Ninety-seven lives lost, 385 missing, and thousands left grieving. These numbers don’t even begin to cover the damage felt by the West Maui community as a result of the August 2023 wildfires.
The fires started in West Maui, mainly affecting Lahaina, a community center. The damage from the fire has been extensive, with The Independent reporting that much of the blame was placed on Hawaiian officials and their numerous mistakes in the buildup to the fires. According to CNN, the large emergency alarm system implemented all over Hawaii was not set off for the first few minutes of the fire being caused, wasting what could’ve been moments for critical prevention.
A large Bay Area effort has set out to support victims of the Maui fires: a food pantry known as The Hope Hangar. The fundraiser has already raised $10,000.
According to Michelle Stewart, executive director of The Hope Hangar, the food pantry based on Mountain View had a special reason to support those in Hawaii.
“Our team in Honolulu has definitely had people in their community that were directly impacted,” Stewart said. “They wanted to do something and reached out to The Hope Hangar to seek those ways we could partner together. We were uniquely positioned to come together to support it.”
Despite the Vive Church branch in Hawaii being on a different island, Mark Pham, the Honolulu campus pastor, said his group was motivated to help the victims of the fire.
“The churches or the organizations, they rallied alongside with one another, do whatever it takes in order to get the necessary aid and need to the Island of Maui,” Pham said. “It’s just a sister island, and that’s how we would see it: They’re family.”
At first, The Hope Hangar was asking for donations of basic necessities.
“When we first launched, our thinking was ‘we’re going to physically resource them with diapers and wipes and all the things that they would need,’” Stewart said. “So what we did initially was we raised funds here in the mainland, and then sent those funds over to our team in Hawaii in Honolulu and they went to their local Costco stocked up on everything that they could get that they got a list from a local church in Maui.”
This fundraiser got support from other organizations to ensure the resources reached Maui.
“Aloha Air Cargo was primarily one of our biggest partners, because they stood up and rose up just like everyone else did everything for free,” Pham said.
However, these fires have also raised a prominent and controversial question about something inherent to Hawaii: tourism. More specifically, whether non-locals are getting more attention and aid than locals.
“The reason why a lot of people are speaking about there being outsiders that are getting more aid than the locals is because they’re trying to relocate the people that are not from there,” Pham said. “So that mediates the impact and the need to support people in that area and just focus on the people that actually live there with their roots and their families grounded there.”
When asked about whether tourists should cancel their vacation trips or continue them as planned, Pham says that there is a fine line to walk.
“We do understand that the state of Hawaii is built primarily on tourism,” Pham said. “The only expectation that the locals have is yes, continue tourism in order to sustain the infrastructure and the requirements of the economy, but be cognitive of the morale within the city and respect that and honor that.”
To help support the affected victims, The Hope Hangar is still accepting donations at this link. These relief efforts have been greatly felt by the local community in Maui.
“You have lots of people within one home that had like three or four generations living dead, the grandparents, the parents are simply in they just lost everything,” Stewart said. “So we’ve come around and we’re getting notes directly back from the families not thanking us for our support.”