Group News: Hawaiʻi Island, Maui, Oʻahu
Hawaiʻi Island Group - Ending the aquarium trade in Hawaiʻi: Milestones in 2020
By Rob Culbertson | Reading time: 2 minutes
In the campaign to end the aquarium trade, a lot was accomplished in 2020. In an unprecedented year of progress led by For the Fishes, Earthjustice, and Native Hawaiian practitioners, and vigorously supported by activists in the Hawaiʻi Island Group, we succeeded in:
Winning a major legal victory that resulted in a full statewide ban on commercial aquarium collection as of Nov. 27, that will last until completion of proper, never before performed, environmental reviews;
Shutting down three of the largest, longest-running aquarium poaching operations on Hawaiʻi Island;
Preventing West Hawaiʻi reefs from being reopened to the aquarium trade via a flawed EIS, which was rejected by two separate state agencies;
Ensuring a third straight year of protection, restoration, and record high abundance of previously depleted species, such as yellow tang and kole, due solely to the closure of areas to collection.
Uncovering decades long violations by commercial airlines transporting reef wildlife.
Now as we look forward to the new year we also look forward to achieving the ultimate goal - a return to natural abundance for the hundreds of marine species statewide that have been decimated by extraction for the global aquarium pet trade!
To that end we have a new bill teed up to finally end the trade. Senate Bill 344 has been introduced by Senator Mike Gabbard, and a companion bill will be introduced in the House by Representative Nicole Lowen. Such fine tuned legislation will protect our reef environment but still allow for multiple exemptions including captive breeding (e.g. aquaculture), regulated take by public aquariums, and ensure subsistence fishers and Native Hawaiian cultural resources are protected. Right now the #1 priority is getting a permanent ban passed by the legislature and enacted by the Governor, as the ‘AQ trade’ is moving very quickly to try and get back in business by submitting two new environmental impact statements; one for Oʻahu and one revised for West Hawaiʻi.
You can help by staying tuned to the Hawaiʻi Chapter legislative reports (and sign up for notices of important environmental bills such as this one) at hawaiicapitolwatch.org.
Maui Group - The Hidden Cost of Maui’s Luxury Resorts: Erasing Hawaiʻi’s History at the Grand Wailea
Grand Wailea Resort (seen here on the right in 2004) on Maui’s south shore secretly dug up and relocated more than 300 ancient Hawaiian burials and numerous burial goods during its 3 year construction, the resting place of scores of the Hawaiian remains was never fully revealed to concerned cultural groups.
By Lucienne de Naie | Reading time: 2 min
The Sierra Club Maui Group and local cultural preservation group Mālama Kakanilua recently co-sponsored, a hard-hitting online presentation titled “The Hidden Cost of Maui’s Luxury Resorts- Erasing Hawaiʻi’s History at the Grand Wailea. The panel discussion revealed the unknown history of the world famous Grand Wailea Resort on Maui. The 36-acre luxury resort was built in 1989-90 displacing and, in some cases, destroying hundreds of ancient Hawaiian burial and cultural sites. Grand Wailea has passed though multiple corporate owners, and is now under subsidiary ownership of global investment firm Blackstone Group, who is proposing further hotel expansion and ground disturbance in sensitive areas where more ancient Hawaiian burials may be disturbed.
Three Hawaiian groups - Mālama Kakanilua, Hoʻoponopono O Mākena, & Pele Defense Fund - are challenging this proposed expansion and pressuring the Grand Wailea's wealthy corporate owners to instead finally PUT THINGS RIGHT. When the resort was built so much was lost to history. This included unique Hawaiian cultural sites like the Kahamanini heiau, ancient burials draped in black kapa and placed in carefully constructed and protected pits; the remains of long extinct native birds and hundreds of indigenous artifacts. Hawaiian place names, stream channels and traditional trails were also simply wiped off the map and replaced by a gleaming fantasy resort that is Maui’s largest private fresh water user. The loss of all the irreplaceable Hawaiian cultural resources and burials was simply hushed up, at the request of foreign corporate investors.
300 ancient Hawaiian remains were moved from ocean sand dunes and are said to be in this constructed burial preserve, set in a convenient location near a massive wing of the resort and a parking structure.
This forgotten story of cultural destruction, and the call for justice, was told during the online presentation by local Hawaiian families whose ancestors are connected with the land, in a newly created video entitled: “Built on a Burial Ground-The Grand Wailea Story” (check it out at facebook.com/SierraClubMaui/live).
The Maui Group urges everyone who respects Hawaiian culture to support our allies and send an automatic email to Grand Wailea’s corporate owners asking that all the hundreds of traditional Hawaiian burials removed from the Resort site be accounted for; burial preserves be expanded; impacts to ocean waters be reduced; excessive fresh water use be reduced; and all of the cultural features and sites that were destroyed be well documented in a complete archaeological study and memorialized in consultation with lineal descendants and the concerned groups.
Please take action here: protecthawaiianburials.com
Oʻahu Group - Progress at Wāwāmalu Beach
By Reese Liggett | Reading time: 1.5 minutes
Two years of attending Hawaiʻi Kai Neighborhood Board meetings finally paid off. Thanks to Chair Roberta Mayor, her Board that voted for Resolution 19-02, great support from Councilmember Tommy Waters—then Mayor Caldwell, then Permitting Director Kathy Sokugawa and then Parks Director Michel Nekota came through with a boulder barrier for each access area of Wāwāmalu Beach. Wāwāmalu Beach, on the Kaiwi Coast, is the northeastern half of Sandy Beach Park. And so the first phase of foreclosing vehicular access and depredation to the dunes and white-sand beach at Wāwāmalu Beach was completed in the first half of January. Now the only exits from the two commodious access areas is back to the highway.
The second phase: guardrails--appears to be a tougher nut. Allies—including Surfrider Foundation (Michael Foley), Livable Hawaiʻi Kai Hui (Elizabeth Reilly) and Sierra Club Oʻahu Group (yours truly) knew there was no way to get both the boulders and the guardrail at once, so boulder barrier must be followed by guardrail. Of course, guardrails are needed to seal the many exit points from Kalanianaʻole Highway and foreclose off-roaders from entry to, and depredation of, the natural features there that provide terrific recreation as well as habitat for native flora and fauna (like endangered monk seals and yellow-faced bees, and native plants that hold the dunes together).
Readers, please get involved—get on the team—and WRITE the State Department of Transportation and Governor Ige to tell then how important the roughly 1,000 feet of guardrail is. Point out that Wāwāmalu Beach is at the midpoint of their Maunalua-Makapuʻu State Scenic Byway—and the State’s own scenic-byway principles call for the resurrection of and care for natural features that make the byway scenic. “Scenic” and “natural” are what make Hawaiʻi a lovely place to live and visit.
Write: Director Jade Butay, State DOT, 869 Punchbowl, Honolulu 96813 and
Write: Governor David Ige, State Capitol, Fifth Floor, Honolulu 96813 and
Write: letters@staradvertiser.com