The devastating wildfires that killed at least 115 people occurred below West Maui Land Company’s developments and the Hawaiian communities that rely on the water.
in more than a century, a developer of land around a threatened Maui community urgently asked state officials for permission to divert water from streams to fight the growing inferno.
"This is a 2023 rendition of what’s been happening in Lahaina for centuries," said Kapua‘ala Sproat, director of the Native Hawaiian law center at the University of Hawaii. Native Hawaiians have long fought to protect what they consider a sacred resource. Stream diversions continued even after the plantations closed, and booming development contributed to West Maui’s arid conditions. The West Maui Land Company’s subdivision — including multimillion-dollar gated homes that use diverted water — was untouched by the Lahaina fires, noted Native Hawaiians who live off the streams and farm taro, a cultural staple.
"No one is happy there was water in the streams while our homes, our businesses, our lands, and our lives were reduced to ash," the company said. The letter said the company requested "approval to divert more water from the streams so we could store as much water as possible for fire control" at 1 p.m. on the day of the fire, but that they were directed to first inquire with a downstream taro farmer.
The letters caused such a commotion that the state Department of Land and Natural Resources re-assigned Manuel, drawing a lawsuit from West Maui residents decrying the move. The department said in a statement that Manuel’s reassignment didn’t suggest he did anything wrong, but would allow officials to focus on Maui.
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