HONOLULU — Approving a 50-year-long safe harbor agreement today, the State Board of Land and Natural Resources (BLNR) agreed to Kamehameha Schools plan to promote the recovery of endangered and threatened species on nearly 33,000 acres of forest and shrubland at Keauhou and Kilauea on Hawaii Island.
The safe harbor agreement is a cooperative effort between Kamehameha Schools, DLNR, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to support the conservation of threatened and endangered (federally listed) species, while KS conducts certain land-use practices, the DLNR said in a press release. It establishes baseline populations for species, details the type of habitat that must be maintained and specifies land-use practices to increase population baselines.
The agreement covers seven native birds including the Hawaii creeper, the Hawaii akepa, the Hawaiian hawk (‘io), the Hawaiian crow (alala), and the Hawaiian goose (nene). It also includes the Hawaiian hoary bat (opeapea) and 25 plant species. The SHA outlines detailed monitoring protocols to avoid and minimize injury or mortality and to provide “net benefit” to the species. Net benefits include increasing the current ranges of covered species, restoring historic ranges and increasing wild populations of species. It is also intended to reduce habitat fragmentation by connecting a network of protected and managed state, federal, and private lands within the south central region of Hawaii Island.
In addition to the agreement, the BLNR approved an incidental take license, which provides mitigation measures in the event land-use practices result in the loss of any of the endangered or threatened species covered by the agreement. The result of an incidental take license is to end up with a net positive gain in the population of a covered species.
The agreement, which has been reviewed extensively for more than a year and was the subject of numerous open meetings, is being heralded as an important step towards species protection and recovery across critical habitat for these endangered and threatened species.