TOURISTS LOST THEIR SUMMER VACATIONS - MAUIʻS LOCALS LOST EVERYTHING
CNN - Catherine Thorbecke - August 16, 2023
The agony wrought by the deadliest US wildfire in a century is only beginning in Lahaina, Hawaii, where the inferno virtually wiped the town off the map.
Fear, anger and despair are setting in for some locals, who are now imploring that repair efforts should focus on not just clearing the way for tourists, but meeting the needs of the people who call Lahaina home.
Rick Avila, 65, a longtime Lahaina resident who lost his house to the blaze said one of the biggest immediate concerns for the community is finding long-term affordable housing for those who lost their homes. He and his wife have found temporary shelter at a friend’s vacation rental condo, but many others now “feel like they have to leave the community,” he told CNN.
“A lot of them are going to Kihei and Wailuku and Kahului – and then a lot of them are leaving the island completely,” Avila said of his friends and neighbors in the days since the blaze, and referring to three cities on the other side of Maui.
Still, Avila emphasized that Lahaina is a strong and tight-knit community, and the people will find a way to rebuild from the ground up.
Lahaina resident Mike Cicchino, who was among the fire survivors forced to jump into the ocean as the flames encroached the town, told CNN, “We just went through a nightmare, and we’re about to go through another nightmare trying to, basically, not stay homeless.”
Cicchino is among those joining the growing chorus of people asking tourists not to come visit, “because we don’t have any places for locals to stay.”
“We’re in desperate need out here,” Cicchino added. “A lot of people have nowhere to go.”
As Avila put it, “At this point, there’s no reason for tourists to come here.” Restaurants and shops are either burned or shuttered as staffers deal with the crisis, he noted, and while many of the resorts and hotels are left standing, their employees are scattered and shell-shocked.
He urged potential visitors to “respect the ‘aina [Hawaiian land] and the people who live here.”
“As soon as everything’s up and running, then we will welcome back visitors, because the hotel people are going to need to work,” Avila added. “But let us get a little bit of a handle on it first.”
What was lost
Lahaina is like no other place in the world, bordered by the turquoise Pacific Ocean on one end and green mountains on the other. Once the royal capital of the Kingdom of Hawaii, it went on to become an agricultural hub and cultural melting pot that served as a conduit for the American dream for so many families – including my own.
My mother was born and raised in Lahaina. Her family immigrated to Maui from Okinawa, Japan, as part of the influx of laborers that were brought in to work on the island’s sugar cane plantations. She was in Lahaina visiting family when the fire broke out and is among the lucky ones who survived. Her family home burned to the ground, and much of the neighborhood she grew up in is now in ashes.
It will be difficult for her community to rebuild: After Lahaina’s historic sugar cane mill shuttered in 1999, the hospitality industry quickly took over as the main economic engine of the community. The explosion of tourism over the years, however, has strained natural resources and astronomically driven up the cost of living – dividing the haves and have-nots in ways that felt untenable even before the fire’s devastation.
