I would like to withdraw my support for this bill as submitted yesterday. This bill must not pass without mandatory drug and mental health treatment included. The passage of the Federal Executive Order “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets,” issued on July 24, 2025, will make federal funding available to localities and we must not waste this opportunity to obtain help with this serious problem.
ESTABLISH PROCEDURES for the expeditious removal of unpermitted encampments
• This proposed chapter should only codify lawful established procedures utilized by the County of Maui by providing clear guidelines on the expeditious removal and prevention of unauthorized encampments.
• Support the County in enforcing public health and safety laws.
• Support the County of Maui’s equal enforcement of laws that apply to everyone in our community, regardless of socio economic status.
• Support the County of Maui protecting, preserving and ensuring safety of our public right of ways, sidewalks, roadways, community spaces, parks, beach parks, community and shorelines.
• While being unsheltered is not a crime, housing status does not determine applicability for enforcement of state code and county ordinances within the County of Maui.
• Support the County’s efforts to restore and properly maintain its properties, ensuring that public spaces are clean, safe and free from unlawful and threatening behavior.
• Support the County of Maui to enforce laws prohibiting unpermitted long-term parking on County property.
• Support the County of Maui’s prioritization of greater community welfare and environment health and safety in public spaces within our community.
• We support and want to facilitate keeping our towns, beaches and roadways clean and safe for all.
• Support the County of Maui providing resources and information for unsheltered people to accept the help that is available- shelter space available with dignified housing for all, drug treatment and mental health facilities are available. Services are offered to support unsheltered people in meeting their own needs; However, it is personal choice to access these services.
• We applaud the County of Maui in the beautification at Amala Pl roadside and County beach park at Kanaha and were relieved to hear that over 25 people who were formerly living in the bushes or on the side of the road were safely housed in existing shelter space -with access to food, water, shower facilities and access to mental/drug abuse facilities.
• Also glad to hear that at Ka Hale A Ke Ola (KHAKO) are able to expand additional emergency shelter space if the need arises, with assistance for those with animals.
• We support the County of Maui in their ability to shelter people as quickly as possible by providing shelter options and notice to vacate to an unpermitted encampment within 10 days (not 45 days). Actually, everyone should be happy- this puts an accelerated time line on providing shelter for the unsheltered.
• As a community, we don't want to encourage folks to continue to live in unsafe and unsanitary conditions on the roadside or in the bushes for as long as is being proposed by Member Johnson (45 days). -We want them to be housed at a shelter with access to services as soon as possible -rather than delay access to sanitary and safe shelter.
• We have heard that there are 3-5 safe parking site proposals out there being worked on -and we support the County providing funding to make them a reality. There are many in our community who would be happy to assist in reaching out to willing landowners to lease land for interim and short term solutions from private sector and identify suitable parcels owned by the County and State for additional proposals.
• With County of Maui budget planning process around the corner, we urge the Mayor and Councilmembers to please allocate significant funding for interim housing solutions; deed-protected, in perpetuity, low- income workforce and affordable housing; extension of the first time home buyer Ho’okumu Hou program; expanded mental health/drug treatment facilities; respite housing (short-term medical recovery for people experiencing homelessness after hospitalization); residential re-entry/transitional housing for the previously incarcerated; safe overnight and safe parking solutions.
• Many fires have begun near and in unpermitted encampments and threaten the health and safety of those living in unsafe conditions. Additionally, fire risk affects the greater community already traumatized by the 2023 wildfires in Kula, South and West Maui.
• The County must lead by example in reducing threat to public health and safety on County owned property -as the County will be held liable when there are deaths or injuries due to negligence, or if the County allows unpermitted activity and dangerous conditions to continue. This bill must support the County to do so in a expeditious manner or don’t pass it.
• Look at the Lahaina fire and how much Hawaiian Electric and Kamehameha Schools are having to pay, our County and our community cannot afford the liability -nor bear the cost of another preventable disaster. We don't want another town burned down or even one more life lost to a preventable situation.
• In times of evacuation due to tsunamis and other disasters, we support the unsheltered to be in a safe shelter space with emergency preparedness on site. Living in the bushes, in parks or on the roadside is unsafe and unnecessarily diverts the attention of first responders and emergency preparedness personnel.
• We support the County of Maui protecting public property through strategies to prevent establishment of unauthorized encampments and illegal dumping through regular outreach, signage, fencing, gates, lighting, digital monitoring, and appropriate land stewardship.
Frequent fires caused by illegal homeless encampments in the brush, including in Maui Lani, is an unacceptable risk to the community (schools, homes, businesses). Please address this issue, giving strong enforcement powers for removing trespassers from areas that pose a threat to nearby homes and development. However, how about also designate a safe outdoor space for the homeless to go?
Please allow this note to support bill 111 with the revisions noted most recently.
I am a business owner in Paia, parent to young children and friend to all in the community, even those living unsheltered. Turns out folks donʻt loose their humanity when living unsheltered. They can still talk story, still have hopes and dreams, still joke, still care and need to be cared for. I urge those in the Kuau community to step out of your comfort zone and meet the folks you are criminalizing for existing. Majority are Kanaka, would love to meet their neighbors and often are just handed a tough hand in the game of life. You may even be able to support some of them, instead of shaming them for getting water from Hookipa.
I believe whatever the County and fake state of Hawaii have been doing to "manage" homelessness, IS NOT working. Thereʻs plenty of research and strategies to intervene and support folks living unsheltered, many places are doing this, look across the globe. Not every place on this planet has homelessness issues like Hawaii does, they implement effective strategies for the problem. If we donʻt fix the root problems, we just continue to move folks around this island, traumatizing them and wasting tax payers money. The EcoNorth study did refer to the trauma informed, evidenced based research that can be combined with the current outreach that is happening, to better serve these vulnerable populations. Putting services in place verse penalizing people for existing not only seems humane, it is also COST EFFECTIVE. Win win ya?
