Update begins on 2022-2027 Statewide Historic Preservation Plan

An update to the Statewide Historic Preservation Plan begins, with the first in a series of public meetings on the 2022-2027 plan taking place on Friday, Jan. 14, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. The link to the meeting will be available on the DLNR State Historic Preservation Division website.  

The document, which provides focus on efforts to preserve, protect, and manage places important to Hawaiʻi’s history and culture, gets updated every five years.

This five-year strategic plan is intended to help create goals for historic preservation in the state and inform the activities of the SHPD. Completion of this plan is required for Hawaiʻi to remain eligible to receive federal funds from the National Park Service. 

The plan’s purpose is to bring together historic preservation professionals and interested community members to craft ways to better manage historic properties in our state. The plan assesses historic reservation needs, priorities, goals, challenges, and opportunities and will highlight recommendations for future management of historic properties in Hawaiʻi.  

Historic properties include, but are not limited to:  

• Historic buildings 
• Archaeological sites  
• Burials  
• Aviation artifacts  
• Cultural landscapes 
• Historic districts such as Chinatown 
• Loʻi  
• Fishponds  
• Heiau and traditional cultural properties.  

Community input is essential to effective historic preservation planning and this plan will be informed by the overall comments from these meetings. All comments related to historic preservation are welcome during these meetings.

The comments from the first two scoping meetings will be used to help develop future focused and topical public meetings.  

If you would like to provide public testimony, RSVP via the SHPD Preservation Plan email address ([email protected]) by 5:30 p.m. on Jan. 13, 2022. Public testimony will be limited to three minutes. People are encouraged to submit written testimony to the address provided above.

While SHPD staff will be unable to answer questions during this meeting, they will do their best to respond if questions are submitted ahead of time. Those who do not wish to testify and simply wish to listen, you do not need to RSVP.  

The second meeting will be held in early February (date and time TBD). To be notified of any upcoming meetings, write to the Preservation Plan email address: [email protected].