So is it Molokai or Moloka’i?
Catherine Aki digs up some facts on the age-old question.
By Catherine Aki
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Add your commentGuild Gallery artist donates giclee of St. Sophia Church
Molokai Artist Jack Geng has donated a giclee, which is a fine quality reproduction printed on canvas, to St. Sophia Church. The painting is a keepsake representation of St. Sophia Church as it appears today. The church is scheduled to be demolished when the new Blessed Damien Catholic Church is built on the same site.
This is the second donation of art that Mr. Geng has made to the island catholic community. His famous full-color painting of Father Damien was completed last year. The giclee of it was presented to the parishioners of St. Francis Church in the Kalaupapa settlement.
Jack is not only a painter, but also a sculptor, having graduated from the University of Hawaii with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. His usual work consists of Molokai landscapes, but his admiration of Father Damien’s life and work inspired him to paint religious themes. He has also painted Our Lady of Seven Sorrows Church.
His work is available at the Molokai Artists and Crafters Guild Gallery & Gift Shop which is located in Kaunakakai – upstairs above American Savings Bank and open Monday to Friday from 9:30 am to 5pm, Saturdays from 9 to noon.
His Father Damien portrait prints and giclees are also available on the web at www.molokai-art-hawaii.com.
Molokai Drop In Center Gets ‘Extreme Make Over’
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By Catherine Cluett
The Molokai Drop In Center on Manako Lane is a flurry of activity. Screwdrivers are whining, hammers are pounding, and shovels are hacking. Over 30 Rotarians from the Metropolitan Honolulu Rotary Club are visiting Molokai for the weekend of October 3rd to 5th to “gut the buildings,” in the words of Kathleen Rhoads Merriam, Metro Rotary Project Leader and DOH Statewide Clubhouse Coordinator for the Community Mental Health Center System Administration.
The Rotarians are working in partnership with the Molokai Community Service Council (MCSC) to provide such facility improvements as a new commercial kitchen and dining areas, a room for clerical services such as vocational assistance and education opportunities, and a community garden.
The Drop In Center, known as Hana Ka Lima ("working hands"), provides a variety of services to people with physical, mental, and addiction challenges. It currently serves 12 to15 clients per week, with a total case load of about 80 people, says facility director Joe Childs. He expects to see an in increase in those numbers after the make over is complete. “What we have to offer would draw more people,” he says. “Putting members’ skills to use in such activities as cooking and gardening is a way of healing.”
Merriam says the kitchen will allow Hana Ka Lima to serve meals, as well as serve the community in food bank donations, which clients will assist with.
Merriam first visited Molokai two years ago, and brought the project to the Rotary last year for planning. “Kathleen is the brains behind this project. If it wasn’t for her, this wouldn’t be possible,” says Childs.
Rotarians are completing about $150,000 worth of work on the project, says Merriam. MCSC obtained $19,000 for Hana Ka Lima renovations from a Maui County grant, and $7,000 was donated by the Metro Rotary. “Funding is short, but we can’t say Molokai deserves less,” says Merriam.
“My sister was on Molokai when the Ranch closed,” says Dana Barnum, who has been a member of Metro Rotary for about a year, and volunteered her time for the Molokai project. “I knew this was a way to let people on Molokai know that people on Oahu cared about them,” she says.
"We are overwhelmed by the Rotary Club's generosity," said Karen Holt, Executive Director of the MCSC. "The members paid all of their own expenses to come to Moloka'i, in addition to donating their time. We can’t thank them enough for this incredible gift to our community."
Many Molokai residents have pitched in their volunteer services to help in the project. Mel Chung of Kaunakakai arrived on Saturday morning, planning to work only an hour, but was still there when the sun went down that night. Drop In Center clients also aided in the work. “They did a lot of preparation before we got here,” says Rotarian and licensed contractor Mike Darcey, who helped supervise the project. “They made our job easy, and their faces light up as they help us.”
The property where Hana Ka Lima is located was recently purchased by MCSC from Bill Aki and his sister Lani Soong. “Because Bill and Lani wanted their family's land to benefit the community, they donated a substantial portion of the property's value so that MCSC could afford to buy it,” says Holt.
