HCDA and Oahu sacred site

SUBHEAD: An area designated as a very sacred burial site is being desecrated By HCDA in Kalaleoa.

By John Bond on 7 February 2014 for Kanehili Cultural Hui -
(http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2014/02/hcda-and-oahu-sacred-site.html)

http://www.islandbreath.org/2014Year/02/140207ewabig.jpg
Image above: Aerial view of undeveloped area within Kalaleoa ahupuaa surrounded my military, suburban and industrial sprawl. From GoogleEarth by Juan Wilson. Click to embiggen.

An area designated as very sacred burial site being desecrated by the Hawaii Community Development Auhority (HCDA) in Kalaleoa. To see my testimony on HCDA plans see (http://www.islandbreath.org/2014Year/02/140207hcdatestimony.pdf).

The  Leina a ka 'Uhane site in Kalaleoa, listed in 2012 by the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation (HART) Federal Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) as National Register Eligible and very important native Hawaiian sacred site is being subject to bulldozing and toxic dumping under HCDA control.

Ancient Kanehili is a location where a cultural expert doing research for HART said there are hundreds if not thousands of native burials. Many very rare native plants can still be found in this Karst sinkhole and cave environment where much of the water flows through underground streams from the mountain to the sea.

These same Karst ponds are being destroyed and used for toxic dumping. The environmental destruction of 12,000 year old Ordy Pond, rated as a very important scientific site, and supposedly a "waterbird refuge" is directly next to a major dirt raceway.

Kanehili is a place where some of Oahu's earliest immigrants from Tahiti first landed, planting the first breadfruit trees, building trails from the shoreline to the vast highly productive kalo fields of Honouliuli which once sustained the largest population on the island of Oahu 200 years ago.

This top grade soil of immense agricultural productivity is now being paved over. Maximum greed plans says it must lie under concrete and asphalt in order to "save" some other place...

Another ancient Hawaiian pond is used to process highly toxic cancer causing chemicals from other industrial waste sites. The underground water carriers all of these pollutants down to the shoreline where people swim in and eat the remaining sealife from a once abundant coastal fishery that is being killed off.

The vast majority of the public has no idea of the industrial waste being processed and stored near popular Barbers Point beaches where all of the toxic chemicals seep into the ground and travel to the shoreline where children swim and play and gatherers
eat polluted fish and limu.

Lands in Kalaeloa originally intended for green open space and preservation have been zoned by HCDA for industrial development, including sites where very important historic and Hawaiian cultural sites exist in still nearly pristine condition.

The 2012 HART wahi pana EIS. designation doesn't deter HCDA Kalaeloa from industrializing the entire ancient Kanehili area. Department of Hawaiian Homelands also just recently approved their HCDA plans in Kalaleoa to fully industrialize areas of ancient cultural Hawaiian sites and rare native plants noted in the one thousand year old chants of Hi'iaka.

Future generations will find that one of the last and most sacred lands of Ewa has been completely polluted and destroyed under HCDA control. Pretending that a small "heritage park" preserves this area is equivalent to cutting down all but a few Redwood trees and proclaiming that the free trees leftover will be the "preserve" future generations will see. This same HCDA "heritage" area has also been used as an illegal dump site.

It is very sad that everything everywhere is headed for full on industrialization and pollution in Kalaeloa and West Oahu. Clearly, we live in a State where there will not be a "future for the keiki" that isn't covered in dumped toxic sludge, asphalt and concrete. The concept of historic and cultural preservation is mocked by those who can't wait to bulldoze it all and make a fast profit. This is our government today.

The full on rape of Hawaii is underway and clearly the people running the State do not believe in a real future, just a big concrete and asphalt profit to be made right now. They pretend one place has to be developed to "save" another place but we all know that the "other place" will be next on their list to pollute and pave over. It is all part of the big monster development machine eating up everything that once made Hawaii a wonderful place to live.

Corruption and Profit rules Hawaii. None of the State agencies protect anything in HCDA Kalaeloa. It is a lawless place made possible by a corrupt political system of government agencies and corrupt politicians with absolutely no real interest in the future, just the quick profits they can grab right now from a dispirited population who have become the disposable trash of the rich and powerful that the corrupt system caters to.

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