Ka`u News Briefs March 6, 2011

 New fissures between Halema`uma`u and Pu`u `O`o.         Photos courtesy of Hawaiian Volcano Observatory
                

HAWAIIAN VOLCANO OBSERVATORY has issued a warning alert level and an aviation code red due to spectacular activity at Halema`uma`u, Pu`u `O`o Crater and an eruption near Napau Crater. 

Pu`u `O`o Crater collapsing yesterday.

Before dawn yesterday the Pu`u `O`o floor collapsed and lava flowed from the west side of the crater, cascading down the center. The floor dropped throughout the day. An eruption has also started between Pu`u `O`o and Halema`uma`u near Napau Crater with several fissures with lava flows, spatterings and gas emissions. 

The new outbreak is between
Napau Crater and Pu`u `O`o.

At Halema`uma`u, deflation continued with rocks falling off the vent wall. Hawai`i Volcanoes National Park closed Chain of Craters Road and all east rift zone and coastal trails and the Kulanaokuaiki campground. Check images and videos at http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/kilauea/update/images.html.

GO! MOKULELE is operating with its parent company, Mesa Air, emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The airline has a code-share agreement with U.S. Airways. The go! Mokulele schedule offers up to 110 daily flights serving Hilo, Kona, Honolulu, Kahului, Lihu`e, Moloka`i and Lana`i.

FOUR MORE NOMINATIONS have been confirmed for Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s cabinet:

William Aila, Jr.

William Aila, Jr. is the director of the Department of Land & Natural Resources. He has a degree in tropical agriculture from University of Hawai`i and was the longtime harbormaster for Waianae on O`ahu, having worked for the DLNR for more than two decades. He also served on state, regional and national committees and commissions, many of them related to land and marine use and the stakeholders involved in their futures. 

Darryll Wong

Major General Darryll Wong is the adjutant general, after having served as the Chief of Staff of the Hawai`i Air National Guard. A pilot and flight instructor, he has held many management positions at Hickam Air Force Base and with the Air Guard. He completed the program for National and International Security Management at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and has an MBA from U.H. as well as a Certificate in International Management from the U.H. Pacific Asian Management Institute.

Jodie Maesaka-Hirata

Jodie Maesaka-Hirata is director of the Department of Public Safety after working as the warden of Waiawa Correctional Facility and launching an offender re-entry program that provided offenders job experience while still incarcerated. She started off as a social worker serving the prison system at Halawa Correctional Facility in 1989. She earned a degree in social work from U.H. and a Master’s degree in criminal justice administration from Chaminade University. 

Bruce Coppa

Bruce Coppa is comptroller for Department of Accounting and General Services. He operated Coppa Consulting, Inc. that specialized in business development, strategy and general management. He was Chief Operating Officer of Communications Pacific, and executive director of Pacific Resource Partnership. He received an MBA from University of Phoenix. 

RAINY DAY AND HURRICANE RELIEF FUNDS may be used to help balance the state budget this year, just like last year when state legislators passed bills authorizing $91 million to be taken from those emergency funds. Similar bills had passed between the two legislative chambers by last Friday.

TODAY IS THE BIG FUNDRAISING day to help raise money to send Ka`u High’s band called One Journey to Brown Bags to Stardom competition. The fundraiser is being held at KAHU Radio in Pahala on Maile Street all day with a CD release party for One Journey and entertainment by Demetrius and Keaiwa, Chris and Gene Akamu, Kawekiu, Mokuleo and Hi-Town.

Miss Ka`u Coffee candidate Brandy Nicole Eder

MISS KA`U COFFEE CANDIDATES have been learning about the growing of Ka`u coffee in the coffee fields above Pahala. The pageant is Saturday, April 23 at Ka`u High School Gym. Tickets are $12 and include a four-color program. The Ka`u Coffee Festival is May 14 and 15 at Pahala Community Center.

Ka`u News Briefs March 5, 2011

The fundraiser for One Journey will be tomorrow at
KAHU radio station on Maile Street in Pahala.

BIG ISLAND COMMUNITIES with the largest Hawaiian populations are in Ka`u, according to the new census statistics. Wai`ohinu ranks top in percentage of Hawaiians at 23.5 percent Hawaiian, followed by Ocean View with 20 percent Hawaiian. The town with the fewest white people on the entire island is Pahala, with only 10 percent. Na`alehu is second in the fewest white people category, with 10.5 percent. However, right next door is Discovery Harbour, which ranks as fourth on the island, with 56.6 percent of the population being white. It is followed by Volcano, which straddles Ka`u and Puna and has a population that is 51.5 percent White. 

     Pahala ranks number four on the island in having the most Asians, with 42.9 percent. Ocean View ranks number two on the island in having the lowest Asian population, at 5.5 percent. This all shows great diversification of cultures in Ka`u.

