A long-awaited fire station in Olowalu that would serve as a critical emergency hub between West and Central Maui received unanimous approval Tuesday for a key special use permit.

The Maui Planning Commission voted 7-0 in support of the county permit that moves forward the privately funded fire station project on donated land. This vote comes nearly three years after the devastating 2023 wildfire destroyed most of nearby Lahaina town and killed at least 102 people.

“I’ve got some emotional ties to this project,” said Joe Pluta, who’s spent years pushing for the station even before he lost his home in the 2023 wildfires. “From what happened to me in person and what I experienced, I saw we need more than just this. But this is something. This is going to help.”

Pluta is president of the nonprofit West Maui Improvement Foundation, which is spearheading the Olowalu fire station project that it hopes could be operational later this year.

In 2022, the Maui Fire Department chose the strategic location between the Lahaina and Wailuku fire stations, each about 9 miles away. The Olowalu fire station also would cover an area where residential development has grown over the past decade.

“Olowalu does have a history of wildfires and this station would help reduce response times in emergency situations,” planning consultant Eric Pachowicz of Munekiyo Hiraga said. “Especially if you’re having issues on highways or with access, this would be right in the middle of both of those stations.”

The construction could move quickly, with a 2,056-square-foot modular building serving as the fire station on a 2-acre vacant lot on Luawai Street, mauka of Honoapi‘ilani Highway. It would be capable of housing up to five firefighters, with four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, living space, gear storage and a fire engine bay, according to project documents. Nine parking stalls also would be included on site.

The $3 million project was fully funded as of last year, but now it’s just short of its goals after recent Trump Administration tariffs increased costs by more than $211,000, the foundation said during a groundbreaking for the project in March. The land, owned by developer Peter Martin, and fire station will be donated to the county once it’s completed. 

The idea for the fire station dates to August 2018 when a passing hurricane led to a wind-whipped wildfire that destroyed more than two dozen homes and displaced longtime families in Kaua‘ula Valley. Realizing how “dangerously close” the fire had come to destroying Lahaina, West Maui community members got together to explore solutions, recalled Rick Nava, vice president of the West Maui Improvement Foundation and executive director of the West Maui Taxpayers Association.

Nava took his grandson to meet with Martin to ask if he would be willing to donate land for a fire station. Martin agreed, donating more than 4 acres. The foundation then started raising funds for the project. 

For years efforts stalled, in part because iwi kūpuna, or ancestral bones, were found in the same subdivision but not on the land donated for the fire station. Maui County officials issued a stop-work order in the Olowalu Mauka Subdivision in April 2023.

The State Historic Preservation Division has approved the project’s archaeological monitoring plan for any remains found on the site, Munekiyo Hiraga president Karlynn Fukuda said Tuesday.

In a November letter, the state division said the permit process could move forward. It also approved a request to lift the stop-work order in June of last year. 

The 2023 Lahaina wildfire that killed at least 102 people also proved critical in pushing the project to the finish line. With the community eager to prevent another tragedy, monetary donations flowed in and Maui County expedited permits.

“This project represents proactive and community-driven investment in public safety and will help ensure more resilient and secure future for West Maui,” Nava said.

Nestled in a valley surrounded by dry brush and open land, Olowalu has also been prone to fire, with notable blazes in the last few years including a 200-acre brush fire in August 2018 and a 120-acre brush fire in June 2023, just two months before the Lahaina fire.

In addition to increasing resources in a fire-prone area, the Olowalu fire station also would decrease response times and increase the survival odds of people in emergencies, said Dennis Terpen, a Lahaina resident, board member of the association, and retired firefighter and paramedic.

“I can tell you and share personal experiences where one, two or three minutes makes the difference between life and death,” Terpen told the commission on Tuesday. “A fire, flashover, cardiac arrest, drowning in the ocean. You have the opportunity today … to save 15 minutes or more.”

Twenty-six years ago, the West Maui Improvement Foundation raised $4 million to build the Nāpili fire station and donate it to the county, which “saved countless lives and helped countless number of people,” Pluta said. 

The Olawalu project would be the third fire station in West Maui.

“I’ve been here long enough to know when you do something good, they say ‘hana hou,’ one more time, right?” Pluta said. “So we thought, oh gosh, after the 2018 fires, we had to do something, because Lahaina almost went up then.”

Pluta moved to Maui in 1979 and “lost my home and everything I owned for 47 years overnight” during the 2023 wildfire. 

As fire survivors, both Pluta and Nava are eager to see the project completed. 

The project has a county-approved grading permit and has also submitted an application for a building permit. It has also received state approval for an individual wastewater system.

Pachowicz noted that the Department of Transportation raised concerns about ongoing plans to move Honoapi‘ilani Highway mauka and develop the vulnerable coastal area into a greenway. However, Pachowicz said the foundation still wants to move forward with the fire station project.

“It is critical infrastructure to not only protect agricultural uses but also people and businesses and homes that may be in the area, and putting off this project longer to coordinate with projects that don’t exactly have a defined implementation date would not be in the best interest of the applicant,” Pachowicz said.

He added that “the fire station is not proposed to be in direct conflict with any future plans of where the roadway might be relocated” and that the plan is to coordinate with the state to make sure the fire station has easy access to the relocated highway. A modular structure could also be moved more easily than a traditional building if needed, he pointed out. 

Maui Fire Department Chief Brad Ventura said because the fire station would be built out of two separate modules, there would be the potential to add more sleeping quarters, office space or an additional bay. 

“The modular station does have probably a shorter lifespan than brick and mortar, so we’ll be obviously watching and maintaining it closely over the next couple of decades to see, especially near the coastline, how it’s doing,” Ventura said. “And then it’ll be determined … if we’re going to build brick and mortar in the future on the same property or just be able to add on to the current module.”

He said there are no plans to put a helipad at the site, but the department does have the ability to land helicopters for emergencies through other means, such as closing the road.