Please remember the traumas that Maui County has faced in the past 2 years, which continue to be focused primarily around housing. Many community members are 1 or 2 paychecks away from homelessness. Instead of criminalizing homelessness, the County Council has been awarded may options to solve these problems. Instead of continued deliberation, DO something different!
Access to a computer and internet may be an issue for those without. Other issues. In this section may be apparent if you think of yourself as houseless.
Regarding this part of the bill:
9.37.110 Online reporting of notices and property logs. A.
Within one business day of the posting of a notice or property log
under this chapter, the County or its designee must upload a copy
of the notice or property lot to a County website. The County website
must include a function that allows encampment occupants to
identify advocates as outreach providers under section 9.37.030 and
for all interested parties and members of the public to be notified
when a new upload is made.
B. The County must maintain and display on the website,
contact information including an email address or telephone
number, to retrieve stored personal property. The telephone number
must have a voicemail and call-back system if staff are unable to
answer calls.
- 10 -
C. Instructions and forms for appeal processes required by
this chapter must be available on this website.
My name is Nicole Huguenin, and I serve as the Executive Director of Maui Rapid Response.
For two years, community partners like us, service providers, and County staff, including the Mayor’s Office, worked together to shape amendments to Bill 111. These amendments are not optional extras — they are the linchpins that keep this bill from becoming just another sweep policy.
* Shelter precondition: no one is removed unless there is safe, appropriate shelter or an alternative available.
* Cultural safeguards: Native Hawaiian consultation and multilingual notices, because Hawaiians are disproportionately impacted.
* Transparency: public reporting so those impacted and their community know who is displaced, what’s offered, and what’s destroyed.
Last night, the Mayor’s office walked away from these efforts, saying they need “flexibility.” But let’s be clear:
* “Flexibility” means sweeping people with nowhere to go.
* “Flexibility” means ignoring Hawaiian voices on Hawaiian ʻāina.
* “Flexibility” means repeating the same failed cycle we’ve already seen and resulted in a lawsuit.
That is not flexibility. That is harm.
Confusing and contradictory
The Mayor’s statement says sweeps will be balanced by outreach. But in October 2024, Family Life Center testified they do not provide outreach before or after sweeps and will not be connected to enforcement. Despite that, the County continues to list FLC as the main outreach provider and has not updated their long-term contract.
So who is really doing the outreach? Where is the accountability? This contradiction makes the Mayor’s proposal confusing at best, misleading at worst.
Proof from recent sweeps
* Amala Place (2025): People who asked for shelter were given options that didn’t fit. A kūpuna with a dog was offered only a top bunk in a crowded shelter — an impossible choice. They and others were pushed deeper into the bush. Now the County blames them for fire danger, when in fact the sweep itself created that danger by not having adequate shelter options or working collaboratively with others like the state where rooms were available at the former Haggai Institute.
* Ukumehame (2024): Long time residents were displaced without alternatives, on ʻāina with deep cultural meaning. The sweep ignored kuleana and aloha ʻāina, replacing them with police and bulldozers. In fact, the first announcement to residents for this relocation included the burnt down Lahaina shelter and phone number. If they can’t update fliers how can they be trusted with harm-reduction and dignity?
These sweeps destabilized lives, wasted resources, and harmed Hawaiian — exactly what we warned would happen without clear safeguards.
The evidence is already in hand
The EcoNorthwest study (2024) and recent trainers that DHC brought in, like Iain De Jong, both of which this County paid for, could not be clearer:
* Enforcement-first approaches cost more and solve nothing.
* Real progress comes from shelter, coordination, and cultural grounding.
Amala Place and Ukumehame prove the study right. Sweeps push people further into hiding, increase risks like fire, and drain money that could fund shelter or housing.
Our request
Bill 111 can only work with the linchpin amendments intact. Without them, it’s just a new name for old sweeps.
We urge you to:
* Reject the Mayor’s call for “flexibility.”
* Pass Bill 111 only with the shelter precondition, cultural safeguards, and transparency amendments we worked two years together to craft.
Maui already has the evidence, the recommendations, and the community-built solutions. The choice before you is simple:
* More sweeps that waste money and cause harm, or
* Real solutions rooted in aloha, kuleana, and justice.
I support Bill 111 and its current Amendments. I encourage everyone and especially Kānaka involved in all aspects of government, to nānā i ke kumu; look to the teachers; the `ike of those who served others, so that policy, administration and enforcement might be culturally inspired if not culturally led.
That Ke Kānāwai Māmalahoe would be more than something used in speeches, reports or studies, and that it would be implemented and its practice encouraged, in our communities.
The way our government and its agencies address homelessness, by placing blame for their lack of stable housing, on those experiencing homelessness, is not only far from the foundational `ike of Ke Kānawai Māmalahoe, but also shows the willful violence of “the powers that ʻbeʻ”, who can create meaningful and compassionate systems of care and recovery for those needing community and support, yet insist on feeding and supporting harmful and false narratives that unsheltered folks are mentally ill, lying, drug addicted thieves who refuse help.
A county-funded study by ECONorthwest shows that homelessness stems from housing scarcity and affordability pressures, not personal failure. So, create the systems and capacity to address those.
Bill 111 isnʻt the answer to life, the universe and everything, but does outline the least this county can do, to see the success of helping people over hurting them. It requires sufficient, appropriate shelter accommodations BEFORE encampment removals; and notice, outreach and property storage for those residents.
Housing-led solutions, safe parking options, sanctioned, managed encampments, culturally grounded shelters and accommodations for couples, pets and ADA access, can improve stability and safety and foster connections of trust for the entire community.
