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Kahoolawe:
a solemn return,
an ambitious future
Hawaiians celebrate the importance
of Kahoolawe in native navigation
HANAKANAEA, Kahoolawe » On a former Navy beach, Pacific navigator Mau Piailug watches Hawaiians on voyaging canoes arrive to re-establish Kahoolawe as the departure point for native vessels.
"They come here with blessings and when they leave, the spirit of this place goes with them," he said.
As native Hawaiians begin to restore the 28,000-acre island without the military's presence, they are developing cultural and education projects, including protocols for native navigation at the island's western point, Kealaikahiki, known in Hawaiian as "the pathway to Tahiti."
But the state Kahoolawe Island Reserve Commission is also facing the task of steering around financial obstacles.
The commission's long-range plan is to increase its $33 million trust fund.
Commission chairman Emmett Aluli said the plan is to rely upon grants to finance projects and help from hundreds of volunteers in the restoration of the island.
Volunteers helped develop a $388,000 state watershed project and plant native species near the island's summit.
Aluli said the commission is also developing a plan to have a team of workers remove the remaining surface ordnance from the island.
Yesterday, native Hawaiians aboard the voyaging canoes brought coconut saplings as part of a reforestation project.
The gathering of some 250 people also honored the early "warriors" of Kahoolawe, two who lost their lives and many others who risked theirs in protesting the bombing of the island.
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The Navy halted practice bombing in 1990, after 50 years, and returned Kahoolawe to the state in 1994.
Navy officials completed a partial clearance of military ordnance last November.
Under a 1993 state law, Kahoolawe has been designated as a cultural reserve and is to be eventually turned over to a native Hawaiian sovereign entity recognized by the state and federal government.
Native Hawaiians said the succession of protest occupations of the island came at a price, including the deaths of Kimo Mitchell and George Helm, members of Protect Kahoolawe Ohana who disappeared in an ocean crossing on a surfboard in 1977.
John De Leon, 54, said those deaths prompted him to be among 14 people who were arrested for occupying the island in 1978. At the time, he was an Army sergeant who had served two tours in Vietnam.
De Leon said he spent five days on the island with bombs falling and the Navy trying to find him, but that his military training helped him to hide until he was ready to turn himself in to authorities.
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Fisherwoman Joyce Kainoa recalled she was 30 and a mother of six children when she joined the protest.
"They were destroying our archaeological sites, our temples. Kahoolawe is a living entity," said Kainoa, who remembered spending eight days in jail.
"Coming on Kahoolawe was a metamorphosis," she said. "Kahoolawe has touched people spiritually."
Kainoa said the Coast Guard confiscated her 16-foot boat because some native Hawaiians had used it to go to Kahoolawe. The government eventually returned it after pressure from the public.
Kainoa said the gathering yesterday was to give thanks to the many people who have helped Kahoolawe, including Mary Helm and other kupuna or elders who have since died.
"I miss them. They have kept our spirits alive," she said.
Charles Maxwell, who organized the first protest landing on Kahoolawe on Jan. 4, 1976, said Kahoolawe has become a "symbol of Hawaiian rights."
"It's a beacon for the Hawaiian people that you can make a difference," he said.
Maxine Kaha'ulelio, who also was arrested in the late 1970s for landing on the island, said she felt Hawaiians should be opposing expanded use of the military on the Big Island, in light of its failure to clean up Kahoolawe.
She said landing on Kahoolawe helped put her in touch with herself as a native Hawaiian.
"You start listening, then you start feeling," she said.
