LIHU‘E — Kaua‘i joined other counties in Hawai‘i in having Mayor Derek S.K. Kawakami issue a proclamation on Tuesday designating January as Human Trafficking Prevention Month.
Kawakami said human trafficking is here after seeking an answer to a question he had during the early months as mayor. His declaration was agreed with by Kanani Lovell Obatake of the Child Welfare Service and the human trafficking issue coordinator on the island.
A group of community agencies and organizations collected to hear the mayor and others speak on the issue and its existence on Kaua‘i.
The proclamation provided a definition for “human trafficking involves recruiting, harboring, transporting, providing or obtaining a human being for the purpose of a commercial sex act, labor, or services by means of force, fraud, coercion, or if the person induced to perform sex acts has not reached 18 years of age.”
“The first documented case of sex trafficking in Hawai‘i was in 1815 when an 8-year-old girl with an English father and a Kanaka ‘Oiwi mother was sold by her father to American sailors for sex,” said Dr. Nikki Cristobal, who is a policy and research specialist for the nonprofit Pouhana O Na Wahine and the lead investigator for the Missing and Murdered Native Hawaiian Women, Girls.
Cristobal said the girl escaped, and eventually a kapu was placed on prostitution.
Despite the kapu placed in 1825, prostitution persisted.
“Today, there are more than 100 identified businesses and locations used for sex trafficking in Hawai‘i,” Cristobal said.
Kawakami said the most important part of the proclamation is that human trafficking prevention requires a coordinated, community-wide response.
Several activities, including the Red Sand Project and a Kaua‘i sign waving campaign on Jan. 11 from 4 to 6 p.m. fronting the historic County Building, are ways people can get involved in raising awareness about human trafficking.
“The Red Sand Project is an international public art demonstration that raises awareness about human trafficking,” Cristobal said. “They have partnered with the missing and murdered native Hawaiian women, girls, mahu movement to donate red sand to pour in our communities to aid in breaking the silence about forms of violence we all see yet not enough of us acknowledge.”
She added, “The eco-friendly red sand is poured into the cracks of public sidewalks. Each grain of sand represents a life that slips through the cracks of our systems. Red represents the lifeblood of those we lose.”
