Ulalia Woodside Lee

Make Investments to Protect Our ʻĀina

By Ulalia Woodside Lee and Puni Jackson

Last year, we saw firsthand the devastating consequences of not being attentive to ʻāina, when raging fires on Maui and Hawai‘i island caused unprecedented destruction. These avoidable disasters were exacerbated by numerous environmental issues, including invasive brush and drought conditions driven by climate change.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

We can act now to aloha ʻāina. By adequately funding conservation, we not only preserve our islands’ unique native plants and animals and the lands that nurture our health and well-being, we protect communities from further devastation while investing in our natural heritage for future generations.

Surveys show that this is what the people of Hawai‘i value.

A statewide poll commissioned by The Nature Conservancy and the Care for ʻĀina Now coalition showed 99% of voters agree that our beaches, reefs and parks are essential to Hawai‘i’s quality of life. An overwhelming 97% believe that it is our kuleana, or responsibility, to protect our ocean and lands for future generations.

Significantly, 4 out of 5 Hawai‘i voters believe that state government programs are critical to protecting natural resources. These results are striking considering that many of us no longer have the opportunity to directly experience Hawai‘i’s healthiest native ecosystems, which remain protected by being remote and inaccessible.

While we may not often get the chance to walk through a native cloud forest, harvest maile or see the scarlet flash of an ‘i‘iwi in flight, we are still in pilina—connected to ʻāina through relationship.

The people of Hawai‘i understand that the pilina between us and our environment is unbreakable. Even if we never walk among ‘ohi‘a lehua, we know they are why we have fresh, clean water. Even if we never see native birds, we know they are part of our ‘ohana. We are all connected. That is why we must act now to invest in conservation and stewardship before the next disaster.

There are many ways to invest. Places like Ho‘oulu ʻĀina, a 100-acre nature preserve in Kalihi Valley, demonstrate how caring for the ʻāina connects and heals us. A project of Kokua Kalihi Valley (KKV), we celebrate the reciprocal benefit of caring for land and human health.

We know we have the power to change; we’ve done it before. At a time when Hawaiian language and traditional practices were nearly extinct, our kumu imagined a different future, a pono future. They took action.

Today, ‘olelo Hawai‘i is spoken in our streets, canoe voyaging traditions connect the world and keiki are born into a world where aloha ʻāina is normalized.

Today, we are the ones imagining a pono future. We imagine a future with clean air and water, healthy reefs, thriving forests and native birds from mauka to makai.

We imagine a future safer from disasters like fire and flood. And we imagine a future where Hawai‘i’s people find healing and connection through access to healthy native forests and shorelines.

But to get there, we need to invest and act. Investing in nature means growing your knowledge, building your pilina and getting serious about land management tools. It also means sharing stories of the land and dreams for the future. It means appropriately funding conservation and natural resource management.

Join us in calling on our state lawmakers to invest in aloha ʻāina—may our actions today create a pono future for our beloved Hawai‘i.

Ulalia Woodside Lee is executive director for The Nature Conservancy, Hawai‘i and Palmyra; Puni Jackson is Hoʻoulu ʻĀina director for Kōkua Kalihi Valley Comprehensive Family Services.

From the Star Advertiser

Column: Celebrating aloha ‘aina means stewardship, funding

By Ulalia Woodside Lee and Kamanamaikalani Beamer

April 20, 2025

When poor land management and a quickly changing planet collide, we witness frightening natural disasters. Some seem to happen suddenly, as with the fire that destroyed Lahaina or the wildfires that engulfed large parts of Los Angeles. Some happen almost invisibly, as with the decline of our Native Hawaiian honeycreepers. But they happen because our actions are not in balance with our environment.

These disasters call on us, the people of Hawaii, to do better. They serve as stark reminders of the need to return to a reciprocal relationship with the natural world. Grounded in the sustaining and timeless values of aloha ʻaina, we have the blueprint for thriving communities and nature.

We recognize that a quickly changing planet is connected to carbon emissions, damages to our waterways, oceans and forests, and an extractive economic system. Across the world we are trying to fix this. We need to pivot toward our ancestral values, to a relationship of reciprocity.

The advanced stewardship systems and practices of our ancestors formed an ancestral circular economy which ensured ‘aina momona (flourishing lands which feed) from mauka to makai, sustaining a population roughly equal to ours today. They recognized the regenerative relationships between forests, streams, lo‘i (pond fields), loko i‘a (fishponds) and the ocean which are as pertinent and relevant today as they were 400 years ago.

As we care for our lands and waters today, we must relearn the deep interconnectedness of our natural world, water, forest, stream and ocean with life and the economy. We must adapt our approaches so we can navigate new challenges and build resilience to threats.

This approach is about more than protection or preservation. It is about understanding — and executing — our practices for resilient and thriving island communities. For example, community-led ‘aina-based collaboration on every Hawaiian island demonstrates how to deploy ancestral principles to contemporary challenges. In places like Ha‘ena, He‘eia, Ka‘upulehu, Miloli‘i, Kipahulu and Mo‘omomi, local leaders and nonprofits work together in returning abundance to coastlines through the creation of community-based subsistence fishing areas, restoration of traditional mariculture and agriculture systems, and state and voluntary rest areas.

On Maui near Olowalu and on Hawaii island in Kealakekua and Kahuwai bays, The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and community leaders are restoring and planting coral reefs. At Kuamo‘o near Keauhou on Hawai‘i Island, Aloha Kuamo‘o ‘Aina (AKA) is restoring the intellectual and physical landscape into a refuge for learning and integration of indigenous culture in modern life.

Yet these practices cannot continue without reliable funding rooted in our collective responsibility to ‘aina. Hawai‘i faces a $560 million funding gap to preserve nature and support our communities. Never has stable, local funding been more important than now, as federal agencies and programs are suffering significant cuts in budgets and staffing.

We urge elected officials to create an environmental stewardship fee, paid by visitors, to close the funding gap and provide steady resources for restoration, conservation and management. More than 75% of visitors surveyed support the fee, which would be used for community safety from fires and floods and resiliency for water and food production. It would create economic opportunity for residents through ‘aina-based jobs and protect public health with clean water for our families.

Our current situation calls us to rethink our relationship with the Earth and to shift from exploitation to stewardship, from overconsumption to conservation, and toward proven traditional practices that guide modern sustainability.

As we mark Earth Day this Tuesday and Earth Month 2025, may we all do our parts to discover, learn, embrace and commit to the values of aloha ‘aina in our lives.

Ulalia Woodside Lee is executive director, The Nature Conservancy Hawaii and Palmyra; Kamanamaikalani Beamer, Ph.D., is a professor and director of Kamakakuokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies, University of Hawaii-Manoa.