The Future Is at Stake

George R. Ariyoshi

Hawaii has made significant strides, but possibly has taken "two steps forward and one step back." Judging from current issues, we must question the strength of our core convictions and the clarity of our thinking.

We are in the 35th anniversary year of Earth Day. For me, the first Earth Day coincided with then Governor John Burns urging me to run for lieutenant governor, which then led to the governorship. I was challenged to think more clearly on a statewide basis, across our widely varied landscapes and communities.

As a young legislator, I had been particularly concerned with opening up equal opportunities for all. While supporting a growing family on a part-time law practice, I became involved in several small developments. Coming from a family that often had depended on small business, I approached the demands of organized labor with a certain level of caution. I was known as a fiscal conservative.

Possibly some voters projected that I would be wary of the new environmentalism. If anything, the opposite was true. While I did not agree with the various environmental groups on every issue, I experienced a refreshing orientation to my most central concern, which was meeting our obligations to future generations.

I focused on the idea of stewardship, which naturally and logically inspired thinking about resource management across a broad front of issues. Many people rallied to this effort. There was a widespread feeling that rapid population growth was distorting Hawaii as we had known it. Our population was growing at three times the national average. Beachfront was disappearing. Pollution of streams and bays was an active concern. Agricultural lands were being quickly urbanized. Whole landscapes were being altered drastically before our eyes.

In response, I brought together some of the best minds of academia, state government and the community. From their efforts came a program of balanced growth, or "managed growth," as it was called. The goal of managed growth was not zero growth, but appropriate, incremental growth that nurtured society's definable objectives.

I told the Legislature that we "must be the masters of our destiny, rather than the victims. There is no reason we must endure what an uncontrolled and unregulated future holds for us. We must shape our own future, not have it thrust upon us by forces over which we have little or no control."

Specific recommendations of my task force included:

o Preventing urban sprawl

o Preserving and strengthening agriculture

o Avoiding excessive use of resources, particularly water

o Building adequate, reasonably-priced housing

With regard to business, one key was: "Reduce private-sector uncertainty about government intentions regarding development." I could paraphrase that by saying, "Create a level playing field. That will be good for business."

I strived for a much better-coordinated state government to efficiently address these goals: A reformed State Land Use Commission, a State Water Commission, the State Plan, and a mosaic of environmental law that has stabilized our precious environment to this day.

Survey research conducted for the State Plan showed that the public supported these concepts and policies by astonishing margins, usually on the order of five to one or 10 to one.

Ambiguity crept in when I left office. Doubt set in through the long economic downturn of the 1990s.

Now we are adrift. The state administration is trying to weaken or dismantle the instruments of planning and conservation under the cover of a slogan, "Home Rule." We lack real informed discussion of what is at stake. I say the future is at stake.