Issue Position: Access

Issue Position

Access is the issue that started my interest in things Hawaiian. I learned to carry a gun and hunt when I was 12 years old on Molokai. In adulthood, I came to rely on hunting deer to feed my family. "No trespassing" signs didn't stop the deer, or me. I was in constant trouble with the large landowners and the law.

Over the years, the 60,000 acres of Molokai controlled by the Molokai Ranch became off-limits to the maka'ainana. But like our kupuna, we needed access to the island's natural resources to survive. We organized a group, Hui Alaloa, and organized the first-ever Hawaiian protest marches along our traditional shoreline trails that had been blocked. We demanded recognition of Mamalahoe Kanawai, a law of the Hawaiian Kingdom that guaranteed use and safety on all of the kingdom's trails. It was Kamehameha the Great's first law, punishable by death. We also invoked state law HRS 7-1, which guaranteed rights of Hawaiian access. We won the battle, and, for a time, the Ranch allowed the people access to its shores. A few years later, I participated in the 1978 State Constitutional Convention, which drafted and adopted Article 12 Sec. 7 recognizing and protecting Hawaiians gathering and access rights. These state constitutional amendments were ratified by the voters of Hawaii.

Now we have recognition of our special access rights, but there is another problem: there's less and less to harvest. Today, the people of Molokai are very involved in resource management planning for our island. The idea is to recreate Molokai as aina momona, the fat land, to be shared.

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