Bill Text: HI HR104 | 2023 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Requesting The Relocation Of All Live Fire Training And Aviation Activities Away From The Puuloa Range Training Facility.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 6-0)
Status: (Passed) 2023-04-25 - Resolution adopted in final form. [HR104 Detail]
Download: Hawaii-2023-HR104-Introduced.html
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES |
H.R. NO. |
104 |
THIRTY-SECOND LEGISLATURE, 2023 |
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STATE OF HAWAII |
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HOUSE RESOLUTION
rEQUESTING THE RELOCATION OF all LIVE FIRE TRAINING AND AVIATION ACTIVITIES AWAY FROM THE PUULOA RANGE TRAINING FACILITY.
WHEREAS, the area now known as the Puuloa Range Training Facility was transferred from the United States Army to the United States Navy between 1915 and 1916 and developed into a small-arms range; and
WHEREAS, the range supported long-range sniper training for a short period of time during the Vietnam War era until 1979, when the training was moved to Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay, now known as Marine Corps Base Hawaii; and
WHEREAS, in the thirty-two years following the departure of the sniper range, Iroquois Point, now known as Kapilina, and Ewa Beach were connected by an access road mauka of the Puuloa Range Training Facility which allowed TheBus of the City and County of Honolulu to service Iroquois Point; and
WHEREAS, in 2011, the Marine Corps Base Hawaii doubled the length of the Alpha Range in the Puuloa Range Training Facility, which is closest to the Ewa Beach community, thereby re‑establishing the sniper range without public participation or conducting an environmental assessment despite the addition of the United States Marine Corps' loudest small-arms rifle shooting from a significantly different location which altered surface danger zones and noise contours; and
WHEREAS, the closure of the access road due to the expansion of the Alpha Range resulted in the isolation of the communities of Iroquois Point and Ewa Beach from each other, termination of TheBus services to Iroquois Point, and elimination of a potential tsunami evacuation route; and
WHEREAS, in recent years, Puuloa Range Training Facility personnel have routinely operated a powerful public address system well before 7:00 a.m. in violation of the Clean Air Act, which has resulted in hundreds of noise complaints from the surrounding community without relief; and
WHEREAS, incessant noise pollution from the simultaneous firing of weapons by dozens of shooters commences promptly at 7:00 a.m., and persists throughout the day, and sometimes into the night; and
WHEREAS, the Marine Corps Base Hawaii recently announced that the Puuloa Range Training Facility would be used as a helicopter night landing zone, significantly increasing existing noise pollution outside of normal range hours; and
WHEREAS, Harvard Medical School researchers have shown that persistent noise pollution such as that experienced by the residents surrounding the Puuloa Range Training Facility not only drives hearing loss, tinnitus, and hypersensitivity to sound, but can cause or exacerbate cardiovascular disease; type 2 diabetes; sleep disturbances; stress; mental health and cognition problems, including memory impairment and attention deficits; childhood learning delays; and low birth weight or miscarriage; and
WHEREAS, scientists are investigating other effects of noise pollution including possible links to dementia; and
WHEREAS, since the Puuloa Range Training Facility is an open‑air range, there is a potential for stray bullet impact to nearby schools, churches, homes, parks, and low or slow flying passenger aircraftall of which are within the firing distance of weapons typically fired at the Puuloa Range Training Facilityvia ricochet, accidental weapons discharge, or the intentional directing of weapons fire off-range; and
WHEREAS, false alarm school lockdowns have even occurred in the Ewa Beach area due to range gunfire being mistaken as an active shooter situation; and
WHEREAS, in April 2021, the Deputy Commandant for Installations and Logistics of the United States Marine Corps specifically directed the Marine Corps Base Hawaii to perform a range compatible use zone study via Marine Corps Order 3550.13; however, the Marine Corps Base Hawaii refused to release the study results after it was properly requested by Ewa Beach residents via a Freedom of Information Act request in 2022; and
WHEREAS, significant lead contamination of over seventy times the legal limit and a high risk of off-range migration of munitions constituents to nearshore waters and adjacent homes and the Puuloa Beach Park have been identified at the Puuloa Range Training Facility, and the proposed remedy of moving only the short distance pistol ranges forty meters landward does not adequately address the long term threat of lead poisoning, especially given that the Marine Corps Base Hawaii has no intention to retreat the significantly larger Alpha and Bravo Ranges that are within two hundred thirty feet of homes and four hundred feet from Puuloa Beach Park where thousands of children play each month; and
WHEREAS, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands recently announced the planned construction of approximately six hundred homes on the eighty-five acre parcel, formerly the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, directly adjacent to the Puuloa Range Training Facility; and
WHEREAS, the native Hawaiian families who will reside in these homes have little choice in where they will acquire shelter through the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, and the pollution and other imminent hazards produced by the Puuloa Range Training Facility will significantly impact their health and safety; and
WHEREAS, impact berms at the Puuloa Range Training Facility are within tens of feet of the high-water mark and, in some cases, interacting with wave activity, causing the off-range migration of munitions constituents; and
WHEREAS, the Marine Corps Base Hawaii's preferred alternative for erosion mitigation at the Puuloa Range Training Facility includes hardening the shoreline with a one thousand five hundred foot corrugated steel sheet pile bulkhead which is inconsistent with Hawaii Coastal Zone Management law; and
WHEREAS, thousands of shooters annually must commute from the Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe to and from the Puuloa Range Training Facility, which significantly adds to vehicle pollution, traffic congestion, and carbon output; and
WHEREAS, the State is constructing a First-Responder Campus in Mililani, featuring a one hundred thousand square foot indoor shooting range which will significantly reduce the demand by non-United States Department of Defense users of the Puuloa Range Training Facility; and
WHEREAS, upon completion of Camp Blaz in Guam, the Puuloa Range Training Facility's sniper distance range will no longer be the only range of its kind in the Pacific; and
WHEREAS, the Puuloa Range Training Facility sniper range has previously been relocated to the more appropriate Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe and could be relocated again; and
WHEREAS, live fire training at the Puuloa Range Training Facility is incompatible with the Ewa Beach community given its close proximity to residences, schools, churches, public parks, and low flying passenger aircraft flight paths; now, therefore,
BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Thirty-second Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2023, that all live fire training and aviation activities are requested to be relocated away from the Puuloa Range Training Facility; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Commandant of the United States Marine Corps, Commander of the Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command Pacific, Commanding Officer of the Marine Corps Base Hawaii, members of Hawaii's congressional delegation, Governor, Chairperson of the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, Chairperson of the Board of Land and Natural Resources, Mayor of the City and County of Honolulu, and members of the Honolulu City Council.
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OFFERED BY: |
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Puuloa Range Training Facility; Live Fire Training; Aviation Activity; Relocation