Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 28, Number 6, 1 June 2011 — CHANGING THE VISION AT DHHL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]
CHANGING THE VISION AT DHHL
ByTreenaShapiro \ew Hawaiian Homes Commission Chairman Alapaki Nahale-a wants to know what it would take to get Department of Hawaiian Home Lands beneficiaries off the waitlist and into homes. "The best way to make the highest use of our limited resources is to be market-driven - to know where our homesteaders are at, what they ean afford, where they want to hve - and build to meet those needs," he says. In recent years the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands has placed a greater emphasis on offering high-quality affordable homes on O'ahu, such as the $225,000 to $300,000 lots being developed in Kapolei. However, more alternative housing options are needed to whittle away at the 21,000 residential waitlist. "We're building a product that only a certain percentage of our waitlist ean qualify for. The truth is most of the folks on our waitlist have been offered a house or a homestead, probabfy mukiple times, but
they've passed on it for various reasons," Nahale-a points out. As a result, while hundreds of units are available on other islands, including many of the first homesteads in Kona, people often end up waiting years, or even decades, for the right offering, particularfy if they're wait-
ing for a lot on O'ahu, whieh has the smallest inventory of any island, and 80 percent of demand. Nahale-a has requested funding to eonduct a deep assessment of the existing waithst and to create a digital database in order to better understand the needs of the applicants and plan future development based on demand and the kinds of products homesteaders ean qualify for. It's a challenge, but Nahele-a is an optimist. "It's easy to say it can't be done," he points out.
"Sometimes you have to change the vision and energy and ask, 'What ean we do?' " Nahale-a has set a goal of awarding 200 homesteads a year, whieh he considers as a manageable number in line with past perfonnance. "I'd like to do more than that, but I'm a realist. To be honest, it may be a stretch. If we do it, I'd be proud. If we don't do it, I want to know why," he says. At the same time, Nahale-a wants to explore alternative housing options to give beneficiaries greater access to residential homesteads, as well as offer more agricultural and pastoral lots for fanning and ranching. "We want to continue to develop what we already do well," he says, adding, "We don't want to take away anything we do, but just complement it." Trying to build quality connnunities with limited resources has been a persistent challenge. The Department has one rent-to-own project and limited kupuna dwellings, but the majority of its offerings are two- to five-bedroom single famify homes. That leaves few options for beneficiaries who are stmggling financially and Nahale-a wants to change
that. "We're going to be very aggressive in this tenn about trying to address that issue and offer other kinds of homestead opportunities," he says. One possibility is building multifamily units, such as townhouses, whieh could reduce the cost of a new home to $140,000 from $200,000, Nahale-a explains. He has also proposed offering rental units, whieh is a bit more complicated. When the Department awards homestead leases, it gets paid back for the cost of building a home. That cost wouldn't be recouped with rental properties. But Nahale-a is clear that his intent is not to turn the Department into a housing agency. His vision is to provide affordable rental units for a fixed period to applicants who have reached their turn on the waithst, but who need financial counseling, support services and time to improve their credit before they ean make the transition to homeowner. "I want to prove that altemative housing options work," Nahale-a says. "I can't build homesteads for several thousand Hawaiians, but at the very least we ean show that those families ean access homesteading if we give them different opportunities." Nahele-a, who was bom and raised in the Keaukaha and Pana'ewa homestead communities in Hilo, feels a profound indebtedness to the Prince Kūhiō Trust for the opportunities his family was given. Although he is no longer a homesteader himself, some of his professional and community work reflects his deep eonneetion to the Big Island homestead communities. Prior to his appointment as Director of the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, he led a Hawaiian immersion charter school on Hawaiian Home Lands in Keaukaha and served on the Hawaiian Homes Commission from 2008. Appfying to be the Hawaiian Homes Commission Chairman was a weighty decision, however, and one he made with his wife and four children. Hawai'i Island remains their home and Nahele-a, 43, commutes to his office in Kapolei. It's hard to be away from home and family during the week, but he views his position more as kuleana than work. "I realfy beheve the Govemor is sincere in his belief that as Hawaiians rise, everyone rises," Nahale-a says. "I think we have this opportunity to work in partnership with the goveinment and in partnership with eaeh other, to raise the tide for us all." ■ This is tliefirst in a series ofprofiles ofnewly eonfirmed Native Hawaiian leaders in the Abercrombie administration. Next month: Sunshine Topping, Director ofthe Department ofHuman Resources Development. Treena Shapiro, afreelance writer, is aformer reporterfor the Honolulu Star-Bulletin and Honolulu Advertiser.
LAND & WATER
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Department of Hawaiian Home Lands Director Alapaki Nahale-a grew up in Keaukaha and Pana'ewa homesteads in Hilo. To this day, he feels indebted to the trust that Prince Kūhiō, pietured in haek, helped to establish. - Photo: Courtesy of DHHL