Hawaiʻi's Green Fee: paying for the islands rather than selling them

From selling the islands to managing them

The Hawaiʻi Tourism Authority (HTA) was created in 1998 and for most of its life was funded by a share of the transient accommodations tax (TAT) ⁶, with marketing the islands as its main role ⁵. Its 2020–2025 Strategic Plan, adopted in January 2020, reorganised the agency around four pillars — natural resources, Hawaiian culture, community and brand marketing ¹². In a 2021 letter to the US Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, its then chief executive, John De Fries, called for a regenerative tourism model led by Native Hawaiians, noting that before the pandemic an average of 48,682 Native Hawaiians worked in tourism-intensive industries ².

Two programmes carried that intent. Destination Management Action Plans (DMAPs), launched in 2020 with the counties and island visitor bureaus, were drafted by advisory groups for Kauaʻi, Maui Nui, Oʻahu and Hawaiʻi Island to tackle overcrowding, encourage responsible behaviour and identify hotspots needing active management ³. In June 2021 HTA and the Hawaiʻi Visitors and Convention Bureau launched Mālama Hawaiʻi, inviting visitors to volunteer with nearly 100 partner organisations and offering a free night at participating hotels to those who did ⁴. HTA says it has evaluated the first DMAPs and is preparing a second generation, but its own page reports no outcome data ³. Both programmes, on the available evidence, are activity reported by the agency rather than independently assessed results.

The agency's position weakened over the same period. Lawmakers ended the 2023 session without a dedicated HTA appropriation while pressing it to move from marketing to destination management ⁵. The Tourism Special Fund was dismantled in 2022; HTA was placed under the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism in 2024; and Act 132 of 2025 reduced its board to an advisory role. In 2026 it relied entirely on general-fund appropriations — US$63 million for fiscal 2026 — and a bill to restore a dedicated share of TAT stalled in the Senate, as did bills to strip its destination-management duties ⁶.

What the Green Fee law does

The larger new money for managing tourism's effects therefore arrived outside HTA. Governor Josh Green signed Act 96, formerly SB 1396, on 27 May 2025, describing it as the first climate impact fee in the United States ⁷. From 1 January 2026 it raised the TAT on hotels and vacation rentals from 10.25% to 11% ⁸⁹; counties may add up to 3% on top ¹⁰. The governor put the cost to guests at about US$3 for every US$400 spent ⁹. The Act also applies an 11% tax to cruise fares, prorated by the days a ship is docked in the state ¹¹. The administration projected about US$100 million a year ⁷. Momentum built after the August 2023 Maui wildfires, which killed 102 people, and after an earlier attempt failed ⁹.

The mechanism matters. The Act does not create a dedicated Green Fee fund. It requires the governor to request general funds approximating the additional revenue, to be expended equally on projects that protect and restore natural resources including native forests, plants and animals; that increase the resilience of structures and infrastructure to natural and climate-related disasters; and that improve the visitor experience and mitigate tourism's impacts on the environment ¹¹.

The cruise challenge

Cruise industry groups and several Hawaiʻi tour companies sued in August 2025, and the US Department of Justice sought to intervene, arguing that the state lacked authority to impose the cruise charge ¹⁰. On 23 December 2025 a federal district judge rejected most of their claims and declined to block the law, but a Ninth Circuit panel then enjoined enforcement against cruise ships pending appeal, without ruling on the merits ¹²¹³. The lodging increase took effect on 1 January as planned ⁸. The state had expected roughly 30% of Green Fee revenue to come from cruise ships ⁸. As of October 2026 we found no reported merits decision; the latest entry in the Sabin Center's litigation database is the defendants' joint answering brief of 18 February 2026 ¹³.

The first spending round

Green appointed a ten-member Green Fee Advisory Council in August 2025, chaired by Jeff Mikulina of Climate Hawaiʻi, with members from foundations, conservation, the university, the hotel industry and community organisations ¹⁴. It reviewed more than 600 applications seeking over US$2 billion and recommended 75 projects worth US$126.41 million, split almost evenly across environmental stewardship, climate resilience and sustainable tourism, with US$500,000 per category for monitoring and evaluation and a public dashboard ⁸. Revenue was forecast at US$42 million for fiscal 2026 and US$87 million for fiscal 2027 ⁸.

The Legislature rewrote parts of the list. The supplemental budget, signed on 26 June 2026 as Act 175, provides about US$129 million over 18 months for 91 Green Fee projects across 11 departments ¹⁵. Hawaiʻi Public Radio reported that additions, mostly from the Senate Ways and Means Committee, included US$200,000 for a cattle slaughterhouse, US$350,000 for a sports events study, US$800,000 for disability-access work at a high school and US$7 million for a food and product innovation network, while a community-led regenerative tourism initiative was dropped. Mikulina said the budget largely met the original goals but that some items were hard to reconcile with the law's intent; Representative Nicole Lowen's bill to place portions of the fee in dedicated funds for watersheds and wildfire prevention failed ¹⁶. The flexibility that lets lawmakers respond to need is the same flexibility that allows drift.

Delivery has begun. In July 2026 the Department of Land and Natural Resources opened Hoʻōla ʻĀina, a request for proposals for community-based restoration of forests, watersheds and wetlands, as part of about US$8 million in Green Fee funding for community projects ¹⁷. These are appropriations and procurements; no outcomes have yet been reported.

Whose priorities?

Native Hawaiian views on the Green Fee itself are thinly represented in the sources we found. The advisory council included Carmela Resuma, destination stewardship director at Kilohana by the Hawaiian Council, and Keoni Kuoha, a Hōkūleʻa crew member and Maui community leader ¹⁴. Resuma told HPR the allocations were imperfect but an improvement, and that she hoped the community-led tourism initiative would be funded the following year ¹⁶. In 2025 testimony on a separate bill allowing park fees for non-residents, the community network Kuaʻāina Ulu ʻAuamo supported visitor fees as consistent with constitutional protection of Native Hawaiian rights, while a Native Hawaiian resident opposed the bill for not explicitly exempting Native Hawaiians exercising traditional access ¹⁸. After the Lahaina fire, the survivors' group Lahaina Strong pressed lawmakers to turn short-term rentals into housing and to back a regenerative tourism model led by small businesses ¹⁹. We did not find a formal position on Act 96 from Native Hawaiian organisations.

Hawaiʻi now has a revenue stream tied to visitor nights — 9.64 million visitors arrived in 2025, against 10.4 million in 2019, and spent US$21.75 billion ²⁰ — and a public process for spending it. Whether that adds up to destination management will depend on whether the promised monitoring reports outcomes rather than spending, and on whether the courts leave the cruise share in place.