![]() Many working group members joined the new authority, continuing their work building relationships and setting a new tone for conversations about Maunakea. Testing a different approachĪ new chapter opened when the Hawaiian legislature stepped in and in July 2021 established the working group that would eventually recommend the creation of the MKSOA, which was formally established in July 2022. ![]() "We might still be there except that COVID came into our community." Leaders sent everyone home to reduce the risk of spreading the virus, and disagreements over the mountain's fate - like so much else - were shelved. "We were wondering, well, how are we going to end this - we didn't want to live up there forever, it's not a place where humans should be living," Wong-Wilson said. By July 2019, opposition to the TMT had crystallized, and Native Hawaiians began what would become a months-long encampment on the mountain that seemed like it might continue indefinitely. The tension came to a head in the 2010s, when Native Hawaiians on several occasions blocked access to the summit in protest of the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT), a massive new observatory that proponents hope could be four times more powerful than the James Webb Space Telescope. (Image credit: TMT International Observatory) "There are people in your midst whose family doesn't talk to them anymore, just because of this issue."Īn artist's depiction of the Thirty-Meter Telescope (TMT) atop Maunakea. "This is the probably the most divisive issue that has come for all of Hawaii, in my lifetime, Komeiji said of Maunakea. Native Hawaiians who opposed the developments began registering their objections with the state but felt government was ignoring their voices, Wong-Wilson said. ![]() In the beginning, there were only a few telescopes, but then more and more observatories staked out territory on the mountain. "I think our community was generally overwhelmed with all of the new technology, all of the new infrastructure that was being placed into our small community." "While there was some discussion that no one in the community opposed that, I don't believe that was so much the case," she said. It was a challenging time for Native Hawaiians, she said. At the time, the state of Hawaii was just five years old and developing at a breakneck pace, Noe Noe Wong-Wilson, an MKSOA member and the executive director of the Lālākea Foundation culture nonprofit, said during the panel. The roots of contentionĪstronomers first came to Maunakea in 1964 with a small dome meant to help scientists evaluate the site. "There has not been one person who hasn't called me crazy," said Komeiji, who left a job as general counsel for Kamehameha Schools, a private school system that emphasizes Hawaiian culture, to lead the authority. ![]() The short timeline will be a challenge, he noted, adding that the authority doesn't yet have any employees and can't access the $14 million allocated to the effort. "At the end of five years, we are to take full responsibility for managing of the mountain including developing a master plan, including deciding how astronomy fits on on the mauna," John Komeiji, chair of MKSOA, said during the panel. (The university issues subleases to the individual observatories.) In 2028, the organization will take over managing the mountain five years later, the state's 65-year lease of the summit to the University of Hawaii for astronomy will run out.
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