MEO offers ‘Helping Lahaina Heal: Mastering Your Money’ workshop

A “Helping Lahaina Heal: Mastering Your Money” workshop, offered by Maui Economic Opportunity, will be held from 5 to 6:30 p.m., Thursday, Dec. 19, at the Lahaina Recovery Center in the Lahaina Gateway.

The hour-and-a-half workshop will cover budget and saving strategies, spending habits, personal financial plans, understanding personal credit profile, establishing credit and improving FICO scores.

The workshop, led by MEO’s Business Development Center, is offered at no cost to participants. The Lahaina Recovery Center in the Lahaina Gateway is located at 305 Keawe St., Lahaina.

Although the workshop arose out of a grant to assist those impacted by the wildfires, Mastering Your Money is open to the general public.

The $1.4 million grant, which runs through July 2025, includes MEO and two other nonprofits – Texas-based Money Management International and Oʻahu-based Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement. MEO’s portion of the grant is about $300,000.

The goal of the grant is to provide financial education and housing counseling to ensure that those impacted by the wildfires have the tools to recover and rebuild, the Red Cross said in a news release.

MEO’s BDC has been offering adult and youth financial literacy classes for years, covering money management, personal credit and basic investment information.  BDC staff also are certified credit counselors with debt management skills.

For more information, contact BDC Director David Daly at 808-243-4318 or david.daly@meoinc.org.