Maui Council committee sends Waiʻōhuli wells water agreement to full Council

The Maui County Council’s Water and Infrastructure Committee voted 7-0 Monday to recommend passage of Bill 97 (2026), which would authorize the county Department of Water Supply to enter into an agreement with the state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands to develop three new groundwater wells in Waiʻōhuli and a transmission system to serve homestead housing for Native Hawaiians. The bill now moves to the full Council for further consideration.

The bill would authorize a memorandum of agreement under which DHHL would engage Tom Nance Water Resource Engineering and Intera Inc. as its well consultants and Austin, Tsutsumi and Associates Inc. as its well system, transmission lines, and water storage tank engineer to plan, design and engineer the project. Plans call for connecting the waterlines to Maui County’s Central Maui system.

DHHL would be responsible for obtaining project permits, funding and permit approvals, while the county would review and approve project plans, inspect the work and assist DHHL in securing permits and funding, if available.

DHHL: Wells would unlock more than 1,000 homestead lots

Project manager Elijah Davidson of the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands told the committee he is himself a beneficiary still on the department’s waitlist. He said the wells are intended to relieve a growing backlog of paper leases the department has issued without the water infrastructure to support construction of more than 1,000 homestead lots.

According to figures Davidson presented, DHHL’s statewide waitlist tied to Maui includes 9,380 people, with an average waitlist age over 60—a figure Davidson linked to the long-running Kalima litigation “where a lot of people on our waitlist are passing away before receiving a home.”

The three wells are estimated to have a combined operating capacity of 1,728,000 gallons per day, all of which would go to DHHL under the draft agreement. Davidson said that volume—described in DHHL materials as providing about 39.5% of the department’s overall water need—would generate “advance water credits.” These would allow DHHL to move forward now on developments—rather than waiting years for water capacity to materialize—including the Waiʻōhuli Economic Development Opportunity Area, 950 residential lots in Waiehu Mauka, Wailuku and Kamalani, 55 agricultural lots to support Ohana farming and self-sufficiency, and future lots in Pulehunui, he said.

Once fully built out, Davidson said, the system could eventually serve an estimated 2,880 residential units.

Davidson said DHHL organized a Waiʻōhuli Water Working Group of beneficiary representatives, including commissioner Archie Kalepa, that met with Maui County water officials to help shape the draft agreement’s terms.

Deputy Water Director James “Kimo” Landgraf told the committee that the Water Department supports the bill because it helps DHHL’s beneficiaries get infrastructure—and housing—built more quickly. Lindgraf said the county Water Department would take on the wells’ significant operating costs but expects to recoup them because DHHL homesteaders would become county water customers billed for their water use.

Committee questions on equity, funding and long-term risk

Committee members raised a range of questions before voting.

Council Member Kauanoe Batangan pressed the Water Department on whether the county could be exposed to costs not covered by DHHL, and asked why the draft agreement did not include language addressing what would happen if the wells’ actual yield differs from the 1,728,000-gallon-per-day estimate.

Landgraf said the department is depending on the reliability of the hydrologist’s estimated yield. “Now, if it doesn’t, then I believe we probably can make an adjustment based on that.” He added later that the department expects to be able to absorb operating costs because homestead residents will become Water Department customers, “so we will get revenue from that.”

Council Chair Alice Lee asked why this agreement would allocate all of the wells’ capacity to DHHL when past county/DHHL water-source agreements typically share some source capacity with the county’s water system, given that Maui’s broader housing needs remain unmet.

Landgraf and Davidson said dedicating the full source to DHHL avoids straining the county’s existing system while directing the water where lease obligations already exist. Davidson added that the expanded water infrastructure would make for a more resilient overall water system for Maui County.

Lee said DHHL gets funding support for its projects, “so that’s why it makes sense that we would partner with DHHL on receiving some water because we are so far behind in providing housing for our residents, which include many part-Hawaiians.”

Davidson said one of the project’s primary goals is to move ahead quickly to address elderly Native Hawaiians before they pass away while still on the waitlist.

Council Member Tamara Paltin asked about the agreement’s six-year construction timeline and its force-majeure provisions. Davidson said the six-year timeline estimate stems from the amount of time needed for environmental reviews and clearances, as well as permitting.

Paltin also asked about DHHL’s plan for addressing chloride levels if the wells’ water quality requires treatment. DHHL and its engineering consultant, Austin, Tsutsumi & Associates, said reverse osmosis treatment would be used if needed, although they said data from a nearby US Geological Survey test well suggests high-quality water is likely.

Council Members Keani Rawlins-Fernandez and Shane Sinenci both raised the state’s public trust doctrine and DHHL’s mandate under the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act. Rawlins-Fernandez saying she supports directing 100% of the wells’ output to DHHL because the department is the only one under a constitutional and organic-act obligation to house Native Hawaiian beneficiaries.

Amendment removes specific gallon figure

Before voting, the committee approved a floor amendment, proposed by Chair Tom Cook in response to Batangan’s concerns. The amendment strikes the specific reference to “1,728,000 gallons per day” from the source-credit language in Exhibit A and replacing it with language crediting DHHL with the wells’ full operating capacity, however much that proves to be, while retaining the 1,728,000-gallon figure elsewhere as an estimate.

Both Maui County water and DHHL representatives said they were comfortable with the change, which the committee’s amendment passed 7-0 before adopting the underlying bill as amended by the same 7-0 vote.

Council Members Yuki Lei Sugimura and Nohelani Uʻu-Hodgins were absent and excused from the vote.

The bill next goes before the full Maui County Council for first reading.