City Council Passes Resolution: Call for Stronger Oversight on Red Hill Crisis

We want to express our deep gratitude to the community for your unwavering advocacy and powerful testimony in support of Resolution 24-216, recently passed by the Honolulu City Council. This resolution calls on the Navy to conduct weekly testing for cancer-causing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, total petroleum hydrocarbons, and forever chemicals at its existing monitoring wells; to install additional monitoring wells to the west and northwest of Kapūkakī; to make raw water data publicly accessible to the Board of Water Supply and the community; and to take further actions to protect our people and precious wai from the poison it has injected into our island’s primary drinking water source. At the community’s request, the resolution was amended to urge the Navy to employ a third-party expert for water testing, following revelations that the Navy’s own testing and analyses—over 8,000 samples collected over two years—were deemed unreliable by multiple experts. Your efforts were instrumental in securing this important resolution, and we thank the City Council for listening to our collective concerns and taking decisive action.

The passage of this resolution strengthens the ongoing calls on Hawaiʻi’s congressional delegation, governor, and Department of Health to demonstrate the same precautionary, proactive, and common-sense leadership led by the Red Hill Community Representation Initiative, Sierra Club, and many others. We urge our city leaders to use all available resources and authorities to hold the Navy accountable for the poisoning of Oʻahu's life-giving water—and to prevent further harms from befalling our residents and ways of life. If you have not yet, click here to join the call to action by contacting your congressional representatives today.

You can also read more about the recent PAH and lead findings and Navy testing failures, as well as updates from the Water Commission meeting, Navy Open House, CRI meeting, and Board of Water Supply here.

Upcoming Event: Water Alliance Initiative Panel

As we continue to address the pressing issues surrounding water contamination and the Navy’s operations, we want to highlight an important upcoming event that directly aligns with the concerns raised in this email. On September 10, from 6-7:30pm HST, a virtual panel discussion will be held on the Water Alliance Initiative (WAI), a government-led effort aimed at fully remediating our ʻāina and wai from the impacts of the Red Hill facility. The event will feature Ernie Lau and Ashley Nishihara, with Wayne Tanaka serving as the moderator.

Ernie Lau will provide an in-depth explanation of the WAI, placing it within the context of the Red Hill crisis and recent discoveries of contaminants in the ʻAiea wells. He will also draw important parallels to the 1999 jet fuel spill at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico, shedding light on the long-term impacts and lessons that can help guide our approach to Red Hill. Ashley Nishihara will share insights gained from her experience on the Fuel Tank Advisory Committee, discussing how Hawaiʻi can implement a remediation program that avoids the Navy’s foot-dragging tendencies, which have been enabled by the agency-driven advisory committee. Wayne Tanaka will moderate the discussion, exploring ways we can all support the critical actions needed to ensure the Navy fully cleans up its mess.

Click here to register for the event and please help spread the word! 

Thank you for your continued support, and we look forward to working together to protect Oʻahu’s life-giving water, now and for the generations to come.