“Molokai Drop In Center has been lacking state support for a long time,” Merriam explains, adding that so far, Hana Ka Lima has received only verbal recognition from the state in its 12 years of operation. Merriam and Childs hope that after this project, the facility will receive recognition from the state as a full-fledged clubhouse, the term used for community facilities like the Drop In Center, and be given more state staffing and funding.
Currently, the Hana Ka Lima has only two full time staff: Childs, and his wife Althea Childs, Drop In Center Coordinator. Merriam says it should have a minimum of four full time staff, which would allow for increased hours and more services. The nine other clubhouses in the state are fully funded and staffed. Hana Ka Lima would be the first and only clubhouse on Molokai. “We like to refer to clients as club members,” explains Childs. “It’s like a foster family to them.”
“We hope this project will be a booster for Drop In Center members and for the community, helping to dispel the stigma of mental illness,” says Childs. “This weekend’s work is just a beginning.”
The Rotary Club and MCSC would like to give a big mahalo to: architect Jim Reinhart of Architectural Diagnostics, Ltd. and Contractor Mike Darcey of Darcey , BJ Dudoit and Karen Holt from MCSC, Rotary Club volunteer organizer Kathleen Merriam, Bobo Alcon for the backhoe, Akamai Tree Trimming, John Kaalekahi, Sr. for the tent, plumbers Malcolm Pastrana and David Nanod, electrician Wynn Walton, local landscaper Alika Kaahanui, Peni Tilini and Dean Spencer for the use of their dump trucks, landscaper Mike Elinski of Native Plant Source, Mel Chung, Ron and Lucy Davis, MSCS, the Rotary Club, and all the Hana Ka Lima members and staff who helped with the project.
Fiber Optic Marine Cable to be Laid This Week
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Expect a big ship to be hanging out on Molokai’s southern shore this week. It’ll be laying fiber optic cable connecting Molokai with Maui and Oahu.
By Catherine Cluett
On Tuesday, Sandwich Isles Communications (SIC) is scheduled to lay undersea cables that will connect all of the land-based fiber optic networks in place on five major Hawaiian islands. The Molokai site of connection is at Ali`i Fishpond; two cables will run over the ocean floor connecting Molokai to Sandy Beach, Oahu, and Wahikuli, Maui.
The Department of Hawaiian Home Lands (DHHL) began constructing the cable infrastructure on each island in 2004. By the end of October, all of the undersea cables should be laid, and a goal has been set for the end of the year to have all cables connected for inter-island connectivity, says SIC consultant Dawn Chang.
Preparations for the Molokai undersea cable are already in place. A conduit was drilled using “horizontal directional boring” technology, Chang says, which travels under the reef system to a distance of about three quarters of a mile offshore, where the cable will surface to the ocean floor.
On Tuesday, the vessel S.S. Intrepid will be located, un-anchored, off the Molokai shore to lay the marine cable. SIC will send down a diver, who will run the cable through the submarine conduit, connecting Ali`i Fishpond site.
Chang says the undersea portion of the fiber optic cable project was financed by commercial funds, amounting to approximately $126 million.
Molokai residents are serviced by either Hawaiian Telcom or Sandwich Isles. Residents using Sandwich Isles won’t see much change in their service, says Chang, unless they live in recently-built homes.
SIC worked with such organizations as the Department of Land and Natural Resources and the Army Corps of Engineers during the approval process for the marine cable project. They also cooperated closely with NOAA to complete the cable-laying before whale season begins, says Chang.
GMO: A Technology of Agri-business
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By Catherine Cluett
Claire Hope Cummings is making bold statements. She says there is a technology that is violating the laws of nature and evolution. She says it is causing farmers in India to commit suicide, and claims this technology has been developed purposefully as a tool for social control. She says it is also being used by the largest employer on Molokai.
What is this technology? Genetically modified organisms, or GMOs for short.
Genetic modification allows for the development of traits many farmers and large-scale growers believe is helpful for production. “Roundup Ready” soybeans, for example, have been altered to be resistant to the herbicide Roundup. BT corn has been developed to contain its own insecticide by adding a gene coming from the bacteria Bacillus thuringiensis.
Cummings is a journalist, activist, and former environmental lawyer of 20 years. She is also author of Uncertain Peril: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Seeds, a book that has been compared to Rachel Caron’s Silent Spring.
Last Wednesday, Cummings visited Molokai to talk to community members about the technology and impacts of GMOs. Soybeans and corn are the two major crops affected by genetic modification, she says. GMOs are grown on Molokai, as well as communities around the world.
