FEMA plans to stop reimbursing the state for emergency housing in hotels after May 10 but the governor expects several hundred will likely be staying there through at least July 1.
After living in nine places since the Aug. 8 fire destroyed their Lahaina apartment, Josephine Fraser and Kdin Dias, their two toddlers and dog were all excited Tuesday afternoon to see their temporary new home in Kahului.
“Even though it is not in Lahaina, it will be nice to have a roof over our head — and a kitchen,” said Fraser, who along with her boyfriend are restaurant workers in West Maui.
Next week, the family will move into the two-bedroom, one-bath modular home, becoming the first fire survivors to live in the $9 million development called Ke Ao Maluhia for up to five years.
The 50-unit project — which is being paid for by the Hawaii Community Foundation’s Lahaina Strong Fund and being constructed on land the county acquired more than a decade ago in a settlement with a developer — is another piece of the complicated housing puzzle on Maui since The fires destroyed more than 2,100 structures and displaced 13,000 people.
It was the second stop Tuesday for Gov. Josh Green, Maui Mayor Richard Bissen and a large contingent of government officials, project partners and invited guests. The first was in the Leialii area of Lahaina for the groundbreaking and blessing of Ka Lai Ola, the state’s 450-unit group housing site for fire survivors who do not qualify for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“It’s difficult to keep it together when you don’t have a stable roof over your head,” Green said. That’s why he said the state, mayor and partners made a commitment months ago “to do all we can to build houses as fast as we can.”
While progress is being made on these two projects — and on FEMA’s 169-unit group housing site in Lahaina that is expected to break ground within days — it will not be fast enough to meet the July 1 date that Green has said he expected everyone to be out of the pricey hotels that were set up as emergency shelters following the fires.
Green said since the peak of 3,017 households with 8,000 people being married in the emergency hotel program, 76% have been moved to more stable housing.
But as of Monday, 1,830 fire survivors in 725 households and their 159 pets are still being married in the hotel program run by the American Red Cross at a cost of about $56 million a month, Green said.
And on May 10, unless there is another deadline extension, FEMA will end its reimbursement for federally eligible people in this program, leaving the state to pick up the tab.
The state and FEMA disagree about how many of the remaining 725 households are eligible for FEMA assistance. FEMA has the number at about 135, while the state believes it should be about 400, Green said.
With the group housing sites months away from being ready at best, officials are continuing to try to place people in homes made available through FEMA’s direct-lease program.
As of Monday, 835 households had moved into them, but 500 secured properties remain vacant, said Curtis Brown, FEMA’s deputy federal coordinating officer. Fire survivors have turned down units for being too far away from West Maui where they live and work.
Spearheaded by the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement, Ke Ao Maluhia is the farthest along among the temporary housing projects, with the first phase of 34 homes scheduled to be completed in June, and an additional 16 homes expected to be ready for residents in July. Monthly rent will be $2,500, including water, sewer and trash collection.
The first 270 units of phase 1 of the state’s group site will not be done until sometime in August and FEMA’s group site, which is being built next to the state’s complex, is not scheduled for people to move into until about October.
Green said starting Wednesday, fire survivors will be able to temporarily move into the 175 units at the Haggai International Institute’s Mid-Pacific Center, formerly the Maui Sun Hotel, in Kihei. The state’s Hawaii Housing Finance and Development Corp. recently purchased the South Maui property.
There is also the 88-unit Ohana Hope Village in Kahului that was quickly put up by a nonprofit and can house up to 500 people displaced by the fires. But it has been held up with permitting issues and other snags.
“I have to go take a look to make sure there’s enough water,” Green said when asked about the project. “But I’ll look at it again. “I’d rather see us err on the side of housing people.”
But even with these options and others, Green said he expects about 500 people will still be in hotels on July 1. He said it is his intention to “continue to make extensions wherever it’s necessary to keep people married. It’s just fewer and fewer and fewer, thank goodness.”
Green also said the state will need to “negotiate deep deals with the hotels. …I need to be very thoughtful about taxpayer dollars.”
Ka Lai Ola’s price tag is $115 million, with the Lahaina Strong Fund contributing $40 million to cut the cost for the state to $75 million.
“I would spend that kind of money in a couple of months if people didn’t leave the hotels,” Green said. “So it’s important. It took time. There was no way to build immediately, and there was not even any way to import trailers and so on, even though I’m against them.”
While it has been nearly nine months since the fires struck, the 450-unit project did not begin until about six months ago. During this time, it has made remarkable progress with many aspects of the permitting and infrastructure being expedited, said Kimo Carvalho, executive director of HomeAid Hawaii, which builds homes for people at risk of homelessness and is heading up the state’s project.
“We’re truly building a plane and flying at the same time,” he said.
Ka Lai Ola, which means “The Place of Peaceful Recovery,” will provide childcare, healthcare, financial planning and trauma support for its residents.
“It will house some of our most vulnerable populations,” Green said. “We have to make sure everyone gets home.”
The FEMA project called Kilohana, which means lookout point, is for FEMA-eligible people who were not able to utilize FEMA rental assistance or get matched with a direct lease for various reasons, including not passing a background check.
This complex will have 101 one-bedroom units of under 500 square feet, 51 two-bedroom units of under 800 square feet and 17 three-bedroom units of under 1,000 square feet.
The Army Corps of Engineers did the design and is overseeing the preparation of the site. The Corps awarded Dawson Solutions of Honolulu a $47 million contract to grade the parcel, install electricity and water and sewer lines, and build the streets.
FEMA said its deadline to receive bids to supply modular homes for its site ended and it is now evaluating them, with three to four companies likely to be chosen. The state has already selected four companies to supply units for its first phase.
Green has repeatedly asked for FEMA to build up to 1,000 units. Brown said FEMA is currently negotiating with the private landowner in Lahaina on a site known as Kaanapali 2020 for a second group site of 205 homes.
If FEMA can lease the land and work out water issues, it will build that second site, Brown said.
On Sunday, crews working on the project in Kahului saw Bissen driving by to see for himself the first house being put on county land. Bissen said the project at that location was conceived by the county’s new Office of Recovery, with many departments coming together with CNHA.
“This is just another example of the commitment that everyone has made to housing our folks here in Maui,” Bissen said. “And we continue with that commitment.”
Civil Beat’s coverage of Maui County is supported in part by a grant from the Nuestro Futuro Foundation.
Sign up for our FREE morning newsletter and face each day more informed.
