our main story tonight concerns Hawaii a place often depicted as Paradise in movies and TV shows like Hawaii 5 NCIS Hawaii and Magnum PI where This Magnificent clip is from morning sister good morning sir [Music] HS don't work on [Music] Sunday yes that happened this fight come as a shot to younger viewers but TV used to be really good and thinking why are you showing me that for this story even if it took place in Hawaii nothing in that clip indicated that it did hey shut up I wanted to remind you of a simpler TV
time when you could shoot a nun to solve all of your Hawaii crime problems without worrying that someone online would point out that actually there's no rule that says nuns can't work on Sundays and given that nuns are by definition committed to service it wouldn't be uncommon to see one performing maintenance even on a Sunday if so ordered by her Superior shut the up TV used to be great not because the people who wrote it were better but because the people who watched it were anyway Hawaii is famous for being one of the most popular
tourist destinations on Earth so much so many visitors can't seem to resist taking a peace home with them tourism officials in Hawaii are reminding visitors not to take lava rocks home with them yeah taking things from National Parks is against the law so taking volcanic rocks from Hawaii's volcanoes is illegal but apart from being illegal Legend has it that taking volcanic rocks from Hawaii is bad luck because of that myth many people who take the Rocks end up shipping them back to the island with notes of apology officials say putting the Rocks back where they
came from costs time and money it's true that apparently happened so much a national park official even said we would love for people just to stop taking stuff and then also please just stop mailing us stuff and I get that especially because a rock with a note attached to it is famously one of the most threatening forms of communication there is he's right with notes where all the letters are cut out from different magazines a message scrolled in Blood on the wall or literally any phone call please just text unless you are planning on murdering
me and even then you know what just do it I've had a good run I've had a run we're talking about Hawaii because a few days ago it marked a grim anniversary a year ago the deadliest Wildfire to hit the US in more than a century ripped through the West Maui town of lahina destroying more than 2,000 buildings causing 5 half billion dollars in damage and killing 102 people the aftermath exposed long simmering tensions under the surface of Hawaii's reputation as a tourist Paradise especially when just a month later it's governor announced plans to begin
reopening Maui to tourism even while many locals were still traumatized or missing something that understandably went down poorly there it's just not right to go back in into full force tourism we're still recovering funerals just started and they want us to go back in are we supposed to be jovial when tourists are here in their bathing suits frolicking in the surf driving these RS like they're on RAC track drinking my ties and partying in our face yeah you can see why he might resent tourists no one wants people partying while they are suffering it's the
main reason that they never did a season of MTV Spring Break Kosovo and it got worse because developers almost immediately started trying to snatch up property there L's now baren landscape is being eyed by developers who want to replace the community with luxury properties to some here it's a dark irony because development may have contributed to the catastrophe here over the years to accommodate the growing tourism industry much of mau's water was diverted to new hotels and golf courses and away from communities like lahina drying the town out and turning it into a Tinder Box
if you walk right over here where all of these hotels are yeah everything's green and Lush then you walk from here to town yeah everything is dry that is infuriating and for native Hawaiians it must be difficult to shake the feeling that you're an afterthought it's like being introduced by your parents saying these are our sons Tommy and Tommy's brother or having a TV show announced as stick around after House of the Dragon I imagine I imagine that might be hurtful it is frankly no wonder that around 2third of Hawaii residents apparently believe that their
state is being run for tourists at the expense of locals and the fact is the more you look at Hawaii the clearer it becomes they're not wrong about that but it's not just tourists Hawaii has long been run for the benefit of everyone but Hawaiian so given that tonight let's talk about Hawaii and let's start with some of its history which isn't actually taught much in American schools something that's a little bit weird given it it only became a state in living memory Hawaii was first settled by seafaring Polynesians as early as the year 300
