There are those who joke that Hawai'i has never seen an activity it didn't want to tax. So it would hardly come as a surprise that a Maui group wants to see a passenger fee or ship tax on the emerging inter-island cruise ship industry.

Considering the amount of effort it took to enact a county-option "transit" tax, a new county-option tax on the cruise industry would surely be a long time coming.

But the underlying sentiment behind the proposal, developed by a cruise ship "task force" appointed by Mayor Alan Arakawa, is worthy of consideration.

The task force rightly concluded that the cruise industry brings both significant benefits and significant impact on the communities it visits.

Thus far, most of the attention has focused on the environmental and ecological impacts. And the response from cruise ship operators has been to launch an aggressive and proactive effort to make their operations as "green" as possible.

But there are also social and physical impacts on the ports visited by these huge passenger vessels that are less often discussed, yet equally as important.

That was the focus of the Maui task force. A fee assessed on cruise liners would help to pay for onshore improvements and other changes needed to mitigate the impact of thousands of visitors coming ashore at any given time, task force members say.

NCL executive vice president Robert Kritzman said his company would welcome further study and discussion of the industry's onshore impact.

That's a good first step. But even absent a professional study, it is clear that adding literally thousands of people to the mix in Lahaina, Kahului, and other island stops will have a major impact.

The industry says it has learned from its experience in Alaska, where massive ships visit tiny rural Alaskan towns. Passengers are offered a variety of onshore activities to break up the impact of numbers and are counseled on the issues and problems they might face.

Long-term, there will come a need for what the task force called "managed growth" of this exciting new industry. And such management may come at a price that might be at least partially offset by a ship or passenger tax of some kind.

Logically, this should be a statewide matter, not one imposed county by county.

It's true that the cruise lines already pay their share of taxes, as does any other business. But this is a new industry here, posing new opportunities, new challenges and new problems that require fresh solutions.

The Maui task force is an appropriate first step.