Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 20, Number 10, 1 October 2003 — State to assume control of Kahoʻolawe Nov. 11 [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

State to assume control of Kahoʻolawe Nov. 11

By Derek Ferrar On Nov. 11, the Navy will officially hand over control of Kaho'olawe to the State of Hawai'i's Kaho'olawe Island Reserve Commission (KIRC), ushering in a new chapter in the long process of the island's repatriation. The state has held title to Kaho'olawe since the agreement to return the island went into effect in 1994, but the Navy has continued to control access during the decade-long process of eleaning up unexploded ordnance left over from fifty years of bombing practice.

"Nov. 1 1 marks a major milestone in the return of Kaho'olawe to the Hawaiian people," said Stanton Enomoto, acting executive director of the KIRC. "It is not the final chapter, but it is an important one, because it will begin to allow greater access the island for Hawaiian purposes." Although its control ends in November, the Navy plans to continue eleanup work through March, when it will demobilize from Kaho'olawe completely. Protect Kaho'olawe 'Ohana (PKO) Access Coordinator Davianna McGregor said that, while the Nov. 11 handover is significant, the 'ohana "can't wait" for the day when the Navy leaves the island altogether. "When the Navy finally leaves," she said, "we'll feel a greater sense of accomplishment for

all our kūpuna, and all who have worked since 1976 for the return of the island." Even with the Navy's departure, however, the eleanup work will remain incomplete. Although the Navy originally planned to perform a surface eleanup of the entire island, it now says it ean finish only about 70 percent of Kaho'olawe's 29,000 acres. And while it originally aimed to clear buried ordnance on 30 percent of the island, it will actually clear only about 9 percent. According to Navy spokesperson Lt. Cmdr. Jane Campbell, the eleanup has been as extensive

as possible within the time frame and funding allotted to the effort. Federal legislation provided for a 10-year eleanup with a budget of nearly $400 million. "Of course you always have a goal of 100 percent," Campbell said. "But then what comes into play is time and money, and that's the case here." Calling the effort "the most extensive unexploded-ordnance eleanup project in the world," Campbell said that more that 92,000 unexploded bombs and shells had been disposed of, and that eleanup workers for Parsons/UXB

and other contractors have removed more than eight million pounds of scrap metal from the island. The eleanup has not been an easy task, agreed Enomoto. But even so, he said, "The fact is that the Navy has eome up short on its commitments, so we are now going to have to work with only a partial eleanup. And the effect of that is that there will have to be more restrictions on access." Initially, Enomoto said, access to the island will remain mueh as it has been, with visits lim-

ited to volunteer projects conducted by the KIRC and cultural access trips supervised by the Protect Kaho'olawe 'Ohana. Onee the Reserve Commission is able to establish its management program, he said, access to the island should be able to expand incrementally, and by late in 2004, other groups may be able to start submitting access proposals. By state law, Kaho'olawe and its waters ean only be used for Native Hawaiian cultural, spiritual and subsistence purposes; fishing; environmental restoration; historic preservation; and education.

Kaho'olawe, whose ancient name is Kohemālamalama o Kanaloa after the ancestral deity of the sea, is not only a central rallying point of the Hawaiian sovereignty movement, but also the only land base that has so far been officially designated as the eventual property of a future Native Hawaiian governing entity. According to state law passed after the end of the bombing, the KIRC will only be holding the island "in trust for the sovereign native Hawaiian governing entity when it is re-established and recognized by the state and federal governments." Enomoto and McGregor agree, however, that the federal government's responsibility will not end with the Navy's departure. "A U.S. military bomb will always be a U.S.

military bomb," Enomoto said. "So we're looking at a number of ways that the remainder of the island ean be cleaned in the future." "Minimally," McGregor said, "there has to be a trail cleared around the island, as well as access to all major cultural sites. Otherwise, it will restrict the kind of access that has to be there, and was originally agreed to. What was originally outlined was essential for meaningful access to the island." ■

One of 92,000 pieces of ordnance removed during the Kaho'olawe eleanup is detonated near the former Navy eamp at Honokanai'a. Photo: u.s. Navy