The process of creating a GMO, says Cummings, involves cutting the DNA of an organism, plant or animal, and forcing molecules upon it which will alter its make-up, severing the evolutionary development of the organism. “They talk about a product; I talk about a process,” says Cummings. She describes the process as the “matrix of control”: control of nature’s processes, control of the political climate, and thus, control of economics.
The problem many people have with GMOs goes far beyond any moral or scientific dilemmas.
Cummings points out that because it is a patented technology and ownership is a key player in the GMO field, violations are bound to occur. Many of these violations are unintentional, over which violators have no control. Contamination of non-GMO crops through pollen being blown by the wind is common. Violators found to have the GMO gene in their crop are often sued by the company owning the patent to the technology, says Cummings.
California is the only state to have bans on GMOs in some counties, and has recently passed a law protecting farmers from being sued if their crops are contaminated, Cummings adds. Farmers in India have been known to commit suicide because they could not pay the royalties owed to patent owners after the farmers were sued for contamination.
After the meeting, the audience was encouraged to spread information about GMOs by word of mouth. Resident Carla Hanchett reminded the community, however, that Monsanto is Molokai’s biggest employer and is a sensitive subject for many people to discuss, even with friends.
The company has had a positive impact on the lives of many Molokai residents, and has no documented safety or environmental violations on the island. “Monsanto provides our local non-profits with thousands of dollars in grants and have generally been a good neighbor,” says Dispatch Editor Todd Yamashita.
Cummings has five main reasons she believes using the technology of genetic modification is detrimental to a sustainable and healthy world.
First, Cummings calls the use of GMOs “bad farming.” “Think chemicals when you see GMOs,” she says. The process, Cummings adds, destroys nature and the integrity of plants and plant systems. In addition, plants modified by genetic engineering do not give back as much to farmers and consumers as non-GMO species. “GMO plants are 10-15% less productive than non-GMOs, and the food they produce is less nutritious,” says Cummings.
Bad economics is the second reason Cummings gives against the use of GMOs. “This technology grows on chemicals and green manure,” says Cummings. She adds that more than $26 billion annually goes to fund the business of genetic modification. “It causes the economics of scarcity,” Cummings says. GMOs place the abundance of nature up against the economics of owning and selling that is a key aspect of the GMO industry.
“We’ve taken the culture out of agriculture,” Cummings says. “Now all we have left is agri-business.”
“It’s also bad social policy,” she explains. “Patents are the life blood of this technology of ownership.” The judge that legalized plant patenting, Clarence Thomas, was a former corporate lawyer for Monsanto. Under Reagan’s presidency, the use of GMOs became unregulated, says Cummings.
Bad biology is another reason Cummings argues against GMOs. “Altering living, growing systems is just messing with us and the natural world,” she says. The contamination rate is also very high, she notes: conventional corn is 80% contaminated by neighboring GMO crops. “The sugar cane that used to be on this island had human genes,” Cummings told the audience.
Bad science is the fifth point Cummings brought to the table. Back when GMOs were being developed, science was “primitive,” she says. “Now they know DNA is not the secret of life. It’s more like RNA.”
“It’s a technology solely controlled by corporations.” Cummings says. “Just because they get it to work, doesn’t mean it’s good.”
“The story of seeds is our story,” she adds. “What we do to seeds is what we do to ourselves, and the future of seeds is in our hands.”
Unstoppable Aloha
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One Act Parade
By Catherine Cluett and Marie Nowell
The State may have cut funding for the Aloha Parade this year, but the Hammond family kept the spirit of aloha by holding their own parade. With decorated cars and banners, Patricia and Chris Hammond and their children honked through Kaunakakai’s streets Saturday to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Festivals of Aloha.
Next year is the 50th anniversary of Hawaii’s statehood, and the Hawaii State Tourism Authority cut funding for this year’s noteworthy festivals of Aloha anniversary parade to save up for next year’s big event.
“But this is an important event,” says Molokai resident and Little Grass Shack owner Patricia Hammond. “They pulled a sneak attack.”
But instead of feeling helpless over the funding loss, they organized their own parade, even calling the police for approval. “We just wanted to carry on the aloha spirit,” says Hammond.
