Upcountry

October 28-29, 2025 in Keʻanae, Wailuku, and Haʻikū

Join the East Maui Water Authority and the Public Finance Initiative to continue the discussion on community needs and priorities for the East Maui Watershed. Together, we will identify and define the East Maui Water Authority’s priority projects, then learn about how we can secure the funding needed to bring them to life.

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Keʻanae: Project Prioritization Workshop

Tuesday, October 28th
4:30pm to 8:00pm
Keʻanae Uka

The purpose of this workshop is for the Keʻanae Community to prioritize EMWA projects that meet community needs discussed in the June 2025 Community Conversation Series and introduce funding & participatory voting to bring these projects to life.

Agenda:

• Opening & Recap of Past Workshops
• Identifying Projects to Meet Community Needs
• Project Prioritization & Funding Tools & Strategies
• Participatory Voting to create a community-generated list of projects

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Hybrid/Wailuku: Public Financing Strategies “From Vision to Action”

Wednesday, October 29th
1:00pm to 3:00pm
J Walter Cameron Center
95 Mahalani St, Wailuku, HI 96793
Join online at: https://events.gcc.teams.microsoft.com/event/562e9356-6ea6-46d1-a1ed-dc5bbe87adc6@34eeab25-8035-4064-b154-7b5fa295796f

The purpose of this session is for county officials and other interested stakeholders to dive deeper into public financing strategies to move from a shared vision to tangible actions and implementation. The work of East Maui Water Authority will be a case study, but the themes discussed can be applied to any public projects related to infrastructure.

Agenda:

• Opening & Recap of Past Workshops
• Financing Strategies Presentation
• Breakout Groups: From Vision to Actions
• Reflections on the Path Forward, Maintaining Momentum & Accountability

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Haʻikū: Project Prioritization Workshop

Tuesday, October 28th
6:00pm to 9:00pm
Haʻikū Community Center
Pilialoha St, Haiku, HI 96708

The purpose of this workshop is for the Haʻikū & Upcountry Community to prioritize EMWA projects that meet community needs discussed in the June 2025 Conversation Series and introduce funding & participatory voting to bring these projects to life.

Agenda:

• Opening & Recap of Past Workshops
• Identifying Projects to Meet Community Needs
• Project Prioritization & Funding Tools & Strategies
• Participatory Voting to create a community-generated list of projects

Maui community members and water resource experts met June 16-18 to support Maui residents in shaping a sustainable, equitable, and community-led future for East Maui’s watershed. The meetings focused on community-driven solutions for water resource management to ensure a healthy resilient ecosystem, thriving local communities, and water availability for food security.

Meetings in Keʻanae, Haʻikū, and Kula provided an opportunity for in-depth community conversations with residents of the Nāhiku, Keʻanae, Honomanū, and Huelo State of Hawaii License Areas, as well as Upcountry residents and farmers who are allocated 5.75 million gallons of day for agricultural and residential use.

The next series of meetings focused on Project Prioritization and Funding will take place on October 28 and 29, 2025. View Event Details

Day 1 began in Keʻanae with a tour from Keʻanae to Nāhiku in order to ensure that participants understood the hydrology and mechanics of the East Maui Irrigation system and to ground them in the history of its impacts. Attendees of the tour included residents of the lease areas, as well as stakeholders from throughout the island and journalists (Read the news stories from Overstory Hawaii & Maui Now).

The meetings included an update from East Maui Water Authority Director Gina Young, Group Break-Out Sessions and Reporting Out, and Expert Presentations from the Public Finance Initiative. Discussion questions for each break-out session were tailored to the unique history, geography, and needs of each area.

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Summary of Themes & Feedback from this June 2025 Series of Community Conversations

While the Keʻanae, Haʻikū, and Kula communities have unique priorities and perspectives, all 3 communities shared core concerns about community empowerment, infrastructure, equity, education, ecosystem health, and a call for transparency/accountability.

And the unique characteristics of each community were also clear:

Keʻanae’s concerns center on generational stewardship amid a commitment to encouraging a return of younger generations and cultural continuity —  in response to the outmigration that resulted from plantation-era water diversion. There is a push for workforce development and solutions to reconnect youth with kupuna to address these concerns, as well as policy reforms that redress historic inequities.

Haʻikū-Huelo’s dialogue reflects a diverse population where both Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian residents share a commitment to cultural and environmental stewardship. The pain of land and water privatization is felt collectively, and even young people—regardless of heritage—voice grief about changes such as drying streams and diminished opportunities for traditional activities, strengthening joint calls for indigenous rights and careful scrutiny of outside actors in water governance.

Kula’s meeting spotlighted deep frustration over long water meter waitlists and fragmented infrastructure, which has resulted in water waste, as well as concerns that new water sources and upgrades are often prioritized for projects outside Upcountry Maui. This sense of inequity is compounded by skepticism toward proposed rate increases, and strong dissatisfaction over the absence of a comprehensive plan and perceived government inaction on Upcountry priorities. 

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Presentations & Surveys

Following the community discussions, four experts from the Public Finance Initiative gave presentations describing how to finance the community’s vision, presenting examples of indigenous governance of land and water projects on the continent, providing guidelines for ensuring decisions align with community values, and detailing a case study of a water utility’s approach to address environmental, sustainability, and indigenous issues. 

“Funding Your Aspirations: A Public Finance Primer” by Lourdes German

Presentation Slides: Full PFI Team Presentation Slides (Kula meeting version) – View/Download

Survey Results

As part of this conversation series, we sent out surveys to the Haʻikū and Kula Communities. Survey results as of September 2025 are available to review below, feel free to respond to the survey if you haven’t already.

• Haʻikū Community Survey Results: View/Download (updated Sept 2025)
  • Click here to fill out Haʻikū survey (if you haven’t already)
• Kula Community Survey Results: View/Download (updated Sept 2025)
  • Click here to fill out Kula survey (if you haven’t already)