Affordable housing was hard to find and keep before the fires. Post-fire, the search is even more strained. Folks are giving up beloved pets, moving off-island, taking on more work and seeing less of their families, to avoid being another kupuna, makua, sibling, friend or neighbor living in a car, tent, bush, on someoneʻs couch or worse.
Please be inspired by the `ike of Ke Kānāwai Māmalahoe. Let it guide you through compassionate and meaningful discussion and later, passage, of Bill 111, as you consider a framework for county administrations and the appropriate departments, to approach and move through situations where the health and best interests of a hui of unsheltered folks guides the path to their recovery.
Aloha Chair Sinenci, Vice-Chair, and Councilmembers,
I support the amendments proposed by Chair Sinenci and Councilmember Johnson. Without them, Bill 111 risks being punitive and retraumatizing, worsening houselessness instead of solving it.
We need solutions, not sweeps. ECONorthwest’s own research shows houselessness is driven by unaffordable housing, not personal failure. Sweeps destabilize people, increase trauma, and drive survival behaviors into less visible but more dangerous spaces. Maui already saw this after the Amala Place sweep.
I also want to acknowledge the very real fears of our neighbors in Kūʻau and Pāʻia. Fires, crime, and unsafe conditions are serious concerns. But scattering people through sweeps only multiplies those dangers. A well-established puʻuhonua would actually reduce fire risk — because when people are given stability, trash pickup, safe cooking methods, and a chance to care for their home, the chaos that fuels unsafe conditions decreases. People care about their home too, whether it’s a hale or a tent. Community-led models like Puʻuhonua o Waiʻanae and Hui Mahiai ʻĀina prove that dignity and safety go hand in hand.
At the same time, Maui County has shown a pattern of favoring luxury developers — like Honuaʻula, where hundreds of affordable units were taken away while developers walked off with nearly half a billion dollars in profit. That is not pono. Imagine how many families could be housed and healed if even a fraction of those resources were redirected to our most vulnerable.
We also need to get creative. There are empty storefronts, warehouses, and underutilized properties in Kahului sitting vacant while our people sleep in brush and cars. Why not repurpose those into transitional housing, safe parking hubs, or indoor puʻuhonua? These spaces are already close to jobs, schools, and medical care. With modest investment, they could provide stability, safety, and dignity far more effectively than endless sweeps.
Bill 111 must ensure that before any encampment action, the County can provide adequate, appropriate shelter — for families, couples, pets, kūpuna, disabled individuals, and vehicle dwellers — proximate to the services they need. It must honor Kānaka ʻŌiwi constitutional rights under Article XII, §7 through Ka Paʻakai analysis. And it must prioritize healing, housing, and public health over displacement.
For too long, Kānaka Maoli have borne the hewa of displacement — from the overthrow of our government, to the taking of our ʻāina, to today’s profit-driven developments that push our people into houselessness. Criminalizing and sweeping those who have already lost the most only repeats the same injustice.
If Maui truly wants to prevent another Lahaina, the answer is not more trauma and instability. It is investing in housing, puʻuhonua, and ʻāina-based solutions that protect both residents and neighbors. Stability, dignity, and aloha ʻāina will create the safety we all deserve.
Please pass the amended version of Bill 111 with compassion and pono.
Good Morning Chair and Councilmembers, thank you for your service.
I don’t understand why vagrants who are loitering and paying no taxes, who often ignite life threatening fires and engage in criminal conduct, are favored over tax paying law-abiding Hawaii residents.
Doesn’t make sense to me. Do the right thing before the entire North Shore burns down!
The encampment in Holomua poses a very dangerous threat to the safety of residents along the North Shore. I live in Kuau and frequently can smell fires coming from that area as we are directly down wind. This is terrifying to think about as a fire from the encampment combined with a strong North Shore winds could wipe out all of Paia just like Lahaina two years ago.
Additionally, this area has become dangerous as far as criminal activity. It used to serve as a reasonable traffic outlet for locals trying to go up country during the busy tourist seasons. But now is nearly impassible due to illegal structures along the side of the road as well as potential toxic materials in the area. Additionally, driving on this road poses a threat of an automobile versus pedestrian accident, which could lead to fatality.
It is in the communities‘s best interest, and safety to clear out the encampment on Holomua and safely place these individuals in the many housing projects that have sprouted up around the area mainly in Kahului.
No one wants another fire that wipes another one of our towns off the map. Additional regulation and barriers and red tape is definitely not the answer.
My name is Nikki Hauptman, I am a fourth generation kama’aina born and raised here on Maui and I write to you today in support of the amended versions of this bill from Committee Chair Sinenci & Council member Johnson.
The amended version’s definition of an ‘encampment’, the inclusion of Kanaka Oiwi constitutional rights explicitly in writing, and the requirement that adequate shelter for peoples needs are met before any forced relocation are crucial amendments to maintain a sense of humanity, dignity, compassion, safety, and cultural preservation for all involved.
I speak from the heart when I say that the people being “swept away” deserve much more than being re-traumatized and destabilized for simply trying to survive through a time where almost every local I know is getting “priced out of paradise.”
Ive watched Maui change through my lifetime, I see classmates and old friends, kupuna and entire families lose access to their homes through no fault of their own. These people deserve compassion, they deserve community and care and they deserve respect just like you and me. The majority of the people being harmed by these sweeps are native Hawaiian and kama’aina, kupuna, keiki, mothers, people who work hard every day and still cannot afford to live in a home. They deserve the dignity of stability without fear of losing everything, again and again through inhumane sweeps.
Please start with basic things like trash pickups and regular public works visits to maintain a clean and safe environment and reduce risk of accidental fires around encampment areas. This will have a huge positive impact for all communities.