but at least in white people's telling the really important stuff didn't happen until around 14 centuries later on a uary Day in the year 1778 two strange ships anchored off the leward coast of one of the islands the flag was English the man in command was Captain James Cook in 1835 the first permanent Plantation was established on the island of Kawai within 3 years there were 20 sugar Mills from these modest Beginnings a great industry was to grow now that clip leaves out a lot but you probably already knew knew that the second you heard
the most ominous line in any historical film the flag was English it's like seeing oranges in The Godfather when the British flag appears on an old newsreel you know someone's about to die and shit's about to go down that first Western contact led to the arrival of Traders and eventually American missionaries with them came diseases which would eventually reduce the native population by as much as 90% descendants of the missionaries set up those sugar plantations and soon came to dominate politics and economic life on the islands and while racist writings of the time paint Hawaii
as a primitive tyrannical society that wasn't the case it was a constitutional monarchy that actually banned slavery in 1852 before the US did and had one of the highest literacy rates in the world nevertheless in 1887 a small group of white plantation owners and businessmen forced Hawaii's King at gunpoint to sign what became known as the bayonet Constitution basically transferring much of his power to them when his sister Queen lilio colani succeeded him she vowed to undo that so the businessman planned a coup to overthrow her fun fact one of the coup's leaders was Sanford
Dole of the pineapple dolls and also the only man ever to have a mustache and a beard that is also a mustache he pushed for the US to Annex the islands against the will of native Hawaiian who collected over 38,000 signatures to oppose it which considering there were about 40,000 native Hawaiian at the time is whopping 90 5% but do and his conspirators got their way and with the help of the US military the queen was overthrown and Hawaii was annexed into the United States although again when white people tell the story of that era
it tends to sound a bit different the queen last of a long line of Polynesian rulers signed the abdication that made Hawaii an American possession these native troops became soldiers of Uncle Sam happy that her Island Kingdom became an American protectorate the queen of aw that farewell yes there's the queen of Hawaii now dressed in her celebratory black signing the islands over to America completely of her own free will surrounded by her closest friends several armed white men with mustaches Hawaii eventually became America's 50th state in 1959 and 34 years later Congress passed a resolution
formally apologizing to native Hawaiians for the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom which is nice isn't it it's always nice to say sorry for things you know whether it's for running late or making your pretend wedding to a cabbage nicer than your actual wedding with your human wife or violent imperialism people appreciate a sincere apology I think but despite that apology over the past Century a number of groups from the US military to tourists to the extremely wealthy have continued to exploit Hawaii and let's start with the military Hawaii's long been used as a strategic military
base in the Pacific thanks to Michael Bay we all now know about the tragedy suffered by beautiful white people at Pearl Harbor but the military's long had an extensive presence in Hawaii more than you may even realize there are 12 key military installations and bases across the state and it hasn't exactly been a sensitive custodian of the land that it occupies take the pakala training area 132,000 acre live fire range on the big island of Hawaii much of it is on federal land that was confiscated after Hawaii was annexed but the military also leased some
more land from the state at a ridiculously low rate and to put it mildly hasn't a great tenant in 1964 the military secured a lease for 30,000 acres of land that they could train on for the next 65 years all for $1 since then they've dropped bombs from Planes launched Rockets from helicopters shot targets with mortars and artillery and left behind unknown amounts of unexploded ordinance this happens every day it happens not not necessarily every day but pretty regularly it must be a big task to go in and clean all that up so further for
the impact area where where we're firing now um we that's we we let that we let that be oh it's never clean the impact area is is the is uh is left as it is when we fire in there and that's for that's for safety safety reasons does that mean like decades and decades and nobody goes in and picks the stuff up correct wow setting aside the fact the military got their own 65e playground for $1 that that is some nuclear grade euphemizing there the place we've been bombing that's an impact area and it's not
