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PS. Extra-Local Actions: Hawaii. 2023

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After the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California, the state spent $1 billion in cleanup and land remediation for one year. It developed a standard for post-wildfire recovery program occuring in phases. Phase 1 is household hazardous waste removal with removal of visible waste like bulk asbestos. Chemical contamination in the soil is addressed later. Phase 2 is Debris Removal includes site assessment, documentation, asbestos assessment and removal, debris removal, hazardous tree removal, soil testing and contamination removal, and erosion control. California's Governor Newsom deployed 101 state and local government personnel for Hawaii. Survivors of the Camp Fire have also offered emotional and practical advice to Lahaina survivor. 

Sources:
https://calrecycle.ca.gov/disaster/wildfires/
https://www.hawaiipublicradio.org/local-news/2023-08-15/survivors-of-ca…

PS. Hazards in Hawaii. 2023

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August 2023 Update:

 

October 2023 Update:
Hazardous Waste after the Lahain fires: After the Lahaina fires, chemical pollutants in the air and water present a hazardous health issue. Chemicals include benzene, polcyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, lead, asbestos. Half the buildings in Lahaina predated the 1978 federal health ban. Symptoms from this chemical exposure can include nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite. Apart form these predictable materials, the debris contains combustion by-products of a unique construction material--caneck, made from sugarcane fibers and treated with arsenic as a termite repellant. 

Sources:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/maui-residents-face-lingering-toxic…
https://www.civilbeat.org/2023/08/toxic-debris-from-the-lahaina-fire-wi…

PS. Stakeholder Actions: Hawaii. 2023

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State power in Hawaii: The state of Hawaii was the first state in the US to declare climate emergency. They have a pretty extensive climate change portal. The state is also reported as enacting many progressive legislations, such as banning some sunscreens to protect coral reefs, raise the smoking age, commited to goals in Paris climate deal. It also aims to be dependent 100% on renewable energy by 2045. The state has also banned chlorpyrifos, a chemical that in other parts of the US is resulting into multiple disabilities for agricultural populations. 

According to the maunakeasyllabus, however, the state of Hawaii participates in production of Hawaiin culture as a resource that undermines self-determination. In their words: 

“For the state, the work entails producing Hawaiian culture as a resource that can be managed in the first place. (Yúdice 2004: 4). Culture-as-resource works in tandem with public trust jurisprudence to make feasible the settler state’s governance of the differences of Indigenous communities and the pasts that produce it… What is expedient about this rendering of Hawaiian culture is that the state can protect it, usually under a management plan, thereby safeguarding the resource-glue that presumably coheres Hawaiian community; and thus allows the settler state to conclude that it protects Hawaiian culture without having to address Hawaiian self-determination.”

PS. Hawaii Community Assets. 2023

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