§183-32  Use of funds, etc.  Such funds
as may be appropriated shall only be used by the department of land and natural
resources (1) to acquire by purchase or exchange any land, or any interest in
any land, within an area which the department has, pursuant to section 183-31
determined to be a watershed and (2) to acquire by condemnation forest reserve
easements in any such area; provided that no land shall be subject to such
condemnation by the department if the owner thereof, prior to commencement of condemnation
proceedings, has surrendered in perpetuity the care, custody, and control of
the land to the State as a forest reserve; provided that no funds appropriated
by this part shall be used to condemn all or any portion of, or any interest
in, any parcel of land now held in fee simple by one or more persons, which
parcel has a total area of twenty acres or less, if on July 1, 1949, any
portion of the parcel was improved or used for residential purposes, unless the
lot or lots are, after July 1, 1949, subdivided for transfer of title into lot
sizes of less than one-third acre, in which case all the lots of less than
one-third acre may be condemned, and the prohibition thereof shall also be
applicable to any lots into which any such parcel shall be subdivided whether
or not the lots after the subdivision shall be improved or unimproved.  Nothing
herein shall prevent the department to accept surrenders for a term of years as
provided in section 183-15.



The term "forest reserve easement" as
used in this part means and includes the right to the possession and control of
land for the purposes of protecting and promoting forest growth thereon and of
protecting the surface and underground waters from pollution or contamination,
including, without limitation to the general­ity of the foregoing, the right to
exclude the owner in fee (except as hereinafter provided) and all others from
the land; provided that the term shall not include any water right, nor shall
it authorize the department to deprive the fee simple owner or the owner's
lessee of the right to enter upon the owner's land for the purpose of taking,
developing, or storing water, or for any other purpose incidental to the full
use and enjoyment of the owner's water rights, or of any other rights in the land,
provided reasonable means be taken to prevent undue destruction of forest cover
and pollution or contamination of water by such activity.



When any forest reserve easement is acquired,
the department shall protect and promote the forest growth thereon to the end
that the water rights of the fee simple owner will not be impaired.  [L 1949, c
274, §3; RL 1955, §19-22; am L 1959, c 263, §4(a); am L Sp 1959 2d, c 1, §22;
am L 1961, c 132, §1; HRS §183-32; gen ch 1985]