unclean it's just left as is for safety reasons I could watch that man spin awful things all night I didn't cheat on my wife I mely discovered an alternate penis holding area and I'm not telling her about it for safety reasons but that is by no means the only place the militaries failed to clean up after itself after the attack on pole Harbor the US took over this island sacred to native Hawaiian and used it has a training ground bombing the out of it but even after activists risk their lives to stop the bombing and
a multi-million dollar effort to clean it up had been completed a full quarter was still not cleared to this day more shells and bombs are sometimes revealed by erosion and additional ordinance sometimes washes up on the beach which really makes you wonder if that famous Jesus and the footprints poem should have ended and I turned to Jesus and asked then why was there only one set of footprints in the sand and Jesus said because my child that was when I jumped up on your shoulders cuz there was no way I was going to step on
a bomb no way my guy they're everywhere but that's not all in 2002 middle school kids working on their school garden uncovered a live grenade and subsequently ordinance experts found three more in the same area and just three years ago the military's massive fuel storage facility on aahu was the site of a spill that poisoned a water system that serves 93,000 people thousands of people were made Sick by it and the entire Island's water supply was put at risk the point is the US military has a pattern of causing an absolute mess in Hawaii with
activists having to struggle to then undo the damage here is one last example makua Valley on a Wahoo's western shore the US Army seized it after Pearl Harbor evicting local families who'd Liv there for generations and promised their lands would be returned to them 6 months after the end of World War II but it still hasn't done that instead it's yet another of Hawaii's sacred spaces that's been used for target practice now thankfully after activists took the Army to court they finally got the military to stop though the relationship between the two remains to put
it mildly strained activists with the group malama makua sued the Army and in 2004 successfully got it to stop live fire training here now the group is allowed to visit the valley but only twice a month so the group has to walk behind this representative from the military who first has to scan the area for potential unexploded ordinance we appreciate access into this Valley but we don't appreciate the fact that we have to ask permission to be in this Valley what is your relationship to the Army right now the reality is it's pretty up sorry
for this morning but it's not like um we're all best friend okay first there is no need to apologize for swearing if anyone is entitled to say on national TV it should be you as for not best friends I get it you don't call an institution who steals your that makes you ask permission to visit it your best friend as we all know you call that the British museum but but as I said it's not just the military who can take precedence over residents of Hawaii that's true of the tourism industry too which is obviously
a big part of Hawaii's economy contributing nearly 20% of its GDP but while tourists experience Hawaii as a Carefree vacation spot many who live there experience a very different reality for one thing tourism jobs tend to to be pretty low wage which is part of why more than 2third of those who live in Hawaii show signs of financial stress like working multiple jobs living with relatives and dipping into savings Hawaii does seem set up to benefit wealthy Outsiders take housing there are currently 32,000 short-term rentals across the state meaning one out of every 18 housing
units there is a vacation rental like an Airbnb and a majority of their owners don't even live in Hawaii in fact nearly a quarter of Hawaiian homes were purchased by buyers from outside the state that is part of why Hawaii is now the most expensive state in the nation for housing and given that it's hardly surprising that Hawaii has consistently had among the highest rates of homelessness in the nation it's been an issue there for years now as this report from 2015 shows we've actually been told by some of the city Crews to be invisible
and how do you want us to do that some of Hawaii's homeless people used to live in much more VIs visible y Kiki Beach officials said that was hurting the tourist industry crucial for the local economy it started to impact our guests they would comment about it on trip advisor and elsewhere okay okay it is shitty to tell homeless people to be invisible but it's extra shitty to do so to protect your trip advisor reviews do you have any idea how useless they are here's an example of one the museum itself was wonderful I was
very disappointed that the entry discount only applies to American Military one star guess what that was from the 911 Memorial Museum a different onear Trip Advisor review reads this experience proves once more that NYC is best likened to a gilded dumpster that is roaming with every kind of vermin as soon as night has been falling if you are looking for true urbanity visit Europe that's annoying thing to say about anything but particularly irritating considering it's a review of again the 911 museum or how about a third trip of not review that reads absolutely woeful avoid
