Volunteers on Kauai get special concert
LIHUE » Kauai County is looking to give back to those who give back, Kauai Mayor Bryan Baptiste announced this weekend.
A free concert for Kauai's volunteers, called "Puuwai Aloha: A Giving Heart," is slated for April 23 at 5 p.m. It will feature Hawaii entertainers, including Grammy nominee Raiatea Helm, Na Hoku Hanohano award winners Andy Bumatai, Robi Kahakalau, the Makaha Sons and Maunalua, along with Kauai natives Glenn Medeiros and Christi Parangao. Mele Apana will emcee the show.
The attendees will be volunteers chosen by their organizations and honored for their hard work, the mayor said.
"The criterion being used to determine if someone should be invited to the concert is that he or she must be an active volunteer -- a person who an organization can consistently count on to help out -- not someone who volunteers once or twice and then disappears from the radar screen," said Art Umezu, Kauai film commissioner and one of the event organizers.
So far, nearly 475 groups have been contacted and asked to submit lists of their volunteers.
Community member John-Paul Gutweniger is handling the gargantuan task of inputting all of the volunteers' names into an electronic file, with more than 2,000 names to date.
And the county is looking for more volunteers.
For those groups who have not been contacted about the concert, they can contact Umezu, aumezu@kauai.gov or 241-6390; Catherine Stovall, cstovall@kauai.gov or 241-6398; or Mary Daubert, mdaubert@kauai.gov or 241-6300.
"We'd like to get the word out about 'Puuwai Aloha' to as many people as possible," said Stovall. "It would also be really helpful if those who know about it would tell others about the event."
To find out more about participating in the upcoming event, leaders of Kauai organizations are invited to attend the next planning meeting at 2:30 p.m. Thursday at the Lihue Civic Center, Piikoi Building. The deadline for submitting volunteers' names is March 10.