Travel to Maui, Hawai’i

The vast majority of Maui vacation rentals are operating "illegally", and there has been much dicussion recently regarding this issue.

Here are links to The Maui News Article and Haleakala Times "Points of View".

I support pono use of the land….  which includes encouraging responsible travelers to visit Maui, and accommodating them in vacation rentals that adhere to sound ecological practices.

People want to visit our beautiful island home. That’s a given.
It benefits all when these visitors are exposed to the true value of our island, which to me, is found in her reality and natural beauty.

Accommodated in vacation rentals and bed and breakfasts, the visitor gets to experience real families living in real neighborhoods, and interact with real people…. the reality of Hawaii, complete with our beautiful insects, heart-wrenching problems, and REAL Aloha Spirit.

Furthermore, this whole vacation rental dispute could be used to uplift the aina (land) by offering incentives to owners (owner occupied or not) who move in the direction of self sufficiency, and natural sustainability, and involving more Hawaiian families, so that the visitor gets to experience more of the real Hawaiian culture.

My favorite VR, owned by a local woman living on-site, with organic gardens, fruit trees, composting, recycling, in a pesticide-free environment, renting at $90. per night, paying taxes, that my clients LOVED, closed its doors at the onset of all this hullabaloo, because she was afraid of being busted as she was not "legal".
The process was too complicated, lengthy, and expensive for her.

I don’t support speculation, and I don’t know personally of any speculators.  If there are, unfortunately, no matter what the outcome, those will continue, as their owners will be able to afford to hire lawyers to find loop-holes, as usual.

If the VR’s are shut down, or the new rules (like the present rules) are too stringent, the lower income middle class are the ones who will loose, as usual, along with the visitors whose Maui experience will be the poorer for it.  And the aina will loose.   Big corporations who suck the profits out of our local economy will build more hotels to accommodate the tourists, and Maui will continue to grow into yet another theme park.

We would love to hear what you have to say!

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 27th, 2005 at 2:39 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.