avoid avoid stay well clear of this establishment a review that is for and I think we all know where this is going New York's TGI Fridays I admit I admit their viws aren't 100% wrong but it's not just housing costs food is incredibly expensive in Hawaii the islands used to be self- sustaining but one Legacy of the sugar plantations is that they destroyed much of the Agricultural diversity as a result Hawaii Today Imports 90% of its food with residents routinely paying some of the highest prices in the the nation for basic Staples as this woman
in Hawaii explains he let me show you how much my groceries cost gallon of milk $9 five apples I did eat two cuz I was very hungry on the walkr $15 $15 $3 an apple bag of grapes $17 $17 is too much for that many grapes in fact it's honestly too much for any grapes grapes are terrible if you don't eat them in three days they just shrivel into skanky little sugar balloons let me be clear about this you either be a raisin or you be a grape I have no patience for your fruit puberty
and awai's cant has said it's addressing food cost in 2014 his Governor set a goal to double Hawaii's food production by 2020 which sounds good but it's not a great sign that he later change the target date to 2030 and it is not clear they'll hit that either but maybe the ultimate expression of the extent to which Hawaii is being reshaped by wealthy Outsiders is its growing population of billionaires 11% of the private land there is owned by just 37 billionaires among them Larry Ellison Mark Zuckerberg and Oprah for sense of just how much land
some of them have considered that in 2019 when a different brush fire broke out in Maui people trying to escape it wound up tweeting at Oprah to kindly share the code to the gate for her private road on her estate so folks could evacuate now to her credit she did that immediately the state's Governor at the time even tweet pointed out a big Mahalo to Oprah for giving Maui County access to your private road but it still feels a bit weird that people had to ask in the first place and other billionaires have gone much
further than just buying parts of an island the rugged Shoreline Sparkling Waters and pristine beaches on the island of laai make this Four Seasons Resort one of the world's most sought-after vacation destinations billionaire founder of Oracle Corporation Larry Ellison loved the remote Hawaiian getaway so much he bought it along with 98% of the entire Island for reported $300 million it's true Larry Ellison bought virtually the entire island of lenai along with most of what is on it meaning he now owns its main grocery store its Lan gas station and the community newspaper he's basically almost
everyone's boss and landlord and I know went by quick but let's just at least acknowledge this image that is Larry Ellison he's 79 and no that's not his daughter it's his granddaughter except I'm kidding that was his girlfriend there she's 33 by the way meaning he was 15 when Hawaii became a state and she was 16 when he became eligible for Social Security aren't facts fun it's just one of many stories that you probably won't read about in leni's local newspaper but when it comes to billionaires in Hawaii nothing compares to what's being done on
Kawaii by Mark Zuckerberg a real boy who wished Upon a Star to become a wooden puppet he is currently building a gigantic compound that reportedly has more than a dozen buildings with at least 30 bedrooms and bathrooms centered around two Mansions connected by a tunnel that branches into a 5,000 ft underground bunker along with a web of 11 tree houses connected by intricate rope Bridges Zuckerberg also has a long stone wall around his property which is ruffled feathers among many native Hawaiian for reasons that as you're about to see are understandable so the land that
you own is just across this fence right here yes but Mark Zuckerberg has put up this wall and fence and it says no trespassing yeah what would happen if he tried to go over there I'll get arrested for trespassing even though it's your land yep the problem is kulana Lands are passed down through the generations without a will or deed the lack of paper trail means some descendants don't even know they own land other times under a complicated legal system called Quiet Title a buyer like Zuckerberg can sue Kiana owners to force them to sell
their lands usually at auction for pennies on the dollar and that's just what he did suing hundreds and infuriating many more yeah he sued hundreds of native Hawaiian with ancestral kolana claims to the land using a legal maneuver pioneered by white sugar Planters it is the most unbrand white guy in Hawaii thing he could possibly do is a thing that I would say if I hadn't seen whatever the this was now now Zuckerberg ultimately withdrew from those lawsuits writing an oped promising to work together with the community on a new approach but you should not
