MEDIA RELEASE

HONOLULU – Starting August 1, 2009, the Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) will use an automated phone service to handle calls received after hours to report violations of state natural and cultural resources laws.

During normal business hours from 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., the toll-free 643-DLNR (643-3567) number will continue to be answered by enforcement staff 7 days a week. From Monday through Friday, calls to 643-DLNR will ring at the respective district office for the county where the call is placed. On Saturday and Sunday calls will be answered by DOCARE staff on O‘ahu.

After-hours calls – on weekdays and weekends — will be answered by a voicemail service that will prompt callers to leave a recorded message with specific information concerning enforcement matters. Officers on duty will check the recordings regularly and respond as available.

“We encourage after-hours callers to leave messages and to provide as much detailed information as possible to assist in our collection of data regarding the type of resource violation, where the violation occurred, and contact information so officers may follow up with them on information and enforcement response,” said Laura H. Thielen, DLNR chairperson.

“DLNR is modifying our statewide enforcement answering service. We will continue the after-hour enforcement answering service, and utilize new technologies and minor changes in answering services for efficiency,” Thielen said.

“Officers will monitor messages and integrate the data into a computer-based reporting system to track violation trends. We will couple the data from calls with our new computer-based reporting system as that becomes operational this fall, so we may chart and strategically address resource violations within geographic regions and type of offender,” she said.

As always, in life-threatening situations, callers should immediately call 911 to seek emergency assistance.

The “643-DLNR” live answering system began in October 2006 to provide service for the receiving, review, and referral of calls relating to DLNR enforcement and other emergency matters. From July 1, 2008 to June 20, 2009, the answering service received 2,411 calls.