HERE ARE SOME OF THE NUMBERS COMING OUT OF THE 2010 CENSUS:

Pahala’s population decreased in the last decade, from 1,378 to 1,356. The main ethnicity is Asian, followed by two or more races, then Hawaiian, Hispanic and White.

Seniors enjoyed bingo and lunch at
the `O Ka`u Kakou function in
Pahala yesterday.

Na`alehu’s population also decreased, from 919 to 866. Most are Asian, followed by mixed race, Native Hawaiian, White and Hispanic.

Ocean View’s population more than doubled, from 2,178 to 4,437. Most are White, followed by Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders, then mixed races and Hispanic. The number of Hawaiian and Pacific islanders increased more than three times during the last decade.

HAWAIIAN ELECTRIC LIGHT CO. workers and union members on the other islands walked off the job at 3:30 p.m. yesterday. According to a report on KITV, International Brotherhood of Electric Workers chief Lance Miyake said they called the strike because management didn't want to negotiate over the weekend. On O`ahu, following a storm and downed poles, thousands of people are without power, though private contractors and non-union employees are trying to restore electricity to all the homes. Miyake said the failed negotiations date back to last October. 

Nani Kahuku `Aina's
proposed development

THE NANI KAHUKU `AINA PROJECT public meeting in Na`alehu this week brought people together to talk about the resort planned for five miles of coast between South Point and Ocean View. The project was scaled down from plans presented over the last few years. Developer representatives pointed out the planned area is 2,062 acres, a 72 percent reduction in the first phase of the development for the 16,456 acres. 

     They also pointed out that they are planning fewer units – a 47 percent reduction – as they now propose to build 1,659 resort and residential units.
     They are also offering a Heritage Park for visitation and education, which would include a research facility, visitor center, fishpond, fishing village, amphitheatre, maritime science center, petroglyph preserve, teaching hale, camping and housing with cabins.
     The resort would require reclassifying and rezoning land that is now protected by the Conservation district.
     The next public meeting will be held on April 7 at Yano Hall in Captain Cook at 6:30 p.m. Developer representative Aaron Eberhardt has been meeting with many community leaders and small groups about the development plan.

Mary Ibarra

Dorothy Louis

QUILTING PAHALA held its first workshop yesterday at Pahala Plantation House. The workshops are organized by Donna Masaniai. While yesterday's workshop focused on original art, future workshops will also include quilting by hand and machine. To organize a workshop, call Masaniai at 808-238-0505 or email pahalaquilting@gmail.com.

THE FUNDRAISER for One Journey’s trip to O`ahu for the Brown Bags to Stardom competition happens tomorrow, Sunday, all day at KAHU public radio station on Maile Street in Pahala. It begins at 9 a.m. and features singer Eunice Longakit and her band members with their CD release party, produced by Ka'u Productions, LLC. Also playing are Chris and Gene Akamu; the new band with Demetrius and Leka and friends, called Keaiwa; and the bands Kawekiu, Mokuleo and Hi-Town. There will be food and crafts. Donations will be accepted to help with the high school musicians’ travel expenses for Brown Bags.

Aiyana Galletes-Alapai,
Young Miss Ka`u Coffee
contestant

YOUNG MISS KA`U COFFEE is a new category in the Miss Ka`u Coffee Pageant. This new category is in addition to Miss Peaberry and Miss Ka`u Coffee titles, which will be awarded on April 23 at Ka`u High School Gym with the pageant beginning at 5:30 p.m.. Tickets are $12. Area businesses can advertise in the program and become sponsors to support a scholarship. You can also become a Friend of Miss Ka`u Coffee for $5.

Ka`u News Briefs March 4, 2011

Kalani DeCoito encourages hunters, ranchers and landowners to help one another.

ABOUT 75 HUNTERS, ranchers and land managers met last night at Pahala Community Center to work out ways to retain access through ranches and farms to hunting grounds. Kalani DeCoito, who organizes hunting tournaments in Ka`u, urged hunters to organize and educate their community to assist landowners so they will be welcomed onto their property. Suggestions came from many hunters: When you see a stray cow, call the rancher. A broken fence or water pipe? Call the land manager. If there is rubbish, don’t think, “That is not my rubbish; I’m not picking it up. Malama the `aina. It is all our rubbish.” It was also suggested that hunters police one another by reporting anyone thieving or vandalizing.
     Hunters acknowledged that poachers and others who cut fence, wreck water lines and troughs, and leave gates open waste so much of ranchers’ time and money making repairs and rounding up loose cattle that the ranchers sometimes close the access to hunting.
     DeCoito and land managers agreed that only a small percentage of hunters ruin it for everyone. Hardest hit are people for whom hunting and fishing are necessary to feed their families.
     During the meeting, Lani Cran Petrie, manager of Kapapala Ranch, addressed the use of a two-mile access road through eucalyptus trees on Kamehameha Schools land that her ranch recently leased in order to have extra grazing area to save cattle during the drought. She proposed to allow hunters through the eucalyptus to access hunting areas mauka, through signing a waiver and calling in each time they go hunting. If registered, they will receive a code to open the gate and can proceed. She said that she wants to help the community to continue the hunting tradition. 

