Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 24, Number 1, 1 January 2007 — Lāʻau Point development protesters picket OHA investiture ceremony [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Lāʻau Point development protesters picket OHA investiture ceremony

By Derek Ferrar Puhlie lnfūrmatiūn Specialist About 40 demonstrators picketed the OHA Board of Trustees investiture ceremony at Kawaiaha'o Church on Dec. 6 to protest against the OHA board's support for a plan to develop 200 luxury homes at Lā'au Point on Moloka'i in exchange for the donation of 26,200 acres of Moloka'i Ranch land to a puhlie land trust and the dedication of a further 28,990 acres for community housing, agriculture and conservation. The deal is part of the Community-Based Moloka'i Master Land Use Plan, whieh the board voted unanimously to support in September. The demonstrators waved signs along King Street and filed silently through the

church at an agreed-upon point in the ceremony to emphasize their point without disturbing the sanctuary. Longtime Moloka'i activist and former OHA Trustee Walter Ritte, who led the protest, said the Lā'au development would be "very detrimental to the cultural lifestyle" of Moloka'i's people. Ritte and other opponents have said that the development will destroy pristine fishing grounds and deplete precious water resources. "The trustees have never responded to our concerns," Ritte said at the investiture, "so today we had to eome to their hale to be heard." However, OHA Moloka'i/Lāna'i trustee Colette Machado, who has strongly advocated the land use plan and serves as president of the Moloka'i Land Trust, said that the plan will permanently protect important Hawaiian lands and help stabilize the island's economy, and that rigorous environmental oversight will be required for the Lā'au development. In addition, she said it would ensure that the development would be "the last one" on Moloka'i Ranch lands, whieh have been at the center of numerous development struggles over the years. "You can't get it any better from any court settlement or any kind of future litigation," she said. "It's a reasonable and just approach." Asked if his group had an alternative land plan, Ritte said that the land trust would have to eome up with that. "All we know is that Lā'au is too precious to give up," he said. "We're not here about the plan, we're about the development, to let the trustees know that it is not supported by the island of Moloka'i." In addition to the investiture protest, Ritte's group began occupying a remote heaeh at Lā'au in September and held a march to the site in early October. S

Protestors opposed to development at Lā'au Point, AAoloka'i, make their views known outside the OHA Board of Trustees investiture ceremony at Kawaiaha'o Church on Dec. 6 - Photo: Derek Ferrar