Molokai’s Aloha Makes It to Berkeley

UC Berkeley Environmental Law Clinic students and faculty reading The Molokai Dispatch on the school’s campus, left to right, students Connor Tamor, Mac Dickerson and Lucy Peterkin, supervising attorney Emily Griffith, law professor Claudia Polsky and student Deena Kleemeier. Photo by Léo Azambuja

By Léo Azambuja

Molokai’s resiliency and aloha keep inspiring other communities across the Pacific. Back in April, a group of four students and two faculty from the Environmental Law Clinic at the University of California, Berkeley, spent a few days on the island to find out about solar energy projects led by community initiatives, and potentially apply their findings to communities on the mainland.

The university’s Environmental Law Clinic has a series of projects trying to get residential solar systems installed in a quicker, cheaper and more reliable manner to give homeowners and renters energy independence.  

“Molokai was a very logical place to come to look at the work of the energy co-op here,” professor and Law Clinic director Claudia Polsky said of the Hoʻāhu Energy Cooperative Molokai, whose mission is to produce community-owned, affordable, renewable energy for the benefit of their members, community and the environment.

Emily Griffith, the clinic’s supervising attorney, said if we start from a posture of listening, asking questions and having curiosity, we can drive solutions forward while supporting the community’s vision rather than making decisions for them based on theory or academic research.

“I think that’s a lesson that can really be clearly demonstrated here on Molokai, and is something that we hope that the students will take forward into a lot of decision making,” she said.

Polsky said she would like to maintain the relationship with Hoʻāhu, and think about how the Environmental Law Clinic can reciprocate for what they learned on Molokai. 

“People have been educating us and have been incredibly warm and generous with their time and their experience,” Polsky said during the group’s experience on the island.

After learning that an article about their visit was published on The Molokai Dispatch, they asked for a hard copy of the issue, and couldn’t hide their excitement while reading about their trip during lunch break at UC Berkeley.

The group got more than what they expected on Molokai. They wanted knowledge, and they got it. But they also left with island’s aloha. 

Visit www.law.berkeley.edu/experiential/clinics/environmental-law-clinic/ and hoahuenergy.coop for more information.