Maui Wildfires Kill Over 100 as Corporate Water Diversions and Land Development Create Tinderbox; Governor Suspends Native Water Rights After Disaster

On August 8, 2023, massive wildfires rage through Lahaina in West Maui, killing at least 100 people in the deadliest wildfire event in the United States in more than a century. The fires destroy thousands of homes and businesses in the historic town, reducing what was once a vibrant wetland community central to Native Hawaiian culture to charred ruins. The catastrophe is not a natural disaster but rather the predictable consequence of more than a century of water and land mismanagement driven by colonial plantation agriculture and modern land development interests. Excessive water diversions by sugar plantations and land developers transformed Lahaina from the “Venice of the Pacific”—a productive wetland community with abundant streams and agriculture—into a desert overrun by dry invasive grasses. Combined with drought worsened by climate change, these corporate-driven water diversions created a tinderbox that ignited with devastating results.

On the day of the fire, as flames approach Lahaina, Glenn Tremble from the West Maui Land Company sends a letter at 1:00 PM to Kaleo Manuel, then Deputy Director of the Commission on Water Resource Management (CWRM), requesting permission to divert more water than the company is legally allowed under the Hawaii Water Code. Rather than immediately granting the emergency request, Manuel advises Tremble to ensure that downstream users and others who depend on West Maui streams would not need that water themselves to fight the approaching wildfire. This brief delay—while Manuel attempts to determine whether granting additional water to the land company would deprive firefighters or residents of water needed for fire suppression—becomes the focus of a corporate and political backlash that seeks to blame water rights for Native Hawaiians and environmental protection for the disaster while ignoring the century of corporate water theft that created the conditions for catastrophic fire.

In the immediate aftermath of the fires, Governor Josh Green suspends environmental and cultural water protections and grants the West Maui Land Company’s request to amend and expand its water diversions, telling The New York Times that Hawaii had “tipped too far” toward water rights for nature and natives. This statement outrages Native Hawaiian advocates and environmental conservationists, who note that it amounts to using the disaster as pretext to dismantle hard-fought water rights protections and to restore the corporate plantation-era water regime that caused the disaster in the first place. Hokuao Pellegrino, a Native Hawaiian community leader, tells CNN: “To take that away from them is just like colonization repeating itself all over again. It’s disaster capitalism at its finest.”

The historical context is essential to understanding how corporate water diversions created the Lahaina fire catastrophe. Lahaina was traditionally a wetland area with abundant streams, fishponds, and irrigated agriculture supporting a thriving Native Hawaiian population. Beginning in the 19th century, American sugar plantation companies diverted West Maui’s streams through an extensive system of ditches and tunnels, transporting water from windward valleys across the island to leeward plantations. These diversions desiccated Lahaina’s streams, fishponds, and agricultural lands, converting a water-rich ecosystem into arid terrain. When sugar plantations closed in the late 20th century, the water infrastructure they built was not restored to traditional uses or returned to streams but instead transferred to land development companies, including West Maui Land Company, which continue to divert water for resort developments, golf courses, and luxury residential projects that serve tourists and wealthy mainland transplants rather than local residents or traditional Hawaiian agriculture.

Native Hawaiians have fought for decades to restore stream flows and to secure water rights recognized under the Hawaii Water Code, which affirms that water is a public trust resource to be managed for Native Hawaiian traditional and customary practices, environmental sustainability, and public benefit rather than purely for private profit. After years of litigation and advocacy, some West Maui streams have been partially restored, with water allocations set to balance development uses with downstream needs including stream ecosystem health and Native Hawaiian traditional practices. These hard-won protections are precisely what Governor Green suspends after the fires, framing environmental and cultural water rights as obstacles to disaster response rather than as essential safeguards against the water mismanagement that caused the disaster.

The West Maui Land Company’s request on the day of the fire to divert additional water reveals the company’s priorities: even as catastrophic fire approaches Lahaina, the company seeks to secure more water for its development projects rather than voluntarily releasing water for firefighting or stream restoration. The company’s water use primarily serves resort developments and luxury residences rather than local working-class residents, firefighting capacity, or ecosystem health. By demanding additional water during an emergency rather than offering to reduce diversions to make more water available for fire suppression, the company demonstrates that its business model depends on maximizing water extraction regardless of consequences for communities or ecosystems.

