Words and images come nowhere near close to describing the true devastation and loss. Our beloved Lahaina Town is a mass of twisted metal and charred cinder block, with the only colors shades of grey. Where thousands lived and too many lost their lives stand only the occasional barbell set or hibachi. Not just a place, but a community and home, a treasured part of the soul of our Hawai‘i that we have all shared, has disappeared. The sense of tragedy and loss on so many levels is overwhelming.

Yet in all of this is also resilience and hope, starting with those who lost their loved ones or who just don’t know yet, and who have lost homes, businesses, their own histories, many of whom are turning their loss into support for each other. Some two thousand first responders from all levels of government and throughout the community are now on the ground, doing everything from the most difficult task of searching for the missing to the beginnings of cleanup to recovery. Communities in Napili, Kahana, Honokowai and elsewhere have taken it on themselves to gather and distribute emergency resources and house survivors in their own homes.

The President spoke to all this in his visit, from walking Lahaina’s streets to thanking first responders to embracing cultural sensitivities to comforting a grieving community to promising that the full weight of our government will be there through recovery. But more than anything else, his presence and effort said that Lahaina and Upcountry Maui and Hawai‘i Island are not alone, that we are all part of one country and we help each other.

The reality is that this tragedy could have happened anywhere in our Hawai‘i; its impacts affect us all, and the concept of two congressional districts is meaningless. We are all one ‘ohana.

In that spirit, the full resources of my office have been devoted to working with my Hawai‘i congressional colleagues and others wherever and however possible, beginning with our August 9^th joint delegation letter to the President requesting an immediate emergency declaration here. I also developed this Wildfire Recovery Guide here to summarize the many areas of federal assistance available to those affected; please forward this along to your friends and ‘ohana on Maui and Hawai‘i Island. 

I am also fully focused on securing the billions of federal dollars that will be required over the next several years to implement full recovery. This largely starts in my House Appropriations Committee’s Subcommittee on Homeland Security, with oversight and funding jurisdiction over the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, through which most federal disaster assistance is channeled. As a member of that subcommittee, my immediate goal is to assure funding for immediate needs in our Fiscal Year 2023 supplemental budget, which is before Congress now and will be taken up when we return to Capitol Hill in September.

Our thoughts and prayers continue to be with all affected by this tragedy. If there are any questions or ways I can help, please contact us at (808) 650-6688 or [email protected].