The resources spent on inhumane sweeps could easily fund programs for Safe Parking, shelters with capacity for pets, disabilities, partners, families, and also help procure spaces for self-managed pu’uhonua locations. People WANT to live and malama aina, they need the space and safety to do so.
In addition to the many ways we can reduce the cruelty of sweeps through the above practices, before any forced relocation, the county must also ask: Are there pet-friendly, partner/family, ADA, and vehicle accommodations? Are beds proximate to jobs, schools, and medical care? Are they stable for more than a night or two? Has a Ka Paʻakai analysis been completed?
Until the county can answer all of these questions positively, there must be a more humane alternative that does not bring further violence and trauma to our communities.
Please prioritize the needs of our most vulnerable community members and amend this bill with compassion and respect in the forefront of your mind.
Mahalo Council members for your time and consideration.
Aloha Councilmembers, I support the amended versions of this bill from Committee Chair Sinenci & Councilmember Johnson. Without these amendments, the bill would be punitive and only contribute to the problem instead of the solution. Specifically itʻs important to include the amended versionsʻ definition of an encampment and inclusion of Kānaka ʻŌiwi constitutional rights explicitly in writing. We must also require that adequate shelter for peopleʻs unique needs are met and stay in the bill.
Studies commissioned by the County agree that sweeps contribute to the problem, not the solution by retraumatizing and destabilizing people who need our help and support. We should invest all the resources spent on this inhumane and outdated practice of sweeps to create more shelters, safe parking, and self-managed puʻuhonua instead. Please refer to ECONorthwestʻs research for more information - we pay for these studies, we need to use the information in them to create fair and just policy. If youʻre worried about cleanliness, start by providing things like trash pickup and see how much that helps.
Before any forced relocation, the County needs to ask: Are there pet-friendly, partner/family, ADA, and vehicle accommodations? Are beds proximate to jobs, schools, and medical care? Are they stable for more than a night or two? Has a Ka Paʻakai analysis been completed?
Unless the county can say yes to all of these questions, you need to hold off on doing anything until they can provide these BASIC things.
Mahalo nui for bringing this issue onto the agenda and prioritizing the needs of our most vulnerable residents. Please amend this bill with compassion at the forefront of your mind.
As an ohana living in Kūʻau with kūpuna and with keiki, we oppose Bill 111. Our biggest concern is safety for our children, kūpuna and neighbors.
Holomua has had over 100 fires in the past year—all human-caused—in an area already full of brush, debris, and abandoned vehicles. Any delay of even 10–45 days puts our homes and families at immediate risk.
We support housing and safe parking solutions, but fire danger cannot wait. Please don’t add more red tape when lives are at stake.
I’m a Kuau resident opposed to Bill 111. This bill will only deepen the problem by fueling the Homeless Advocacy Industry. The reality is simple: the more advocates and programs we fund, the more homelessness grows. This industry, largely supported by Maui County taxpayer dollars, has become a self-sustaining cycle. Just look at the Mayor’s Budget Ordinance to see how much of our money is being funneled into these efforts—yet the situation continues to worsen as the industry expands.
I shouldn’t have to pay for something that directly threatens my safety and quality of life in my own community. It’s time to wake up and recognize that this approach is leading us nowhere.
Aloha Councilmembers and our island communities of Maui County,
I oppose this bill.
I will keep it brief.
I agree that some points are necessary towards the goal of getting help for people amongst the homeless populace that want to stop the cycle they are in and better themselves (as each individual should do in life), but as a whole this bill is highly flawed! It recommends solutions and policy/procedures that DOES NOT take into consideration the already devastating effects that have been occurring in our communities by enabling poor life choices or actions, and not enforcing existing laws and common sense standards of conduct that is what makes civilized communities flourish.
This bill is a liability to the County of Maui (not just the government but the whole community), not an asset.
Thank you for the opportunity to express my vote and brief opinion.
We live in Kuau and are constantly terrified that the neighborhood will be burned down by fires started at Holomua Road!! The almost daily fire engine sirens are a constant reminder of this huge risk to our neighborhood and the town of Paia.
From the Keiki:
We are Keiki that live in Kuau. Please focus on our safety. When we go to Hookipa there are people filling water jugs, taking showers, driving fast and through there. Our street and the Kuau store have more people wondering around - 1 with a knife on his belt, laying in the grass passed out, peeing on the side of the road and we feel unsafe. We had a fire back and got robbed from drug users when we were really small and now terrified we will have another one or something will happen. Please do not pass this Bill and focus more on enforcing the current laws and moving the encampments to a designated safe spot for them and us.
Stop avoiding the insanity that is Holomua. If you want to continue to have extreme fire risk and rampant crime, this bill and Gabe Johnson are for you! I can't wait for the next council elections where I will be telling every single person I meet about how Gabe Johnson doesn't care about Kuau residents.
Living on the fence line I am one of the closest properties to Holomua encampments. Frequent fires, sometimes of entire vehicles creates toxic smoke along with extreme risk of wild fires. The smoke often wakes me in the middle of the night. In addition to weekly Maui FD trips I have witnessed uncontrolled wildfires which due to strong winds are a real threat to all living in the Paia area. No sanitation results in runoff into the ocean which so many residents use on a daily basis. There has to be a better location closer to town and further from the ocean to set up encampments. Yet more inaction is not a solution. Please work toward ending this threat to life health and safety for all Paia / Kuau residents. John Nichols 38 Holua Place Kuau.
I would like to withdraw my support for this bill as submitted yesterday. This bill must not pass without mandatory drug and mental health treatment included. The passage of the Federal Executive Order “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets,” issued on July 24, 2025, will make federal funding available to localities and we must not waste this opportunity to obtain help with this serious problem.
