According to reports, California Governor Gavin Newsom has been discussing the best course of action with Hawaii Governor Josh Green as the state attempts to recover from the wildfires that tore through the Los Angeles region.
The road to recovery will be lengthy if California’s efforts are similar to those of Hawaii.
In August 2023, wildfires devastated the Hawaiian island of Maui, burning the town of Lahaina and seriously damaging neighboring communities.
Over 2,000 residential properties were destroyed or seriously damaged, according to statistics gathered by the Real Property Assessment Division of Maui County.
Since these properties consist of multifamily structures, there are probably more individual units that have been damaged or destroyed.
According to a housing dashboard released by the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, the fires damaged 3% of the island’s total housing stock.
According to county data supplied with Reason, three of those properties had been rebuilt as of last week, about a year and a half after the fires. The third house is in the Upcountry region of the island, while the other two are at Lahaina.
112 dwellings are already under construction, and 228 more building licenses have been received for wildfire rehabilitation.
According to Joe Kent, executive vice president of Honolulu’s Grassroot Institute of Hawaii and a former resident of Lahaina, Hawaii used to be excellent at this.
In 1992, Hurricane Iniki damaged 2,000 homes on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, but most of those homes were rebuilt within a year, Kent said.
According to Kent, there have been many more rules since then. Even in cases of emergency, it has become difficult to lift goods due to the bureaucracy created by those restrictions.
The Grassroot Institute released a paper in July 2024 that listed some of the regulatory obstacles to Maui’s reconstruction. Long wait periods for permits and exorbitant permission fees are two examples.
The cost of rebuilding might increase by tens of thousands of dollars due to permit fees. According to county permitting records, six-month wait durations are not unusual, and some applicants have had to wait over a year for permits to reconstruct single-family houses.
The creation of a private permission bureau to aid in obtaining permits quickly was essential to accelerating the reconstruction process after Hurricane Iniki.
Maui just opened one of these offices. In order to speed up the process, the county opened a privately run Recovery Permitting Center in April 2024.
The county’s permitting bureau had a wait time of about 200 days even prior to the fires. Wait periods at the Recovery Permitting Center have been shortened to about 70 days.
Because of tougher zoning laws, several buildings on Maui were deemed non-conforming prior to the fire. Buildings that have been at least 50% destroyed are required by county zoning law to be rebuilt utilizing more recent, stringent zoning regulations.
Many of the buildings in Lahaina cannot be reconstructed in their original configuration since they were non-conforming structures before the fires. The new regulations require that some damaged apartments be rebuilt with fewer units.
A bill that would have permitted the reconstruction of non-conforming structures in their current condition was passed by the county Planning Commission in February 2024. The law has not yet received final approval from the Maui County Council.
Given that Lahaina and other impacted areas are close to the coast, the state’s Special Management Area law, which imposes additional approval and public hearing procedures on new development, has also been a barrier.
The majority of single-family house building is already excluded from that law. Additionally, Green exempted multifamily projects from the Special Management Area regulation. Rules requiring new residences to be connected to a sewage system have been waived by the state health department.
However, the state government has also retreated from its plan to streamline regulations, which might further expedite reconstruction work.
Green announced a broad, contentious emergency declaration just prior to the July 2023 fires, suspending the majority of Hawaii’s development regulations and establishing a state commission to approve housing projects under a more relaxed, accelerated regulatory framework.
Free market proponents in Hawaii responded to Green’s YIMBY martial law proclamation with a mix of praise and criticism, arguing that while the governor was correct to point out regulations as a barrier to homebuilding, he was incorrect to attempt to unilaterally suspend them.
Green was sued for power abuse by a group of more left-leaning detractors, including Native Hawaiian cultural organizations, the Sierra Club, and the Hawaii chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
They said the governor’s streamlining directive amounted to attempted genocide and despotism.
Green immediately changed his mind after receiving this feedback. He issued a second, far more limited order that allowed local governments to hire private, third-party permitters and waive payments.
Interestingly, Lahaina was not granted several of these less extensive regulatory exceptions under the decree.
Serious humanitarian repercussions have also resulted from the island’s protracted reconstruction. About 5,000 individuals were still in emergency shelters as a result of the Maui fires in January 2024, almost six months after the flames, according to the federal government’s annual homelessness survey.
According to Jonathan Helton, a researcher at the Grassroot Institute, the situation for restoring commercial buildings is much more dire than the slow pace of residential reconstruction operations.
Commercial rebuilds are nevertheless subject to the full effect of the Special Management Area law. Before building permits can be granted, at least two public hearings—and possibly more—must be held if the demolished business is also located inside a historic preservation district.
Helton claims that many Maui people are essentially underinsured due to the escalating cost of building materials, which adds unanticipated expenditures to any reconstruction effort.
It will be necessary for those reconstructing their homes to have a place to work, shop, or visit the doctor.
“I think it’s going to be much harder for Lahaina to come back if none of these businesses are allowed to move because the state and county don’t change anything,” Helton adds.
When reconstructing, time is a major consideration. “People will just give up and leave if it’s so hard to rebuild,” Kent adds.
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Eliot Pierce is a dedicated writer for ChiefsFocus.com, covering local crime and finance news. With a keen eye for detail and a passion for storytelling, Eliot aims to provide his readers with clear and insightful analysis, helping them navigate the complexities of their financial lives while staying informed about important local events. His commitment to delivering accurate and engaging content makes him a valuable resource for the community.