And while lawmakers may be able to say they didn't raise taxes, they will make the manufacturers look like the ogres because the manufacturers will have to increase their prices in order to recover the new fee. And we wonder why it costs so much to live in Hawaii?

Last year we warned you about a new fee on maritime containers to raise funds to fund the invasive species eradication and prevention program. It was noted that the $1 per 20 linear feet of container length would not raise enough money as the number of containers imported into Hawaii is rather limited and sooner or later lawmakers would have to come back to either raise the rate or find other sources to fund the program.

Sure enough, lawmakers are back this year to impose fees on aircraft containers and freight that is not shipped in containers. Of course, the cost of this additional fee will be passed on to us as consumers, but on the way to the shelf at our local stores at each stage of the wholesale and retail chain, mark-ups will be added. With a larger initial base for the products we consume, the cost of the fee will be exacerbated by those mark-ups.

And that's what's wrong with imposing the fee at the front end of the wholesale/retail transaction chain.

In the discussion last year, one of the populations singled out as carriers of invasive species were visitors, both from the outside the state as well as visitors going from island to island. Hawaii has nearly eight million visitors, yet somehow in all the discussions, visitors got left on the cutting room floor. Instead, lawmakers decided to impose the invasive specie fee on shipping containers, perhaps hoping no one would notice.

But notice or not, it is certainly showing up in everything we purchase and consume. Several years ago lawmakers imposed what is known as an environmental response tax on every barrel of petroleum imported into the state for the purpose of setting up an emergency fund to clean up oil spills that may occur on Hawaii=s shores. It was set at a nickel per barrel.