The fires also expose the broader conflict between tourism development and local needs that has intensified in Hawaii over decades. While Lahaina residents flee the flames and search for missing family members, tourists return to nearby beaches and continue their vacations in the same waters where Hawaiians died just days earlier. As one Native Hawaiian Lahaina resident tells BBC: “The same waters that our people died just three days ago are the same waters that the very next day these visitors, tourists, were swimming in. There is two Hawaiis right now. There is the Hawaii we’re living in and the Hawaii they’re living in, visiting in.” The state initially discourages non-essential travel to Maui to avoid diverting resources needed for disaster response, but reopens West Maui to tourism on October 8, just two months after the fires, following recognition that tourism employment is critical to local recovery. This rapid reopening despite ongoing resident displacement illustrates how Hawaii’s tourism-dependent economy subordinates local needs to maintaining visitor flows and tourism revenue.

The fires trigger immediate fears among Lahaina residents and Native Hawaiian advocates of disaster capitalism and land grabs targeting displaced residents. Maui local Archie Kalepa, a cultural advisor and Lahaina resident, warns: “We cannot have the people of Lahaina quit, but what we don’t want to happen is big land grabbers come in and take the land from these people. People are already talking about relocating, moving because they have nothing to come back to.” These fears are grounded in historical patterns where disasters have been exploited to acquire land from vulnerable populations at below-market prices and to implement development plans that displaced residents would have opposed. Residents report receiving unsolicited offers to purchase their properties within days of the fire, with investors seeking to acquire destroyed lots before residents can rebuild or assess their options.

The water rights controversy that erupts after the fires centers on fundamental questions about who controls Hawaii’s natural resources and whose interests they serve. The Hawaii Water Code, adopted in 1987 after decades of advocacy, establishes that water is a public trust resource and that the state has a duty to protect stream ecosystems, Native Hawaiian traditional and customary practices, and public uses. The Code requires water users to obtain permits and limits diversions to quantities that do not harm public trust purposes. These protections emerged from recognition that private plantation-era water diversions had devastated stream ecosystems, eliminated traditional Hawaiian fisheries and agriculture, and concentrated water control in corporate hands that used it for private profit at public expense.

Deputy Director Kaleo Manuel, who becomes a target of corporate and political attacks for his brief delay in granting the West Maui Land Company’s emergency water request, is a Native Hawaiian who has worked to implement the Water Code’s public trust protections. His alleged failure to immediately divert more water to the land company is characterized by critics as prioritizing environmental protection over human safety. However, a fuller examination reveals that Manuel was attempting to ensure that granting additional water to the company would not deprive firefighters or downstream residents of water needed for fire suppression—precisely the kind of public safety consideration that water managers are supposed to apply during emergencies. The attack on Manuel reflects broader corporate resistance to water regulation and Native Hawaiian rights, using the disaster as an opportunity to discredit both the official who enforces water protections and the regulatory framework he implements.

Governor Green’s statement that Hawaii “tipped too far” toward water rights for nature and natives explicitly frames environmental protection and Native Hawaiian rights as excessive and in need of rollback. This framing erases the historical reality that for more than a century, Hawaii tipped overwhelmingly toward corporate water extraction that devastated ecosystems and Native communities, and that recent water protections merely began to restore some balance after decades of one-sided corporate exploitation. By suspending water protections in response to a disaster caused by corporate water diversions, Green embraces disaster capitalism—using crisis to implement policy changes that benefit corporate interests and that would face strong public opposition under normal circumstances.

