Parcel on Honokohau Bay purchased
Land to be permanently protected for cultural enrichment, stewardship
These areas at Honokohau Bay will now be protected for cultural enrichment, stewardship, aina-based education, and traditional agriculture.
Hawai‘i Land Trust photos
These areas at Honokohau Bay will now be protected for cultural enrichment, stewardship, aina-based education, and traditional agriculture.
Hawai‘i Land Trust photos
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The Maui News
Na Mamo Aloha 'Aina o Honokohau, a Honokohau-based nonprofit organization, in partnership with the County of Maui and Hawai'i Land Trust has completed the purchase of 1.447 acres on Honokohau Bay in Kaanapali.
The parcel is permanently protected for cultural enrichment, stewardship, aina-based education, and traditional agriculture, according to a news release Tuesday.
The County of Maui Open Space Program contributed nearly $750,000 toward the purchase, and community members donated numerous hours of in-kind services. Hawai'i Land Trust, a 501(c)3 statewide nonprofit that protects, stewards, and connects people to the lands that sustain Hawaii, stepped into the project manager role, assisting in securing the county grant and facilitating the closing process, the news release added.
Once granted to the ali'i Moses Kekuaiwa during Hawaii's hybridized land tenure system of the 1848 Mahele, the area was an abundant landscape with wetland taro terraces, mountain ridges of pili grass, and a "bay of plenty" full of fish and limu.
Over the years, the property changed hands and later became a neglected mansion on the beach. Na Mamo plans to transform the land through culture-based education, growing ai pono (healthy food), and furthering connection within the ahupua'a, the news release said.
Following the Lahaina wildfires, Na Mamo and Maui's Hawaiian-language immersion schools provided hands-on aina-based lessons to preschool-12th grade students at Honokohau. This acquisition provides the West Maui and greater community a rare space to connect to aina, heal, and uplift one another.
"Like our community, this land has been through so much," said Karyn Kanekoa, secretary of the Na Mamo Board of Directors. "As we feed and heal the land, the land will feed and heal us. Mahalo piha to the county and HILT for their guidance and unwavering support. We never dreamed this would ever happen in our lifetime. This labor of love shouldered by our community is truly captured by the 'olelo no'eau, 'Kano ke kihi po'ohiwi o Honokohau - The people of Honokohau, Maui, were said to be hard workers.'"
Mayor Richard Bissen said: "The history and cultural value of this aina will live on through stewardship that will benefit our future generations. We are pleased to be a part of an important acquisition that has involved many others and look forward to the inspiration its restoration will give our people. As our aina thrives, so will our community. We are grateful for the hard work, contributions and support from all those who have played a part in bringing us to this great occasion."