ESTABLISH PROCEDURES for the expeditious removal of unpermitted encampments
• This proposed chapter should only codify lawful established procedures utilized by the County of Maui by providing clear guidelines on the expeditious removal and prevention of unauthorized encampments.
• Support the County in enforcing public health and safety laws.
• Support the County of Maui’s equal enforcement of laws that apply to everyone in our community, regardless of socio economic status.
• Support the County of Maui protecting, preserving and ensuring safety of our public right of ways, sidewalks, roadways, community spaces, parks, beach parks, community and shorelines.
• While being unsheltered is not a crime, housing status does not determine applicability for enforcement of state code and county ordinances within the County of Maui.
• Support the County’s efforts to restore and properly maintain its properties, ensuring that public spaces are clean, safe and free from unlawful and threatening behavior.
• Support the County of Maui to enforce laws prohibiting unpermitted long-term parking on County property.
• Support the County of Maui’s prioritization of greater community welfare and environment health and safety in public spaces within our community.
• We support and want to facilitate keeping our towns, beaches and roadways clean and safe for all.
• Support the County of Maui providing resources and information for unsheltered people to accept the help that is available- shelter space available with dignified housing for all, drug treatment and mental health facilities are available. Services are offered to support unsheltered people in meeting their own needs; However, it is personal choice to access these services.
• We applaud the County of Maui in the beautification at Amala Pl roadside and County beach park at Kanaha and were relieved to hear that over 25 people who were formerly living in the bushes or on the side of the road were safely housed in existing shelter space -with access to food, water, shower facilities and access to mental/drug abuse facilities.
• Also glad to hear that at Ka Hale A Ke Ola (KHAKO) are able to expand additional emergency shelter space if the need arises, with assistance for those with animals.
• We support the County of Maui in their ability to shelter people as quickly as possible by providing shelter options and notice to vacate to an unpermitted encampment within 10 days (not 45 days). Actually, everyone should be happy- this puts an accelerated time line on providing shelter for the unsheltered.
• As a community, we don't want to encourage folks to continue to live in unsafe and unsanitary conditions on the roadside or in the bushes for as long as is being proposed by Member Johnson (45 days). -We want them to be housed at a shelter with access to services as soon as possible -rather than delay access to sanitary and safe shelter.
• We have heard that there are 3-5 safe parking site proposals out there being worked on -and we support the County providing funding to make them a reality. There are many in our community who would be happy to assist in reaching out to willing landowners to lease land for interim and short term solutions from private sector and identify suitable parcels owned by the County and State for additional proposals.
• With County of Maui budget planning process around the corner, we urge the Mayor and Councilmembers to please allocate significant funding for interim housing solutions; deed-protected, in perpetuity, low- income workforce and affordable housing; extension of the first time home buyer Ho’okumu Hou program; expanded mental health/drug treatment facilities; respite housing (short-term medical recovery for people experiencing homelessness after hospitalization); residential re-entry/transitional housing for the previously incarcerated; safe overnight and safe parking solutions.
• Many fires have begun near and in unpermitted encampments and threaten the health and safety of those living in unsafe conditions. Additionally, fire risk affects the greater community already traumatized by the 2023 wildfires in Kula, South and West Maui.
• The County must lead by example in reducing threat to public health and safety on County owned property -as the County will be held liable when there are deaths or injuries due to negligence, or if the County allows unpermitted activity and dangerous conditions to continue. This bill must support the County to do so in a expeditious manner or don’t pass it.
• Look at the Lahaina fire and how much Hawaiian Electric and Kamehameha Schools are having to pay, our County and our community cannot afford the liability -nor bear the cost of another preventable disaster. We don't want another town burned down or even one more life lost to a preventable situation.
• In times of evacuation due to tsunamis and other disasters, we support the unsheltered to be in a safe shelter space with emergency preparedness on site. Living in the bushes, in parks or on the roadside is unsafe and unnecessarily diverts the attention of first responders and emergency preparedness personnel.
• We support the County of Maui protecting public property through strategies to prevent establishment of unauthorized encampments and illegal dumping through regular outreach, signage, fencing, gates, lighting, digital monitoring, and appropriate land stewardship.
Frequent fires caused by illegal homeless encampments in the brush, including in Maui Lani, is an unacceptable risk to the community (schools, homes, businesses). Please address this issue, giving strong enforcement powers for removing trespassers from areas that pose a threat to nearby homes and development. However, how about also designate a safe outdoor space for the homeless to go?
Kahului homeowner (Maui Lani)
Please allow this note to support bill 111 with the revisions noted most recently.
I am a business owner in Paia, parent to young children and friend to all in the community, even those living unsheltered. Turns out folks donʻt loose their humanity when living unsheltered. They can still talk story, still have hopes and dreams, still joke, still care and need to be cared for. I urge those in the Kuau community to step out of your comfort zone and meet the folks you are criminalizing for existing. Majority are Kanaka, would love to meet their neighbors and often are just handed a tough hand in the game of life. You may even be able to support some of them, instead of shaming them for getting water from Hookipa.
I believe whatever the County and fake state of Hawaii have been doing to "manage" homelessness, IS NOT working. Thereʻs plenty of research and strategies to intervene and support folks living unsheltered, many places are doing this, look across the globe. Not every place on this planet has homelessness issues like Hawaii does, they implement effective strategies for the problem. If we donʻt fix the root problems, we just continue to move folks around this island, traumatizing them and wasting tax payers money. The EcoNorth study did refer to the trauma informed, evidenced based research that can be combined with the current outreach that is happening, to better serve these vulnerable populations. Putting services in place verse penalizing people for existing not only seems humane, it is also COST EFFECTIVE. Win win ya?
