HILO, Hawai‘i — A downtown Hilo homeless shelter was closed and relocated elsewhere in town this week, to the surprise of some of its new neighbors.
Hawaii County on July 5 erected a temporary shelter on Ponahawai Street in advance of an impending audit by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of a nearby storm drain. To comply with the audit, the county needed to move a group of homeless people who were camping in the drain.
“There wasn’t a lot of notice for the audit,” said county Housing Administrator Susan Kunz. “The quickest move was for us to set up a shelter right next to the canal, since it was on county land. We knew we’d be there only for a limited time.”
On Wednesday that time ran out. The county dismantled the Ponahawai shelter and relocated its 15 remaining occupants to a new shelter on Kuawa Street — a short road connecting Manono Street and Mamalahoa Highway just mauka of Kamehameha Avenue.
The relocation was performed via a partnership between the county and nonprofits including Hope Services Hawai‘i, Project Vision Hawai‘i, the Neighborhood Place of Puna, Going Home Hawai‘i and Salvation Army Hawai‘i.
Kunz, who was at the site of the new encampment Wednesday, said the county had set itself an administrative deadline to dismantle the Ponahawai camp by the end of July. With the International Va‘a Federation’s World Sprints to be held beginning Aug. 13, she said the Department of Parks and Recreation needs to prepare the Ponahawai site for an influx of visitors.
According to a news release from the mayor’s office, the Ponahawai site has been restored to its original condition and is serving as an extension of the Wailoa Soccer Fields under the management of Parks and Rec.
The new camp, on a private lot adjacent to the Extra Space Storage facility, was secured through an arrangement with the owner, who Kunz said lives on Maui and “wants to give back to the community.” The terms of that arrangement allow the county to use the site as a shelter through the end of December.
“We’re hoping we won’t need it for that long,” Kunz said.
The occupants of the new shelter — named the “Ponahawai Short-Term Shelter at Kuawa” on a sign — will only be the remaining residents from the previous camp.
Kunz said the downtown Hilo site began with about 40 former storm drain occupants, but that number has diminished. Some left the camp on their own, others broke rules and were made to leave, and still others were connected with homeless services.
In what Kunz called “a bit of tough love,” residency at the Kuawa camp comes with a condition: All residents must register for assistance.
“If you’re coming here, then you want to be helped,” Kunz said. “If you don’t want to be helped, there’s nothing we can do.”
Kunz said a major challenge at the Ponahawai site was not the difficulty of keeping residents in it, but in keeping out visitors. The Kuawa site already had a chain-link fence around it before the camp was established, and will have 24/7 security to keep the peace.
Although Kunz said she has been reaching out to neighboring businesses about the Kuawa camp — she said Wednesday that she had spoken to “about half” of the nearby businesses and was continuing to meet with them during the day — some were still surprised and concerned by the development.
An employee at the nearby Waiakea Health Center said he first learned about the development from an article in the Tribune-Herald on Wednesday morning. As he was speaking with reporters, Kunz approached him to discuss the camp.
One woman — who asked not to be identified — at a nearby business said she was extremely concerned about the safety implications and that she had only been informed of the camp Monday evening.
“Customers are afraid to come here,” the woman said. “And I’m afraid for the safety of our workers.”
The woman added that people at other businesses have said they received even less notice than she had.
“Our tax dollars are going to this private property owner,” she said. “Why don’t they just use county land?”
The woman laid the blame for the whole situation at the foot of the county administration.
“I don’t usually vote,” she said. “But I’m absolutely voting this year.”
The new camp is a separate endeavour from a planned emergency overnight sleeping shelter that the county will open in late this month at the Salvation Army in downtown Hilo. That shelter will house up to 25 people per evening, although Kunz said it will differ from the Kuawa camp in that it will require occupants to sign in each night and sign out each morning.
