Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 9, Number 6, 1 June 1992 — H-3 realigned in Halawa [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

H-3 realigned in Halawa

by Deborah L. Ward

On a request by the Ottice ot Hawauan Affairs, the state Department of Transportation and the Federal Highways Administration have designed, and agreed to realign, a portion of the H-3 freeway thus preserving two significant ancient Hawaiian sites in Halawa valley. OHA requested that the alternate alignment run between sites 85 and 75, avoiding eaeh complex. The function of these sites has been the subject of a dispute between Bishop Museum archeologists doing contract archeology surveys and Barry Nakamura, who formerly worked on the research team as an assistant anthropologist. OHA made the realignment request as a signatory member of a memorandum of agreement between OHA, DOT and Federal highways plus the state Historic Preservation Officer, and the National Advisory Oouneil on Historic Preservation. The MOA establishes a preservation and mitigation plan for the entire route of the H-3 highway to lessen known negative impacts on historic properties listed or eligible for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. This is the second freeway realignment OHA has requested in Halawa valley to protect significant sites. The MOA already includes a modified loop design on the windward side of H-3 whieh

avoids and preserves the Luluku lo'i, the largest existing agricultural fields on O'ahu. Site 85 is described in a Bishop Museum preliminary summary report of north Halawa valley sites as a complex including a heiau, men's house, habitation terrace and possible dwelling of a konohiki, or land manager. Site 75 was described as an agricultural and habitation eomplex, that might have contained a high status household. Nakamura has said that site 75 is a Hale O continued on page 10

John Kaikainahaole with one of his famlly's quilts. See story page 5.

H "™ 3 from page 1

Papa, or women's heiau, in association with site 85, whieh he believes to be a heiau luakini, a temple of human sacrifice. The museum has rejected this interpretation, citing a laek of archeological or ethno-historical evidence. Realignment of the freeway to avoid and preserve both sites recognizes the significance of both clusters of pre-contact village and agricultural sites, regardless of what their actual historic function may nave been. The impact of reaiignment on any sites downhill from sites 85 and 75 must still be investigated before a final decision ean be made. An informational briefing and a public hearing on Halawa valley sites and realigning the H3 highway were held last month. They were sponsored by the OHA Native Hawaiian Historic Preservation Oouneil. Presentations by the Federal FIighways Administration, the state Department of Transportation, Bishop Museum and the University of Hawai'i Center for Hawaiian Studies were included. Bishop Museum archeologists Jane Allen and Jonathan Damp presented a summary of their findings at Halawa valley, and refuted seven points presented by Nakamura in support of his determination that the two sites are a luakini heiau and Hale O Papa women's heiau. Bishop Museum has identified 68 sites in its survey of the Halawa valley project area whieh have provided the most significant information when excavated. These include house sites, agricultural sites, religious and ceremonial sites. work sites, historic period sites and groups or eomplexes. Detailed field reports will be published in five volumes within two to four years. The Center for Hawaiian Studies, represented at the information meeting by UH professors Haunani-Kay Trask and Lilikala Kame'eleihiwa, severely criticized the Bishop Museum report for poor scholarship and faulty cultural interpretation. The Center's own panel of experts consists of Kame'eleihiwa as cultural

historian, anthropologist Marion Kelly, Earl Neller, a National Parks Service archeologist, Kehau Abad, a graduate student of archeology at UH-Manoa, Matthew Spriggs, archeologist at the Australian Nahonal University, and Trask, a professor of Hawaiian studies. They support the findings of Nakamura. Trask called for all Halawa construction to stop immediately, and for an in-depth archeological and cultural survey of the entire Halawa valiey to be carried out by "unbiased" experts with the involvement of all interested members of the Hawaiian community. Kame'eieihiwa cited cultural sources that suggest important religious and agricultural activities took plaee in Halawa valley. Yet, she pointed out, reliance on written sources alone may result in incomplete understanding. "We never know everything from (just) written material." She pointed out that after

1778 there was a break in continuity of traditional knowledge due to disease, death and starvation, and disrupted lives. "Some things we will never know." "What could be important there that we ean be learning about our history? ... Why not preservation for preservation's sake?" she said. The Native Hawaiian Historic Preservation Council is chaired by Lydia Namahana Maioho, and is charged with reviewing the findings and recommending to OHA's board of trustees an agency response to the impact and mitigation of the new realignment route through Halawa valley; weighing cultural evidence and significance of potentially affected sites-. and proposing mitigation or preservation when needed. All public input from the hearing, together with the council's recommendations, will be forwarded to the federal and state highways agencies, for their review and final decision.

H-3 highway corridor through Halawa valley. Photo by Deborah Ward