Please remember the traumas that Maui County has faced in the past 2 years, which continue to be focused primarily around housing. Many community members are 1 or 2 paychecks away from homelessness. Instead of criminalizing homelessness, the County Council has been awarded may options to solve these problems. Instead of continued deliberation, DO something different!
Mahalo for your time.
Access to a computer and internet may be an issue for those without. Other issues. In this section may be apparent if you think of yourself as houseless.
Regarding this part of the bill:
9.37.110 Online reporting of notices and property logs. A.
Within one business day of the posting of a notice or property log
under this chapter, the County or its designee must upload a copy
of the notice or property lot to a County website. The County website
must include a function that allows encampment occupants to
identify advocates as outreach providers under section 9.37.030 and
for all interested parties and members of the public to be notified
when a new upload is made.
B. The County must maintain and display on the website,
contact information including an email address or telephone
number, to retrieve stored personal property. The telephone number
must have a voicemail and call-back system if staff are unable to
answer calls.
- 10 -
C. Instructions and forms for appeal processes required by
this chapter must be available on this website.
Aloha Chair and Councilmembers,
My name is Nicole Huguenin, and I serve as the Executive Director of Maui Rapid Response.
For two years, community partners like us, service providers, and County staff, including the Mayor’s Office, worked together to shape amendments to Bill 111. These amendments are not optional extras — they are the linchpins that keep this bill from becoming just another sweep policy.
* Shelter precondition: no one is removed unless there is safe, appropriate shelter or an alternative available.
* Cultural safeguards: Native Hawaiian consultation and multilingual notices, because Hawaiians are disproportionately impacted.
* Transparency: public reporting so those impacted and their community know who is displaced, what’s offered, and what’s destroyed.
Last night, the Mayor’s office walked away from these efforts, saying they need “flexibility.” But let’s be clear:
* “Flexibility” means sweeping people with nowhere to go.
* “Flexibility” means ignoring Hawaiian voices on Hawaiian ʻāina.
* “Flexibility” means repeating the same failed cycle we’ve already seen and resulted in a lawsuit.
That is not flexibility. That is harm.
Confusing and contradictory
The Mayor’s statement says sweeps will be balanced by outreach. But in October 2024, Family Life Center testified they do not provide outreach before or after sweeps and will not be connected to enforcement. Despite that, the County continues to list FLC as the main outreach provider and has not updated their long-term contract.
So who is really doing the outreach? Where is the accountability? This contradiction makes the Mayor’s proposal confusing at best, misleading at worst.
Proof from recent sweeps
* Amala Place (2025): People who asked for shelter were given options that didn’t fit. A kūpuna with a dog was offered only a top bunk in a crowded shelter — an impossible choice. They and others were pushed deeper into the bush. Now the County blames them for fire danger, when in fact the sweep itself created that danger by not having adequate shelter options or working collaboratively with others like the state where rooms were available at the former Haggai Institute.
* Ukumehame (2024): Long time residents were displaced without alternatives, on ʻāina with deep cultural meaning. The sweep ignored kuleana and aloha ʻāina, replacing them with police and bulldozers. In fact, the first announcement to residents for this relocation included the burnt down Lahaina shelter and phone number. If they can’t update fliers how can they be trusted with harm-reduction and dignity?
These sweeps destabilized lives, wasted resources, and harmed Hawaiian — exactly what we warned would happen without clear safeguards.
The evidence is already in hand
The EcoNorthwest study (2024) and recent trainers that DHC brought in, like Iain De Jong, both of which this County paid for, could not be clearer:
* Enforcement-first approaches cost more and solve nothing.
* Real progress comes from shelter, coordination, and cultural grounding.
Amala Place and Ukumehame prove the study right. Sweeps push people further into hiding, increase risks like fire, and drain money that could fund shelter or housing.
Our request
Bill 111 can only work with the linchpin amendments intact. Without them, it’s just a new name for old sweeps.
We urge you to:
* Reject the Mayor’s call for “flexibility.”
* Pass Bill 111 only with the shelter precondition, cultural safeguards, and transparency amendments we worked two years together to craft.
Maui already has the evidence, the recommendations, and the community-built solutions. The choice before you is simple:
* More sweeps that waste money and cause harm, or
* Real solutions rooted in aloha, kuleana, and justice.
Please choose solutions.
Mahalo nui loa,
Nicole Huguenin
Executive Director, Maui Rapid Response
I support Bill 111 and its current Amendments. I encourage everyone and especially Kānaka involved in all aspects of government, to nānā i ke kumu; look to the teachers; the `ike of those who served others, so that policy, administration and enforcement might be culturally inspired if not culturally led.
That Ke Kānāwai Māmalahoe would be more than something used in speeches, reports or studies, and that it would be implemented and its practice encouraged, in our communities.
The way our government and its agencies address homelessness, by placing blame for their lack of stable housing, on those experiencing homelessness, is not only far from the foundational `ike of Ke Kānawai Māmalahoe, but also shows the willful violence of “the powers that ʻbeʻ”, who can create meaningful and compassionate systems of care and recovery for those needing community and support, yet insist on feeding and supporting harmful and false narratives that unsheltered folks are mentally ill, lying, drug addicted thieves who refuse help.
A county-funded study by ECONorthwest shows that homelessness stems from housing scarcity and affordability pressures, not personal failure. So, create the systems and capacity to address those.
Bill 111 isnʻt the answer to life, the universe and everything, but does outline the least this county can do, to see the success of helping people over hurting them. It requires sufficient, appropriate shelter accommodations BEFORE encampment removals; and notice, outreach and property storage for those residents.
Housing-led solutions, safe parking options, sanctioned, managed encampments, culturally grounded shelters and accommodations for couples, pets and ADA access, can improve stability and safety and foster connections of trust for the entire community.
