 |
 |
| Dear Friend, |
| It is heartbreaking to see the extensive wildfire damage in Kula, Kihei, and especially Lahaina. Please join us in sending love and support to our friends, family, clients, and partners as they evacuate to safety. We have provided suggestions below for local groups to support if you would like to do so. Climate change makes hurricanes, flooding, and wildfire emergencies like these more frequent and more extreme in Hawaiʻi and around the world. It is more important now than ever to strengthen environmental protections that will help make ecosystems more resilient against natural disasters. This is why we work so hard to uphold environmental protections. |
| We have long fought alongside the communities of Maui. Right now, we have an opportunity to support Maui residents in their decades-long effort to uphold the Clean Water Act. Since the 1980s, Maui County’s Lahaina Wastewater Reclamation Facility has discharged millions of gallons of treated sewage into groundwater every day that reaches the coral reef off Kahekili Beach, an area traditionally called Hāʻenanui. In 2012, Earthjustice and our partners sued the county under the Clean Water Act to hold Maui County accountable for its pollution. |
| The county claimed it didn’t need a permit to pollute the water because it was discharging pollution underground into groundwater — rather than directly to the Hāʻenanui reef — even though the county knew the injected wastewater would end up in the ocean. |
| Over the next eight years, the case worked its way up to the Supreme Court, where it became a broader question about how the Clean Water Act should be interpreted. We won — the Supreme Court affirmed that the county couldn’t get away with polluting the ocean just because it wasn’t doing so directly. |
| Following this win, the case worked its way back to the Hawaiʻi Federal District Court, which applied the Supreme Court ruling to the question that started it all — ultimately concluding that Maui County must secure a Clean Water Act permit for its Lahaina discharges. The Hawaiʻi State Department of Health has now drafted a permit in response to the court rulings. |
| This permit will be the first of its kind in Hawaiʻi to regulate ocean pollution through underground injection wells, which are used throughout the islands for wastewater disposal. We need your help to ensure this precedent-setting permit is the best it can be. |
| This is not a problem we can leave unaddressed. The treated wastewater has high levels of nutrients and freshwater that destroy coral reef ecosystems by eroding corals from the inside out and blanketing them with harmful algae. The waters of Hāʻenanui moreover provide important feeding areas for the critically endangered honu ʻea (hawksbill sea turtle). Honu ʻea depend on healthy coral reefs for food. The shoreline also provides resting areas for ʻīlio holo i ka uaua (Hawaiian monk seal), one of the most endangered seal species in the world. |
| Since this permit is the first of its kind in Hawaiʻi, we need to make sure that the regulators know that the public backs the strongest possible clean water protections. Tell the Hawaiʻi State Department of Health to clean up our water. |
| While the work continues to bring this wastewater facility into compliance, you can help during this difficult time on Maui. |
| If you’re able, support local groups involved in recovery efforts:
|
| Together, we know that we can persevere through the challenges of the wildfire disaster on Maui. It took a decade and a Supreme Court ruling to finally see real progress in cleaning up Maui’s water. And with that same tenacious, collective effort we will fight alongside the community to see our way through this climate disaster, too. |
|
|
|
|
|
Sincerely,
Mahesh Cleveland
Senior Associate Attorney
Mid-Pacific Office |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Earthjustice, 50 California Street, Suite 500, San Francisco, CA 94111 |
| About Us | Receive Less Email | Unsubscribe |
| This email was delivered to you by Earthjustice. |
| Photo Credits: A turtle surfaces offshore of Kahekili Beach Park, Maui, Hawaiʻi. (Courtesy of Don McLeish) |
| © 2023 |
|
|
