequately assessed. There would be no opportunity to consider the testimonies and evidence provided by potentially afflicted communities including farmers, cultural practitioners, and community experts, and no opportunity to issue environmental assessments to ensure the state’s agreement with proposed county plans.
Please oppose HB1844 to ensure due diligence in the process of confirming land use re-classifications.
Mahalo for your consideration!
Your Name, Town
Support HB2218 : Community Co-Management Agreements
What Does This Bill Do?
Authorizes the Department of Land and Natural Resources to enter into community co-management agreements and establishes qualifications for eligible community co-managers. Authorizes the disposition of public lands by a community co-management agreement.
Why Is This Important? Sample Testimony:
Aloha Chair Hashem, Vice Chair Morikawa and Members of Committee,
The legislature has identified grassroots and lineal descendant communities which have spent decades collaborating with government agencies to care for spaces (wahi pana) and the surrounding resources. The legislature also finds that “these efforts would be more effective and sustainable if supported by long-term community co-management agreements.
HB2218 seeks to enter into community co-management agreements with community-based organizations who honour traditional Native Hawaiian concepts of mālama ʻāina and place-based practices for effective management.
Article XI, section 1, and Article XII, Section 7, of the Hawaii State Constitution support co-management agreements as a means of restoring and protecting biocultural public trust resources for future generations, including for subsistence, cultural, and religious purposes.
Currently, community–government partnerships exist through curatorships, revocable permits, and concession agreements, the lack of statutory authority and a formalized process limits their effectiveness. Through HB2218, the board may enter into community co-management agreements, by direct negotiation and without recourse to public auction, with qualified community-based organizations for a time period exceeding sixty-five years.
Community-based co-management has established community-based subsistence fishing areas, and additional communities are organizing, all of which would benefit from long-term co-management agreements. This legislation seeks to strengthen the management efforts currently sustained by the organizations performing the work to-date.
HB2218 authorizes the department of land and natural resources to enter into community co-management agreements for “preservation and practice of all rights customarily and traditionally exercised by Native Hawaiians for subsistence, cultural, and religious purposes”, “preservation, protection, and restoration of archaeological, historical, and environmental resources”, “rehabilitation, revegetation, restoration, and preservation of native species and habitats”, “management of parking and visitor activities”, and “āina education.”
Qualifications for eligible community co-managers would be established as well as the authorization of the disposition of public lands by a community co-management agreement.
Please support HB2218 in enabling a state supported community co-management agreement between DLNR and partners that would strengthen existing efforts and serve to establish a resilient island of place-based practice and sustained care to the work being done.
Mahalo for your consideration!
Your Name, Town
Support HB1561 : Expanding Free School Meals
What Does This Bill Do?
Beginning with the 2026-2027 school year, expands the free school meals program to include public charter schools. Provides free meals to students whose family income is no more than three hundred per cent of the federal poverty level.
Why Is This Important? Sample Testimony:
Aloha Chair Woodson, Vice Chair La Chica and Members of the Committee,
Please support HB1561. Expanding coverage for free school meals in Hawaiʻi’s public charter schools to support families earning no more than 300% of the federal poverty level supports students who may otherwise be unable to eat.
Last year Act 139, SLH 2025 was passed which expanded free school meals to schools within the Hawaiʻi Department of Education. HB1561 proposes to expand coverage to those students in public charter schools.
One in three households in Hawaii report food insecurity, and almost half (46%) of ALICE households reported food insecurity. Yet two out of three financially vulnerable families in our state are ineligible for free school meals. Implementing free school meals for all can provide food security to students who may otherwise not eat at all. This statistic is indiscriminately affecting department public school students as well as public charter school students.
Nutrition is essential to all growing children and teenagers. It has been shown to vastly improve academic outcomes. However, there are still up to one in four children in Hawaiʻi that regularly go without enough nutritious meals at home. This means that for many children in Hawaiʻi, school breakfast and lunch are the most nutritious meals they get in a day. Being able to feed all students regardless of need at no cost to the students allows for us to remove the stigma of being on "Free/Reduced Lunch." Applying the same benefits to those students in our public charter schools also shows a unified effect to indiscriminately provide food security to all students.
Please support HB1561.
Mahalo for your consideration!
Your Name, Town
Support SB2334 : Support Healthy Soils
What Does This Bill Do?
Creates a funding mechanism to support a healthy soils program and other incentives for agricultural conservation programs by requiring the payment of an Agricultural Land Conversion Fee by the buyer or lessee in a transaction for any agricultural land that will be converted from agricultural production for certain purposes. Requires all state lands used in the commercial production of agricultural commodities, including any lands under lease agreements with the Department of Agriculture and Biosecurity, to use an established metric to advance the adoption of conservation practices.
Why Is This Important? Sample Testimony:
Aloha Chair Gabbard, Chair Lee, Vice Chair Richards, Vice Chair Inouye and Members of the Committees,
Currently, agricultural land is converted to non-farming uses without any offsetting fee. SB2334 introduces a per-acre Agricultural Land Conversion Fee to ensure that when productive lands leave agricultural use, resources are reinvested to help conserve and restore what remains.
This legislation aims to collect a fee on agricultural lands intended to be converted to a solar energy facility, a wind farm, an industrial park, a commercial area, a single-family or multiple-family dwelling that is not a farm dwelling, or any other uses that prevents land classified as agricultural from being used specifically as agricultural land.
The agricultural land conversion fee will be collected under the agricultural land conversion fee fund established under the state treasury by this legislation with explicit purposes in directly supporting soil and water conservation districts in addition to supporting the healthy soils programs.
This legislation shall also use an established metric to advance the adoption of conservation practices to improve the agricultural land we are stewarding through conservation practices to improve holistic cultivation.
Please support SB2334 to strengthen Hawaiʻi’s commitment to regenerative agriculture and soil stewardship.
Mahalo for your consideration!
Your Name, Town
Mahalo for taking the time to support Hawaiʻi's communities!
In solidarity,
The HAPA Team
New to Legislative Engagement? Learn more about how to engage in the Legislative Session!
Make sure you have set up your account on the Hawaiʻi State Legislature website. If you are new to the process, see this helpful page on legislative engagement 101 from the Public Access Room including a link on how to submit testimony!
