Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say

Speaker, House of Representatives

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2004

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Water, Land Use, and Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred H.C.R. No. 149 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this concurrent resolution is to recognize the national and cultural significance of the American buffalo by urging Hawaii's Congressional Delegation to:

The Fund for Animals submitted testimony in support of this measure.

Yellowstone National Park is home to the Yellowstone buffalo herd, the only free-roaming American buffalo in the United States. In recent years, the buffalo have migrated to a lower elevation habitat adjacent to the park to forage during winter and spring, where they face the threat of hazing, capture, and slaughter.

The U.S. National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service, and U.S. Department of Agriculture, and Departments of Livestock and Fish, Wildlife, and Parks of the State of Montana have ordered the shooting of the buffalo because of the alleged threat of brucellosis disease being transmitted to cows grazing on public lands adjacent to the Yellowstone National Park. Since the mid-1980s, more than 3,000 buffalo have been massacred.

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Water, Land Use, and Hawaiian Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee concurs with the intent and purpose of H.C.R. No. 149 and recommends its adoption.