Maui nonprofit executive director receives Humanitarian of the Year award

Jennifer Karaca, the founding executive director of Maui nonprofit Common Ground Collective, has been honored with the District 50 Hawai’i Lions’ Humanitarian of the Year.

The D50 Hawai’i Lions champions community service and philanthropy. It awarded Karaca with Humanitarian of the Year for her community work in the wake of the Maui wildfires.

Karaca has led Common Ground Collective’s mission to increase food security, economic opportunities and education for Maui’s community members. That includes ensuring that families still reeling in the aftermath of the August 2023 fires are nourished and have access to fresh, locally grown food.

Common Ground Collective strives to foster social equity in disaster relief programming and develop the supply of locally grown food in relief efforts. In 2023, the organization helped provide more than 230,000 hot meals, 15,000 food boxes and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of food and supplies to the Westside Community Resource Hubs.

“Jennifer Karaca is a visionary leader of our time, and she’s incredibly deserving of this award for her tireless dedication to improving Maui food systems and her ability to act in a time of crisis,” said Barry Henry, president and chairman at Common Ground Collective. “Jennifer’s unwavering commitment to addressing feeding needs is paving the way toward a more food-secure island community. It’s a blessing to be able to work alongside such an inspirational person.”

Paul Seto of the Kahului Lions Club nominated Karaca for the award for her leadership and work focused on empowering communities, feeding those in need and creating lasting change in Maui’s food systems.

“In the wake of Hawaii’s most devastating disasters that occurred on Maui, we have witnessed a community member that emerged as a strong and resilient leader,” Seto said. “She has led the way and continues to lead to help support, encourage, and provide one of the most essential necessities of life: feeding the displaced and most vulnerable members of our community.” 

Karaca said: “I am deeply honored to receive this award from the D50 Hawai’i Lions. This recognition is not just a celebration of my efforts but a tribute to the collaborative spirit of our organization and phenomenal community.”

She thanked the Maui Lions Clubs for its support and contributions to initiatives like our Fire Relief Food Box Program at the University of Hawaiʻi and the numerous other projects the clubs support across Maui County and the state.

Common Ground Collective was established in 2017 as a Maui-based nonprofit that promotes food security and economic opportunity through education and capacity-building assistance. The nonprofit provides harvesting and administrative services for agricultural landowners and supplies Maui nonprofit organizations with fresh, local produce to nourish food-insecure populations.

For more information, visit commongroundcollective.com.