Paul Makuakane, left, asked ranchers to respond to reports
of loose cattle eating kalo and sweet potato, while
Mike Silva, right, was concerned about lost hunting dogs.

     How about staying late to find lost dogs? asked Mike Silva. If hunters lose dogs, call her and she will let them stay past hunting hours to find their dogs, she replied.
     She said, however, it takes days and sometimes weeks of extra effort when gates are left open or fences cut and cattle are left “huikau” – mixed up.
     Legal hunting hours are 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.            

     Paul Makuakane asked ranchers to respond quickly to reports of loose cattle eating farmers’ crops, including his kalo and sweet potatoes. 

     Some hunters, including Eddie Salmo, offered to donate hours to help the ranch with fencing and other chores.
     The phone number to request to traverse the road through the eucalyptus grove to go hunting is 928-8405. Applications were circulated among hunters who attended the meeting. 

Longtime rancher and hunter Wally Andrade
asked hunters to help the ranchers.

     Rancher Wally Andrade also spoke up, saying hunting was his life growing up in Ka`u. “I was one hunting freak,” he proclaimed. He gave the hunters suggestions to get along with landowners: “You got to educate these guys what is respect. When you go hunting, put back the loose cattle; respect the rancher. Then come talk to me; chase some pigs. I will open the gate for you,” he said.
     Others who came to Ka`u to share their mana`o included state game warden Jackie Kaololu, Jim Thayne from Forest Solutions, which manages the eucalyptus trees, Kala Kanakaole, with the land operations division of Kamehameha Schools and pig hunter Hano Grace. They all encouraged open communication and cooperation between hunters and land managers. 

Lani Cran Petrie, of Kapapala, shares the struggles of the ranch
through the drought and the vog.

THE HISTORY OF KAPAPALA RANCH was presented to hunters at the meeting on access to the forest. Manager Lani Cran Petrie noted that Kapapala is the second oldest continually operating ranch on the island, having only four owners in the last 150 years: William Reed and Charles Richardson from 1850 to 1877, C. Brewer from 1877 – 1975, Parker Ranch for two years and Gordon Cran, Lani’s respected paniolo father and family since then. She reminded the hunters that the land is rugged, the job of raising cattle is difficult and the vog and recent drought have made this a survival situation for the iconic Kapapala Ranch. She asked for everyone’s kokua.

THE HISTORY OF KAMEHAMEHA schools, which owns land in Ka`u that is leased out to ranchers and foresters and sometimes used for hunting access, was also presented at the hunter meeting. Kama Dancil, the KS local land manager, explained that the purpose of Kamehameha Schools is education. Most of the funding for the educational programs throughout the state is raised through its Financial Assets Division and Commercial Real Estate Division, with such projects on this island as the Four Seasons at Hualalai and Keauhou Shopping Center. The Land Assets Division brings in only two percent of the income.
     Kamehameha Schools owns 295,000 acres on the Big Island, with 65,000 acres in Ka`u, and most of this land is managed for its conservation values. Some of it is leased out, however, and it is up to the lessee to determine who they will allow on the property, Dancil said. In fact, Kamehameha Schools is leasing out all of its eucalyptus stands in Ka`u to ranchers.

Jaeneise Cuison,
candidate for
Miss Ka`u Coffee

PAHALA UNITED METHODIST CHURCH holds its annual Market Day tomorrow from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. It includes a thrift sale, plant sale and bake sale.

THE BIG FUNDRAISER for the high school band One Journey is on for this Sunday, March 6th  at the radio station on Maile Street in Pahala. It will be a CD release party and will raise money for their trip to O`ahu to participate in Brown Bags to Stardom. One Journey will perform along with other musical groups including Gene and Chris Akamu, and the new band Keaiwa. The fundraiser is from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Plenty of music and plenty of food will be available to help these talented youth. 

MISS KA`U COFFEE CANDIDATES have only a few hundred tickets left to the pageant scheduled for Saturday, April 23rd at 5:30 p.m. at Ka`u High School gym. The pageant, featuring Miss Ka`u Coffee, Young Miss Ka`u Coffee and Miss Peaberry competitions, will also feature a choreographed dance involving all the candidates. The $12 tickets are available from the candidates.