Council Chair Alice Lee sees "communications" as the council's top priority following the recent Lahaina wildfire disaster. Her goal is to make sure the community has a strong voice in the planning and rebuilding. A series of upcoming council committee meetings will help to set future priorities going forward. Lee spoke with the Lahaina News on Aug. 24 following the initial council meeting on Aug. 22 to hear public testimony on rebuilding and future resilience. PHOTO BY SUSAN HALAS.

WAILUKU — In the days directly following the Lahaina wildfire disaster, the mayor and governor directed the emergency response. Going forward, the Maui County Council expects to serve as a forum to air public concerns and help set priorities for rebuilding and ensuring future resilience.

On Aug. 24, the Lahaina News met with Council Chair Alice Lee to hear her expectations of the role the council will play in the future:

“My two priorities, beyond seeing that all of our affected residents and businesses have the immediate support that they need, are:

• To ensure that these issues – and others relating to the tragedy – are vetted thoroughly in their respective committees with input from the administration;

• To establish a sound economic and tax policy to guide our spending and revenue for the upcoming years, given the drastic changes we must implement to provide the resources our community needs to recover.

Asked her reaction to criticism directed at local, state and federal responders, Lee replied, “In terms of anger or trust relating to how this tragedy was handled, I think it’s too soon to criticize anyone’s actions because we don’t know enough yet about what happened, when and why.

“The scale and conditions were unprecedented, and I don’t think anyone doubts there would have been extensive losses due to the fire and the high winds that fueled it. But it will take time to learn more details and evaluate if there were errors, poor judgment and other factors that contributed to the extent of the tragedy.

“Not just in Maui County but in other levels of government nationwide, there has been a growing distrust of political leadership – sometimes well-founded and sometimes not. It’s hard to separate this trend from the fire-specific reaction, but both are important to recognize.

“At all levels of our government, we have our work cut out for us to listen to the community and respond effectively, to help build or maintain trust with the public we serve.”

As for her evaluation of Maui Police Chief John Pelletier, she responded, “His manner may come across as brusk, (but) I appreciate his straight-forwardness and I think he has displayed solid leadership.”

Discussing invasive grasses growing on former agriculture land which fueled the spread of the fire, Lee commented, “Better land management probably would have helped but that is not easily achieved given the vast acreage of vacant and undeveloped former ag lands and the lack of water. There are, however, wildfire management techniques that can be better deployed in addition to better land management, such as establishing and maintaining firebreaks around these lands.”

As for lack of water pressure that made the fire department’s job more difficult, “This is definitely something that the council will be discussing in the coming weeks so we can learn how to be better prepared.”

Turning to the housing emergency, Lee said, “This will be a key topic of discussion in our upcoming committee meetings, as the need for housing just increased by anywhere from 25-50 percent. With the governor’s emergency proclamation on housing, I think we will see more proactive efforts from the county, state and private property owners and developers to redevelop existing properties and to rejuvenate or accelerate projects that are in the pipeline.”

Many of the properties destroyed were close or directly on the water. Under current county codes, it would be difficult if not impossible to rebuild them as they were formerly constructed.

Asked her thoughts, Lee replied, “It’s too early to say for sure but it’s likely that the ‘footprint’ of Lahaina Town will be different to account for current rules and regulations, including shoreline setbacks. We need community input on how they want to rebuild, but current health and safety regulations (will) have to apply.”

With respect to harbor facilities at Lahaina, Maalaea and Mala, she said, “I would imagine that the harbors will be among key components of recovery planning. While it is true that the operation of these harbors is under DLNR, onshore facilities and other supporting infrastructure are under some degree of county authority, so it has to be collaborative. We would also need information from harbor users and other stakeholders.”

Besides Lahaina, there were fires in other parts of the island (including Kula, Olinda and Kihei) that caused significant damage. In some portions of Upcountry, hot spots are still smoldering. Because of the huge damages in Lahaina, losses in other areas have not received as much attention as West Maui.

“This is an important point,” Lee said. “My office, and Councilmember Sugimura and her team, have reached out to several individuals impacted by the fire to provide them with information and how to access various resources. I know that various agencies and non-profits have also been providing direct support. We hope to hear their testimony, too, at our upcoming committee meetings.”

Turning to financial concerns, Lee saw two areas of impact. They are re-evaluation of current capital improvement projects and changes to the budget.

On CIP, she explained, “Some items, like the parking structure or the Center for Oiwi Arts, were wholly or mostly funded by specific federal grants and the purpose cannot be changed. Depending on our capacity to deal with the current crisis, though, these projects could be postponed so staff and resources can be dedicated to response and recovery.”

As for the budget, “There will certainly be changes made to our revenue forecasts based on a drop in real property tax, TAT and GET revenue, but we should also have state and federal funds coming in, and I don’t know those amounts yet. Expenditures will need to be adjusted, and perhaps some County CIP projects will be delayed so that our local resources can be redeployed to response and recovery. These matters will also be discussed in the coming weeks.”

Asked about the mayor’s emergency proclamation #3, which suspended many standard procedures and gave the administration sweeping new powers, Lee thought that given the circumstances, this kind of authority was warranted as long as it did not extend indefinitely.

“While some of these steps are typical in an emergency, we are asking for clarification on how broadly, and for how long, he intends to exercise these powers.”

Asked what has been learned, she replied, “Clearly, we were not prepared for this combination of events – mainly high winds, drought conditions, and multiple brush fires that were potentially containable at first. And clearly our communication to the public and among county agencies was inadequate.”

The council’s discussion of future priorities moves to the Government, Relations, Ethics and Transparency Committee (GREAT) chaired by Councilmember Nohelani U’u Hodgins. All nine members of the council are members of this committee. An early September date for the next meeting is anticipated but has not yet been set.

To read prior coverage of the council’s Aug. 22nd meeting that began the rebuilding dialog, see: https://www.lahainanews.com/news/local-news/2023/08/24/maui-councils-aug-22nd-hearing-marks-start-of-rebuilding-dialog-following-wildfire-disaster/