The fires also reveal the intersection of climate change, land use policy, and resource management in creating disaster vulnerability. Climate change has increased drought frequency and severity in West Maui, reducing natural water availability and increasing fire risk. However, climate change alone did not create the Lahaina catastrophe. The specific vulnerability of Lahaina to catastrophic fire resulted from the conversion of wetlands into arid grasslands through corporate water diversions, the introduction of invasive grass species that thrive in disturbed dry environments and burn intensely, the development patterns that placed homes and businesses in fire-prone areas, and the failure to maintain adequate firefighting infrastructure including water storage and hydrant systems. All of these factors reflect policy choices driven by corporate profit maximization and tourism development rather than by concern for community safety or ecosystem health.

The tourism industry’s impact on Maui extends far beyond the water conflicts. Tourism directly or indirectly generates approximately 70 percent of every dollar on Maui, and nearly 40 percent of Maui’s GDP comes directly from tourism. This economic dependence creates political pressure to prioritize tourist needs and tourism industry interests over local residents’ needs. Land and water are allocated to resorts, golf courses, and luxury developments that serve tourists and wealthy part-time residents rather than to affordable housing, local agriculture, or traditional Native Hawaiian practices. The University of Hawaii estimates that Maui lost more than $13 million per day in visitor spending after the wildfires as tourist numbers dropped by nearly three-quarters, creating enormous pressure to reopen tourism as quickly as possible regardless of residents’ ongoing displacement and trauma.

The conflict over water rights after the fires is fundamentally about whether Hawaii’s resources will serve Native Hawaiians and local residents or will continue to serve mainland tourists, wealthy transplants, and corporate development interests. Native Hawaiian water advocates argue that streams must flow to support traditional agriculture, fisheries, and cultural practices that sustained Hawaiian communities for centuries before plantation agriculture devastated water systems. Land development companies argue that they need diverted water to maintain resort landscaping, golf courses, and luxury residential developments. The fact that these uses compete—that water diverted for corporate developments means less water for streams, Native agriculture, and fire suppression—makes water allocation a zero-sum conflict over whose interests the state prioritizes.

The Lahaina fires demonstrate that environmental protection and Native rights are not luxuries that can be sacrificed during emergencies but rather are essential safeguards against the corporate exploitation that creates emergencies. The disaster resulted from prioritizing corporate water extraction over ecosystem health and community needs for more than a century. Responding to the disaster by further prioritizing corporate water access over environmental and Native Hawaiian protections ensures that the conditions for future catastrophes will persist and intensify. The fires should have prompted recognition that corporate water diversions must be reduced to restore stream flows, rebuild wetland ecosystems, and increase landscape fire resistance. Instead, Governor Green’s response doubles down on the corporate water regime that caused the disaster, using the crisis to dismantle protections that might prevent future catastrophes.

The case illustrates disaster capitalism’s characteristic pattern: corporations or their allies exploit disasters to implement policies that benefit private interests at public expense, framing these policies as necessary emergency responses while obscuring the reality that corporate practices created the disaster conditions in the first place. The West Maui Land Company’s emergency request for additional water becomes the basis for suspending water rights protections that took decades to establish. The fires become justification for prioritizing development interests over Native Hawaiian rights and environmental protection, even though development interests’ historical water diversions created the fire vulnerability that killed over 100 people.

For Native Hawaiians, the Lahaina fires and the subsequent attack on water rights represent another chapter in the ongoing dispossession and marginalization that began with the 1893 overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom. Water, like land, was seized through colonial processes and diverted to serve foreign business interests at the expense of Native communities and ecosystems. The partial restoration of water rights through the Water Code represented limited progress toward rectifying these historical injustices. The suspension of water protections after the fires reverses this progress, using disaster to justify policies that Native Hawaiians would never consent to under normal political processes.

As Lahaina residents struggle to rebuild and as Native Hawaiian advocates fight to prevent land grabs and to restore water protections, the fires stand as testament to the catastrophic consequences of subordinating environmental health and indigenous rights to corporate profit. The disaster reveals that climate adaptation requires not just emissions reductions but also fundamental restructuring of resource management to serve community resilience and ecosystem health rather than corporate extraction and tourism development. The failure to implement such restructuring—and the use of the disaster to move policy in the opposite direction—ensures that Lahaina will not be the last community destroyed by the intersection of climate change, corporate resource extraction, and the political capture that prioritizes private profit over public safety.