Affordable housing was hard to find and keep before the fires. Post-fire, the search is even more strained. Folks are giving up beloved pets, moving off-island, taking on more work and seeing less of their families, to avoid being another kupuna, makua, sibling, friend or neighbor living in a car, tent, bush, on someoneʻs couch or worse.
Please be inspired by the `ike of Ke Kānāwai Māmalahoe. Let it guide you through compassionate and meaningful discussion and later, passage, of Bill 111, as you consider a framework for county administrations and the appropriate departments, to approach and move through situations where the health and best interests of a hui of unsheltered folks guides the path to their recovery.
Aloha Chair Sinenci, Vice-Chair, and Councilmembers,
I support the amendments proposed by Chair Sinenci and Councilmember Johnson. Without them, Bill 111 risks being punitive and retraumatizing, worsening houselessness instead of solving it.
We need solutions, not sweeps. ECONorthwest’s own research shows houselessness is driven by unaffordable housing, not personal failure. Sweeps destabilize people, increase trauma, and drive survival behaviors into less visible but more dangerous spaces. Maui already saw this after the Amala Place sweep.
I also want to acknowledge the very real fears of our neighbors in Kūʻau and Pāʻia. Fires, crime, and unsafe conditions are serious concerns. But scattering people through sweeps only multiplies those dangers. A well-established puʻuhonua would actually reduce fire risk — because when people are given stability, trash pickup, safe cooking methods, and a chance to care for their home, the chaos that fuels unsafe conditions decreases. People care about their home too, whether it’s a hale or a tent. Community-led models like Puʻuhonua o Waiʻanae and Hui Mahiai ʻĀina prove that dignity and safety go hand in hand.
At the same time, Maui County has shown a pattern of favoring luxury developers — like Honuaʻula, where hundreds of affordable units were taken away while developers walked off with nearly half a billion dollars in profit. That is not pono. Imagine how many families could be housed and healed if even a fraction of those resources were redirected to our most vulnerable.
We also need to get creative. There are empty storefronts, warehouses, and underutilized properties in Kahului sitting vacant while our people sleep in brush and cars. Why not repurpose those into transitional housing, safe parking hubs, or indoor puʻuhonua? These spaces are already close to jobs, schools, and medical care. With modest investment, they could provide stability, safety, and dignity far more effectively than endless sweeps.
Bill 111 must ensure that before any encampment action, the County can provide adequate, appropriate shelter — for families, couples, pets, kūpuna, disabled individuals, and vehicle dwellers — proximate to the services they need. It must honor Kānaka ʻŌiwi constitutional rights under Article XII, §7 through Ka Paʻakai analysis. And it must prioritize healing, housing, and public health over displacement.
For too long, Kānaka Maoli have borne the hewa of displacement — from the overthrow of our government, to the taking of our ʻāina, to today’s profit-driven developments that push our people into houselessness. Criminalizing and sweeping those who have already lost the most only repeats the same injustice.
If Maui truly wants to prevent another Lahaina, the answer is not more trauma and instability. It is investing in housing, puʻuhonua, and ʻāina-based solutions that protect both residents and neighbors. Stability, dignity, and aloha ʻāina will create the safety we all deserve.
Please pass the amended version of Bill 111 with compassion and pono.
Mahalo nui,
Maui Tauotaha
Good Morning Chair and Councilmembers, thank you for your service.
I don’t understand why vagrants who are loitering and paying no taxes, who often ignite life threatening fires and engage in criminal conduct, are favored over tax paying law-abiding Hawaii residents.
Doesn’t make sense to me. Do the right thing before the entire North Shore burns down!
Aloha, I am writing in support of Bill 111 with the amendments. I believe Bill 111 with the amendments is a step in the right direction.
The encampment in Holomua poses a very dangerous threat to the safety of residents along the North Shore. I live in Kuau and frequently can smell fires coming from that area as we are directly down wind. This is terrifying to think about as a fire from the encampment combined with a strong North Shore winds could wipe out all of Paia just like Lahaina two years ago.
Additionally, this area has become dangerous as far as criminal activity. It used to serve as a reasonable traffic outlet for locals trying to go up country during the busy tourist seasons. But now is nearly impassible due to illegal structures along the side of the road as well as potential toxic materials in the area. Additionally, driving on this road poses a threat of an automobile versus pedestrian accident, which could lead to fatality.
It is in the communities‘s best interest, and safety to clear out the encampment on Holomua and safely place these individuals in the many housing projects that have sprouted up around the area mainly in Kahului.
No one wants another fire that wipes another one of our towns off the map. Additional regulation and barriers and red tape is definitely not the answer.
Aloha Council and community members,
My name is Nikki Hauptman, I am a fourth generation kama’aina born and raised here on Maui and I write to you today in support of the amended versions of this bill from Committee Chair Sinenci & Council member Johnson.
The amended version’s definition of an ‘encampment’, the inclusion of Kanaka Oiwi constitutional rights explicitly in writing, and the requirement that adequate shelter for peoples needs are met before any forced relocation are crucial amendments to maintain a sense of humanity, dignity, compassion, safety, and cultural preservation for all involved.
I speak from the heart when I say that the people being “swept away” deserve much more than being re-traumatized and destabilized for simply trying to survive through a time where almost every local I know is getting “priced out of paradise.”
Ive watched Maui change through my lifetime, I see classmates and old friends, kupuna and entire families lose access to their homes through no fault of their own. These people deserve compassion, they deserve community and care and they deserve respect just like you and me. The majority of the people being harmed by these sweeps are native Hawaiian and kama’aina, kupuna, keiki, mothers, people who work hard every day and still cannot afford to live in a home. They deserve the dignity of stability without fear of losing everything, again and again through inhumane sweeps.