so not only did he continue buying up Parcels of kuliana land himself he also continued to support his co- claimant in the lawsuit who was very conveniently a kuliana owner who wanted to buy out the rights of all the others in the end that co- claimant successfully forced the disputed Parcels of land to be put up for auction then bought them for $2 million though as the local newspaper put it how exactly the retired college professor put together over $2 million remains a point of contention and look who can say where he got that money
apparently not me legally maybe $2 million just fell out of a random Treehouse somewhere but basically it does seem like that new approach for the community ended up with Zuckerberg getting what he wanted anyway and billionaires like him will insist that they contribute to local charities and help the economy there but it's the larger Dynamic at work here where wealthy Outsiders can out purchase and outmaneuver a local population that can be so dispiriting and it's instructive to contrast the ease with which billionaires can snap up whole islands in Hawaii with how difficult it can be
for native Hawaiians to navigate even programs designed for them take the Hawaiian homelands program established to provide homesteads to native Hawaiians as a form of reparation Congress created a trust of over 200,000 acres for it but there are some huge caveats here Not only was it chronically underfunded from the start much of the land set aside is unusable in fact on the big island hundreds of native hawaian have been awarded plots of land but can't build homes there because the land is sitting within a unexploded ordinance Zone what's more the weit list is 29,000 people
long and as this woman will tell you you can be on it for a while you'll see this or at lists as of December 20120 the different Islands you can see the Maui weight list here I went on the weight list in 2002 this is 2021 so 19 years I've been on my's weight list so I have to wait for them to give me a lot when that happens in my lifetime you think probably not yeah probably not and that is absurd she's waited 19 years think about how frustra it can be to stare at
your phone waiting when your UB bre driver is running 6 minutes late now imagine that 6 minutes is 19 years and your spaghetti vongal is a home that's your Birthright and when you take everything you've seen tonight the cost of living crisis the low wages of a tourism dominant the off chance of being exploded or poisoned by the US military it's frankly no wonder that many are simply choosing to leave the islands in fact each year 15,000 native Hawaiians leave the state for the mainland which now boasts a larger Hawaiian population than Hawaii itself so
where do we go from here when a situation is this complicated and took this long to develop there aren't going to be quick and easy solutions but there are still some obvious steps that we could take when it comes to the military's absurd $16 65 year leases on state lands they actually expire in 2029 and while the military is currently trying to renew them over the objections of many locals I would argue that probably shouldn't happen as for Hawaii's housing crisis there are again some small ways to address that right now including restricting short-term rentals
or second homes and making sure what's being built by developers is actually affordable for residents and in general I'd argue the state government should be focused on growing a more diverse and balanced local economy instead of prioritizing tourism at the expense of all else in the wake of last year's fires there was a lot of talk of helping Maui rebuild but maybe the question we should be asking is for who exactly and to their credit some community-led groups like these have been hard at work in L to make sure the community doesn't end up permanently
displaced and get a real say in what the future there looks like honestly when it comes to determining the future of Hawaii you should probably be listening less to Outsiders like me and more to groups like these and finally when it comes to tourism if you're watching this right now thinking I wanted to take a vacation to Hawaii should I go well as you've seen many people there do depend on the tourism industry with others justifiably infuriated by how it's exacerbated so many problems that Hawaii's been struggling with I will say though the solution is
not going to come down to any single trip you might take it's going to require much bigger systemic choices that said if you do end up visiting try to be aware of the the history of what you're stepping into a history I realize most of us were never taught and remember that your vacation spot is someone else's home also just a few quick extra tips don't take any rocks definitely don't send any back with a note and if you see a none on a ladder on a Sunday shoot her before she shoots you that's just
common sense
