Tag: Mauna Kea

About the Jobs

Note: This is an editorial that I wrote a while back. It was originally published in Civil Beat on August 18th, 2016. It appears here in the original form (pre-editor) and with far better photos…

Ancient and Modern
A radio telescope of the Very Long Baseline Array stands in the background of an ancient ahu atop Mauna Kea
The construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope has become a symbol of the many issues that swirl in these islands. It is an argument that touches the fundamental question as to who we are and where we are going.

While many frame the argument as one between science and culture, others frame it as one of development versus culture. Their premise is that somehow building another telescope is destroying local culture. They overlook the opportunity the telescopes represent, that the right economic development can support a community, preserve a culture.

Supporters of TMT highlight the jobs that the telescope will bring… “It is not about the jobs!” is the reply from opponents. Of course it is. You cannot maintain a culture in poverty. You cannot maintain a culture when your keiki leave to seek opportunity elsewhere. Leave the island behind… Leave the culture behind. Economic struggle is the greatest single threat to a local culture, a threat that cannot be overstated.

The lack of economic opportunity has an enormous impact on a local community. The stress of struggling for a living, of getting by on a low paying service industry job can be destructive to families and individuals. Drugs use, family abuse, all of the social ills so often identified in low income areas are as destructive to the culture as they are to the person. The statistics tell the story… Hawai’i Island routinely tops rest of the state in numbers that are not good…. Lowest per capita income, highest number of children living in poverty, unemployment and more.

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Mauna Kea Adze Quarry

The AO system was broken, nothing really bad, but something I would need to go up and fix. Reading the nightlogs each morning there are occasionally surprises like this, a sudden re-planning of an otherwise lazy Sunday.

Workshop
A workshop in the Mauna Kea adze quarry

I suspected that the fix would not take me long at all. But I would be on the mountain… What to do with the rest of the day? I load camera and hiking gear along with my backpack of tools. If I do complete the job quickly I will go hiking. The Mauna Kea adze quarry springs to mind as a likely spot to spend a few hours.

The ancient Hawaiians had no access to metal on these volcanic islands. What they did have was a source of very hard volcanic rock. High on Mauna Kea there were once glaciers, a place where the fury and heat of the volcano met ice. Cooling quickly in the icy realm the lava formed a dense, fine grained rock suitable for making tools.

The rock from this quarry could be shaped and ground into a number of tools, particularly adzes that could be used to cut wood or carve the great ocean going canoes. Tools made from this particular rock were so prized that they have been found in archaeological sites on distant islands across the Pacific.

I have known how extensive the adze quarry is for years. The numbers are abstract, number of find sites mapped, square kilometers of area, just numbers on paper. What I found was quite different than what I was expecting, nothing conveys the actuality of being there.

I was amazed at the sheer size of the piles of flakes. These are sites that were worked for centuries, each workshop accumulating many tons of waste rock flake to tumble down the slope. Having worked with my hands continually over my lifetime, I know how hard hand labor like this is. I stood amazed at the sheer amount of human effort it took to accumulate these piles.

I found I had another misconception to correct… Looking from a distance you see the caves with piles of waste rock spilling down. I had assumed that the caves and ledges are where the actual mining took place, where the basalt was pried from the mountain. Visiting one of the workshops I quickly see this is not the case.

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A Touch of Winter

It is not snow in the image, but rather hail covering the ground and temporarily turning the summit white.  A trough rich in moisture is passing the islands, leading to very active thunderstorms and even hail at the summit.  We completed segex today, with thunder rumbling outside the dome. The hail melted off in a few hours, pretty while it lasted…

Hail at the Summit
Hail at the Summit

Violence Loses

Like so many with a Native American heritage I have been watching the protests at Standing Rock, trying to figure out which side of the issue I am on. I find I can not automatically support the tribal side of this as some of my relatives have, the issue is not so clear cut. I have been reading both sides to see where the issue lies.

The incident has much in parallel with the issues here on our mountain. Native people protesting a project that takes place on a purported sacred site. There is also the element of environmentalism in protesting an oil pipeline, and entirely different issue than a clean project like an observatory.

This week’s violent episode has me asking questions. How did this happen? What happened. The protest side has been loudly proclaiming that security guards just attacked them with pepper spray and dogs. They play up the injuries, including some to a child.

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Monitoring the TMT Contested Case

I have not had a chance to attend any of the contested case meetings, they are taking place in Hilo on workdays. Following along by reading all of the court documents is almost as good, maybe better. Big Island Video news has also posted quite a few videos of the proceedings where you can watch and get a feel for the tone and process of the hearings.

TMT Rendering
An overhead view of the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope, credit TMT Observatory Corporation
All of the filings are available online, posted to the DLNR website. There are now over two hundred filings, with at least a few added almost every day. They detail the legal maneuverings of all of the parties as they make claims and counterclaims over every issue in the case.

It is clear that the telescope opponents have a couple basic strategies, neither of which address the issues. First is simply to delay and obstruct. Every decision is appealed and contested, from who is party to the case, to the selection of the hearing officer herself. Attempts to limit the discussion to the issue at hand have been vigorously contested by those who have other agendas.

One observation is that witness lists of telescope opponents are extensive, 39 persons on the Mauna Kea Anaina Hou (Doc-103 and Doc-104) list alone. To be fair, many of the the opponents do only have a few witnesses to call, but the sheer number of participants makes the resulting numbers a bit excessive. Reading through the various lists I fail to see where each witness will bring unique testimony to the case. In contrast the University and other supporters have very brief witness lists with only a handful of witnesses requested. Certain names do stand out… Dr. Sai, a well known sovereignty proponent. UH Chancellor David Lassner is present. Even Governor Ige has been listed, a request that is already subject to extensive legal wrangling.

A common theme in both the hearing room behavior and in the document opponents claim that they have been subject to personal attacks or harassment. Claims are made that they are “under duress” despite the fact that participation in this proceeding is entirely voluntary. Judge Amano has gone out of her way to explain methods by which opponents could participate in the hearings without being full parties in the process and subject to the associated paperwork and attendance burdens.

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