Please start with basic things like trash pickups and regular public works visits to maintain a clean and safe environment and reduce risk of accidental fires around encampment areas. This will have a huge positive impact for all communities.
The resources spent on inhumane sweeps could easily fund programs for Safe Parking, shelters with capacity for pets, disabilities, partners, families, and also help procure spaces for self-managed pu’uhonua locations. People WANT to live and malama aina, they need the space and safety to do so.
In addition to the many ways we can reduce the cruelty of sweeps through the above practices, before any forced relocation, the county must also ask: Are there pet-friendly, partner/family, ADA, and vehicle accommodations? Are beds proximate to jobs, schools, and medical care? Are they stable for more than a night or two? Has a Ka Paʻakai analysis been completed?
Until the county can answer all of these questions positively, there must be a more humane alternative that does not bring further violence and trauma to our communities.
Please prioritize the needs of our most vulnerable community members and amend this bill with compassion and respect in the forefront of your mind.
Mahalo Council members for your time and consideration.
Aloha Councilmembers, I support the amended versions of this bill from Committee Chair Sinenci & Councilmember Johnson. Without these amendments, the bill would be punitive and only contribute to the problem instead of the solution. Specifically itʻs important to include the amended versionsʻ definition of an encampment and inclusion of Kānaka ʻŌiwi constitutional rights explicitly in writing. We must also require that adequate shelter for peopleʻs unique needs are met and stay in the bill.
Studies commissioned by the County agree that sweeps contribute to the problem, not the solution by retraumatizing and destabilizing people who need our help and support. We should invest all the resources spent on this inhumane and outdated practice of sweeps to create more shelters, safe parking, and self-managed puʻuhonua instead. Please refer to ECONorthwestʻs research for more information - we pay for these studies, we need to use the information in them to create fair and just policy. If youʻre worried about cleanliness, start by providing things like trash pickup and see how much that helps.
Before any forced relocation, the County needs to ask: Are there pet-friendly, partner/family, ADA, and vehicle accommodations? Are beds proximate to jobs, schools, and medical care? Are they stable for more than a night or two? Has a Ka Paʻakai analysis been completed?
Unless the county can say yes to all of these questions, you need to hold off on doing anything until they can provide these BASIC things.
Mahalo nui for bringing this issue onto the agenda and prioritizing the needs of our most vulnerable residents. Please amend this bill with compassion at the forefront of your mind.
Aloha Chair and Councilmembers,
As an ohana living in Kūʻau with kūpuna and with keiki, we oppose Bill 111. Our biggest concern is safety for our children, kūpuna and neighbors.
Holomua has had over 100 fires in the past year—all human-caused—in an area already full of brush, debris, and abandoned vehicles. Any delay of even 10–45 days puts our homes and families at immediate risk.
We support housing and safe parking solutions, but fire danger cannot wait. Please don’t add more red tape when lives are at stake.
Mahalo,
A Concerned Kūʻau Ohana
I’m a Kuau resident opposed to Bill 111. This bill will only deepen the problem by fueling the Homeless Advocacy Industry. The reality is simple: the more advocates and programs we fund, the more homelessness grows. This industry, largely supported by Maui County taxpayer dollars, has become a self-sustaining cycle. Just look at the Mayor’s Budget Ordinance to see how much of our money is being funneled into these efforts—yet the situation continues to worsen as the industry expands.
I shouldn’t have to pay for something that directly threatens my safety and quality of life in my own community. It’s time to wake up and recognize that this approach is leading us nowhere.
Aloha Councilmembers and our island communities of Maui County,
I oppose this bill.
I will keep it brief.
I agree that some points are necessary towards the goal of getting help for people amongst the homeless populace that want to stop the cycle they are in and better themselves (as each individual should do in life), but as a whole this bill is highly flawed! It recommends solutions and policy/procedures that DOES NOT take into consideration the already devastating effects that have been occurring in our communities by enabling poor life choices or actions, and not enforcing existing laws and common sense standards of conduct that is what makes civilized communities flourish.
This bill is a liability to the County of Maui (not just the government but the whole community), not an asset.
Thank you for the opportunity to express my vote and brief opinion.
We live in Kuau and are constantly terrified that the neighborhood will be burned down by fires started at Holomua Road!! The almost daily fire engine sirens are a constant reminder of this huge risk to our neighborhood and the town of Paia.
From the Keiki:
We are Keiki that live in Kuau. Please focus on our safety. When we go to Hookipa there are people filling water jugs, taking showers, driving fast and through there. Our street and the Kuau store have more people wondering around - 1 with a knife on his belt, laying in the grass passed out, peeing on the side of the road and we feel unsafe. We had a fire back and got robbed from drug users when we were really small and now terrified we will have another one or something will happen. Please do not pass this Bill and focus more on enforcing the current laws and moving the encampments to a designated safe spot for them and us.
Stop avoiding the insanity that is Holomua. If you want to continue to have extreme fire risk and rampant crime, this bill and Gabe Johnson are for you! I can't wait for the next council elections where I will be telling every single person I meet about how Gabe Johnson doesn't care about Kuau residents.
Living on the fence line I am one of the closest properties to Holomua encampments. Frequent fires, sometimes of entire vehicles creates toxic smoke along with extreme risk of wild fires. The smoke often wakes me in the middle of the night. In addition to weekly Maui FD trips I have witnessed uncontrolled wildfires which due to strong winds are a real threat to all living in the Paia area. No sanitation results in runoff into the ocean which so many residents use on a daily basis. There has to be a better location closer to town and further from the ocean to set up encampments. Yet more inaction is not a solution. Please work toward ending this threat to life health and safety for all Paia / Kuau residents. John Nichols 38 Holua Place Kuau.