Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 11, Number 10, 1 October 1994 — OHA should heip house Hawaiians [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

OHA should heip house Hawaiians

by The Rev. Moses K. keale, Sr. Trustee, Kaua'i & Ni'ihau No one should be without shelter in paradise. Housing is an issue where there is

far too mueh talk and too little action. Housing is an issue where terminology is tossed around with great confusion. Affordable housing! Market priced housing! Low-ineome housing! Subsidized housing! Then there are the terms of financing. Hula Mae! Fanny Mae! FHA! Veteran's financing, etc. etc. But the bottom line is

building truly affordable quality homes that people want to live in and ean afford to live in. Homes that occupants ean be proud of and want to care for. In Hawai'i, our govemment labels homes

"affordable" that list for $180,000 to $220.000. This is just a little perplexing. I ask the question - affordable to whom? Certainly not to me and my family. Certainly not to the average Hawaiian fam-

ily. Regardless of the financing package, $180,000 is just not affordable to the vast majority of Hawaiian families. Shortly after Hurricane 'Iniki, an organization known as Habitat for Humanity International eame to Hawai'i to render assistance to those who needed shelter. In October 1992. Kaua'i Habitat

for Humanity was born. In the 22 months since they began their operation on Kaua'i, they have completed 17 homes. The average cost of these homes was $56,000 eaeh. Now this is an action plan worth looking

at. How does this program work? This is a "sweat equity" program; a partnership is made with the community of beneficiaries in whieh eaeh family pledges 500 hours of work in the building of eaeh other's homes. Three hundred of these hours are pledged to work on other families' homes while eaeh family invests 200 hours of work in their own home. Through community efforts neighbors are bonded together in a relationship of pride and cooperative spirit. The hours invested reduce the labor cost and provide skills necessary to maintain and improve the property in the future. The program works! I have first-hand experience in watching this program grow and prosper on my island. This is a program worth exploring! It is a meaningful way to extend our assets, address the housing needs of our people, build community spirit and cohesiveness and assure long-

term pride īn the ownership of property. Here is a program whieh places housing above profit. Kaua'i Habitat

also provides no-interest financing for fixed term in a revolving loan program. The on!y thing that it does not provide is a land base on whieh the homes are to be built. OHA should provide leadership in obtaining land for this purpose. In our negotiations we should look at obtaining a land base on whieh this program ean prosper. This is not so difficult! If we aggressively pursue our full entitlements our land base ean easily be negotiated in lieu of monetary reimbursement. With this land we ean duplicate the program with Habitat's assistance; we ean fund the program and finally, we ean really build shelters for all our people. I know this ean be done. I know this should be done. Although I fully endorse exploring every avenue available to us in securing housing for our people, this type of program, whieh will bring immediate relief to a larger populahon, should be our priority and primary objective. If you believe in this, then let us hear from you.