By Saleah Blancaflor
The Mauna Kea Stewardship and Oversight Authority recently kicked off a series of statewide workshops as it gears up to take over management of the mountain.
The news and schedule of the workshops was first reported by Hawaii News Now.
“The most important thing that we are doing tonight is to hear from you,” Authority Board chair John Komeiji said at the Kamehameha Schools Community Center in Maili.
The state board, which has 12 members, was first created in 2022 due to the protests that blocked the construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) at Mauna Kea’s summit. Over the next two and a half years, the board is expected to take full responsibility of the summit.
“If something came up tomorrow for TMT, it wouldn’t come to us. It would go to the bodies that now govern that,” board member Neil Hannahs told HNN. “As of July 1, 2028, it will come to us, and our job right now is to be prepared for that day.”
Some of the Native Hawaiians that attended the workshops reportedly came to feeling both skeptical and hopeful.
“There’s this commonality of oppression and abuse of the lands and the people. And now we’re trying a little bit to get some of that back,” one of the workshop attendees, Sparky Rodrigues, told the publication.” But he emphasized that it’s “taken so long.”
According to the board, all the feedback presented during the workshops will be used to develop policies reflecting the people and their concerns.
“I hope this can set the framework for other contentious issues that we have to face here in the state of Hawaii,” state Rep. Darius Kila (D-Honokai Hale, Maili, Nanakuli) told the local news publication.
Nine more workshops have been scheduled statewide and can be found here.
Registration is closed for Common Ground: Building Together conference and gala award banquet in San Francisco on January 24. A shoutout to our planning committee: Jane Chin, Frank Mah, Jeannie Young, Akemi Tamanaha, Nathan Soohoo, Mark Young, Dave Liu, and Yiming Fu.
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