A soldier aims his rifle during a drill at Kahuku Training Area in Oahu, Hawaii, Oct. 14, 2014. (Mariah Aguilar/U.S. Army)
FORT SHAFTER, Hawaii — The Army is proposing to lease vastly less acreage from the state of Hawaii at three training areas on Oahu, forgoing leasing entirely at two sites, according to a final environmental impact statement released Friday.
Under the Army’s preferred alternatives in the document, the service would lease only 450 acres at Kahuku Training Area and relinquish its leases at the other two sites — a roughly 93% reduction from current leasing.
The Army prepared the environmental assessment as it anticipates negotiations to renew a lease for about 6,322 acres of state property it uses in central and northern Oahu. The lease is set to expire in 2029.
The lease includes 1,150 acres at Kahuku Training Area, 4,390 acres at Kawailoa-Poamoho Training Area and 782 acres at Makua Military Reservation.
The Army will issue a final decision on its land-lease renewal plans after a 30-day waiting period.
The proposed reduction is partly a response to growing public opposition in Hawaii over military land use in general and Army leases on Oahu and the Big Island in particular.
The Army received more than 2,000 comments — many in opposition — after its draft environmental assessment was issued in June 2024.
The final environmental statement acknowledges that obtaining a new lease prior to the 2029 expiration would be “arduous.”
Meanwhile, the Army’s initial steps for renewing its lease for almost 20,000 acres of state land that are part of the Pohakuloa Training Area on Hawaii’s Big Island have not fared well.
After a full day of public testimony May 9, the state Board of Land and Natural Resources rejected the Army’s final environmental impact statement for Pohakuloa, a 132,000-acre live-fire training range made up of mostly federal property.
Board members said some of the data used by the Army for the environmental study was outdated and called on the service to provide fresher information.
“The Army is committed to continuing its environmental and cultural stewardship in support of the U.S. Army Pacific training strategy while maintaining an enduring partnership with the Hawai‘i Island community,” Col. Rachel Sullivan, commander of U.S. Army Garrison Hawaii, said in a news release following the board’s May 9 vote.
Kahuku Training Area in northeast Oahu has been used by the military since the mid-1950s. It is used for company-level helicopter training, large-scale ground maneuvers and air support training.
Kawailoa-Poamoho Training Area in the Ko’olau Mountains in north-central Oahu — scored with deep ravines and covered in jungle vegetation — is used for helicopter training.
Makua Military Reservation, in northwest Oahu, has been used for military training for almost a century. The Army employs the site’s restricted airspace for aerial drone training.
Relinquishing use of state-leased land at Kawailoa-Poamoho and Makua would come at a cost to the Army, according to the environmental impact statement.
The loss “would compromise the combat training” that the Army, other service branches, law enforcement and international partners now accomplish with the inclusion of state-owned land, the environmental statement asserts.
“Military training requirements at the training areas would have to be concentrated onto nearby U.S government-controlled lands within the same training area, be altered, or go unmet as the military would not be able to meet training needs,” the document states.
