Disaster Preparedness for Future Wildfires
While much of the focus on the Hawaiian island has been on putting out fires and helping survivors, residents have also had to grapple with issues related to disaster response. With 111 confirmed dead and the number of missing persons rising, residents are rightly asking questions about why sirens were not used to alert people to evacuate their homes and why warnings from experts were not heeded.
Hawaii’s Maui fire lawyers geography, which is thousands of miles from the continental US, has made this response a complex puzzle with lots of moving parts. A combination of local and federal government agencies must coordinate to get help to the affected areas. But the fact that many of these agencies have come under fire has added to frustrations.
The head of the Maui Emergency Management Agency, Herman Andaya, resigned Thursday after his controversial statements about the use of sirens during the fires that ravaged Lahaina. Andaya had said he had no regrets about not using the sirens, which could have helped residents avoid clogged roads and other problems as they fled their homes. His resignation came as residents blasted the lack of coordination and communication during the fires.
Do Maui Fire Lawyers Offer Guidance on Disaster Preparedness for Future Wildfires?
While Hawaii’s government officials face a barrage of criticism for failing to evacuate residents and warn them of danger, there are people in the state trying to make things better. One example is Boots On the Ground Maui, a nonprofit group that is mobilizing donated funds to assist with recovery and rebuilding in Lahaina and other devastated communities on the island.
This non profit organization has already raised $35M from donors in over 40 countries and is working quickly to understand evolving needs on the ground and deploy the funds for high impact. In the short term, the money will go to helping displaced families with temporary housing, food, supplies and even veterinary care for animals that have been lost or injured during the fires.
One of the biggest concerns among displaced residents is that developers will try to buy up land in their neighborhoods. It is a fear shared by residents of other places like Paradise, California and northern New Mexico where outsiders bought up property after wildfires. Many fear such a land grab will accelerate a trend of Native Hawaiian families leaving the state for affordable housing elsewhere in the country.
Another concern is that the resale of property will lead to a loss of Hawaiian culture. That is a worry shared by Cathy Loeffler, president of a community-based foundation that works to preserve Hawaiian culture in Lahaina. She says that she fears the sale of homes to outsiders will cause a mass exodus of multi-generational Hawaiian families from Hawaii and destroy the Hawaiian way of life. For that reason, she is pushing for a moratorium on foreclosures to protect Hawaiian culture. She believes that a community-based approach is best in the long run. She is working with the Hawaii Alliance for Progressive Action and other state and local groups to document unsolicited offers to purchase properties in Lahaina, which was once the capital of a kingdom that was overthrown in a U.S. backed coup in 1893.