Hammond would like to give special mahalos to:
Kawano Ohana for many years of Aloha; Chris, Hikili'i, Kapahu, & Sunni for their never failing Aloha; Lisa Wooldridge for Decorations; Kalawe Ohana; Tongonan Ohana; Moloka'i 'Aina Momona Community Garden for supplies.
A Little Ouch Can Prevent a Painful Flu
Windy Kaiama, RN, administers the flu vaccine to Donna Puaa.
By Marie Nowell and Catherine Cluett
The Molokai Health System purchased 500 flu immunization doses, and gave over 120 shots to patients at the Farmer’s Market on Saturday. It was the second of four locations where the shots are being administered around the island over the course of a week and a half. Immunizations will continue at Lanikeha and Maunaloa this week.
Janice Kalanihuia of Molokai General Hospital says practitioners of many Molokai health organizations banded together for the project including Dr. Dan McGuire, Molokai Community Health Center, Molokai Drug Store, Molokai Family Health Center, Molokai General Hospital, and Na Pu’uwai.
“We want to make sure as many people as possible are immunized on Molokai,” she said. The shots are free to those whose insurance companies won’t cover the immunization.
Vaccinations are especially recommended children 6 months through 18 years of age and anyone 50 years. Although the free immunizations are only being given to adults, it is recommended to anyone who wants to reduce the likelihood of becoming ill or spreading the flu virus to others.
Flu viruses are always changing, so scientists update the vaccine each year to match those most likely to cause flu that year. Therefore, an annual vaccination is recommended. When there is a close match in virus strains, the vaccine protects most people from serious illness, and even without a close match, some protection is still provided. The vaccine will not prevent “flu-like” illnesses caused by other viruses.
Risks and side effects are extremely minimal, but like any medicine, can cause serious health problems, such as severe allergic reactions. Mild problems may include fever, aches, and/or soreness, redness or swelling where the shot was given.
Any slight discomfort for short periods is well worth it to keep you healthy during the flu season.
Ranch Requests Quarter Million in Property Tax Breaks
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By Molokai Dispatch Staff
Molokai Properties Limited (MPL), known as Molokai Ranch, got rid of its biggest operational expense when it closed down and terminated its employees in March. Now MPL management is trying to continue cutting expenses by appealing over 72 of its property tax bills received from Maui County for 2008.
If MPL management is successful with its appeals, it will save over $250,000 in property tax payments it makes to the County.
Depreciated Values
In 2007, MPL appealed taxes on nine properties assessed by the company at $22,899,600. In appeals documents, MPL claimed the properties were only worth $16,512,900. In 2008, the company is claiming that the same lands have depreciated to $6,255,570, according to 2008 appeal documents.
Last week the County’s Real Property Tax Board of Review traveled to Kaunakakai to hear appeals from a number of Molokai landowners including MPL for 2007 property tax bills.
Dan Orodenker, General Manager for MPL, appeared briefly at the meetings and advised the Board that MPL was withdrawing its 2007 appeals on all nine properties.
He offered no definitive reason for the withdrawal.
The Board of Review will return to Molokai at a later date to take up 2008 appeals.
One of the nine properties is the Kaluakoi Hotel, which was closed in 2001 and has been allowed by MPL to continue deteriorating. For 2008, the County valued the 18 acre hotel site and buildings at $5,867,600. MPL is appealing, and claims the hotel property should only be valued at only $315,290, less than the cost of an average single family home on Molokai.
If MPL is successful with its appeal, the property taxes on the hotel property for 2008 will be only $545.88, according to County records. The tax would be less than what many residents living in Kaunakakai’s Ranch Camp subdivision pay on their modest single family homes.
Uncontested Properties
Despite MPL filing over 70 property tax appeals with the County for 2008, there are many properties over which MPL is not challenging the County.
One property is the 6,348 acre La’au Point parcel for which MPL is planning a controversial 5-mile coastal development. In 2006, MPL reported to investors that the La’au parcel was worth $14,910,000.
The County has the property currently assessed at only $147,400. MPL’s 2008 tax bill for La`au is $1,091. This is substantially less than what many Kaluakoi residents are paying on their individual homes and condos.
MPL is not contesting this tax bill.
MPL’s now-defunct 30-acre Kaupoa Beach Village site is also not being contested. While it appraised in Ranch figures for $5,380,000 a few years ago, the County has it valued at only $105,400 in 2008. MPL’s property tax bill for this property is a mere $474 for the year.
