Dr. Eleanor Castillo Sumi

A Lanai-born clinical psychologist has launched a new nonprofit foundation aimed at expanding educational, health and emergency support opportunities for current island residents and Lanai families living elsewhere.

On Tuesday, Ohana Healthcare Partners Foundation Inc., a newly formed 501(c)(3) nonprofit, announced its inaugural fundraising campaign and first sponsored community event, a volleyball clinic on Lanai. The free clinic for youth in sixth grade and older began Tuesday and will continue today at Lanai High and Elementary School.

The new nonprofit foundation was founded by Eleanor Castillo Sumi, who was born and raised on Lanai before she left the island at age 17 to attend California State University, Northridge.

Sumi earned a doctorate in clinical psychology and spent more than 25 years working in behavioral health, health equity and digital health strategy in Hawaii, California and across the nation.

Sumi said she created the foundation to help address challenges faced by people connected to Lanai, particularly barriers created by the island’s geographic isolation.

“Growing up on Lanai didn’t just shape what I believe — it shaped how I see everything,” said Sumi. “The island gave me a lens: what it means to build a life with intention, to take care of the people around you, to carry your community with you no matter how far you go.”

According to the foundation, its programs will focus on five primary areas: education, health and well-being, emergency care support, technology access and board-directed charitable giving. Funding opportunities will be available to current Lanai residents as well as members of the Lanai diaspora, including descendants of those born or raised on the island.

The foundation was incorporated in Hawaii in January and received federal tax-exempt status in February. It grew out of Ohana Healthcare Partners, a behavioral health technology consulting firm Sumi founded in 2023.

The organization’s board includes Lanai Tabura and Henry Costales, both graduates of Lanai High and Elementary School.

The foundation has set a goal of raising $1.5 million during its inaugural campaign to establish grant and scholarship programs and support its early operations.

Sumi said the effort was inspired in part by her family’s experience seeking medical care after her father, Prudencio Castillo, was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer. According to the foundation, Lanai was unable to provide the level of care he needed, requiring treatment elsewhere.

“Lanai is a community of approximately 3,400 people,” Sumi said. “There are no stoplights. No hospital capable of delivering babies or providing serious medical care. And yet it produces people of extraordinary resilience, ambition, and love for one another.”

More information about the Ohana Healthcare Partners Foundation is available at ohanahcpfoundation.org.