A State of Decline and Few Remaining Trees
Before the shutdown of operations in March, MPL had warned of a “doomsday” scenario should it be unsuccessful in developing La`au Point. Indeed, since shutting down operations, MPL has allowed its oceanfront properties to fall into disrepair.
Most of the trees on the Kaupoa property have died, and what little else on the property remains similarly continues to deteriorate. At the company’s Kaluakoi Hotel, sidewalks are falling into the sea while hotel rooms host stray cats and beehives.
In a correspondence to homeowners, MPL has told residents that the company will be cutting down the remaining coconut trees because of liability issues and because MPL does not have the funds to keep the trees trimmed.
Kaluakoi condo owners are circulating an “adopt a tree” letter, however, and residents are being asked to contribute $70 per remaining tree every nine months for trimming and debris removal. The donation will be paid to MPL.
“It’s very important we do what we can to save the remaining trees. Once they are cut they will not grow back in our life times,” wrote West end resident Jeff Kent, who has already contributed $840. The sum will keep MPL from cutting 12 trees. In the letter Kent said there were approximately thirty trees remaining.
Let’s Talk Story
As a Senator representing a wonderfully complex district, I often wish I had more time to spend with every one of you. I learn great things in every conversation, feel your support and, sometimes, your disappointment or frustration. Talking with you is the best way I know to learn what is going on, and where your deepest concerns lie.
For my friends and ‘ohana on Moloka‘i, I know that there are day-to-day concerns that sometimes do not make it across the channel to the media on Maui or in Honolulu. Anyone with a deep understanding of Moloka‘i appreciates that the conversations in your homes and in the community are where the grassroots issues first come up.
I would like to make this column—which I hope will be the first in a long weekly series—a regular way for us to carry on this conversation. Serving our district means facing some simple geographical facts. We cover four islands, so it is not likely that everyone will gather in the same place. And while technology may make it seem that your neighbors on Lana‘i and in Hana are closer than ever, there are still challenges in seeing where your interests are the same, and where they may differ.
Frankly, we just won’t have as many chances to sit and talk story in the traditional ways. But rather than give up on that time-honored tradition, we will simply have to find new ways to keep the conversation going.
At the same time, I don’t want to be the person who comes to your house and won’t stop talking long enough for you to let you share your mana‘o too. Instead, I hope that this will be a place where we can share ideas. You can look forward to not only a report of what issues are at the top of the Senate’s agenda, but also what I am hearing in my community meetings with your neighbors. I will share my opinions, and I hope you will free to share your as well.
Of course, for this to work as a new version of an old-fashioned talk story session, it is up to you to speak up and join in. I know that sometimes community members feel that their representatives stop caring as soon as they get elected, or that we lose sight of their concerns once we land in Honolulu. Join me in overcoming those old ideas and artificial barriers. Call me at my Senate office, email me, or come to a community meeting and tell me what concerns you.
So let’s talk story.
State ID Cards On Molokai
The fee is $10.00 for senior citizens 65 years and older, and $15.00 for all others, payable incash only. State ID cards will be processed and mailed to applicants within ten business days.
Priority will be given to applicants with completed application forms and required certified documents. Applications without these documents cannot be processed.
New applicants must minimally provide an original social security card and a certified
copy of their birth certificate (or resident alien card, if applicable).
For renewals of current ID cards with no change in name or citizenship, no other
documents are required.
All changes in name or status due to marriage, divorce, annulment, adoption, or
citizenship must be supported by certified government-issued documents. Altered or
illegible documents are not acceptable.
Recorded information on application requirements is available at (808) 587-3111 and on the Internet at www.stateid.hawaii.gov. Further questions can be directed to (808) 587-3112. Application forms are available on the Web site and at the State ID office, and will also be available at Mitchell Pauole Community Center on October 25, 2008.
Mitchell Pauole Community Center is located at Aiona Street and Ala Malama Avenue in
Kaunakakai. A map is provided at www.stateid.hawaii.gov.
For more information, contact:
Liane Moriyama, Administrator, or
Virtta Hite, Civil ID Supervisor
Hawaii Criminal Justice Data Center
(808) 587-3110
hcjdc@hcjdc.state.hi.us
www.hawaii.gov/hcjdc
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