Despite rules prohibiting camping on Mauna Kea, protesters of the Thirty Meter Telescope have been allowed to do so for more than two months, maintaining a 24-hour presence outside the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station.
Despite rules prohibiting camping on Mauna Kea, protesters of the Thirty Meter Telescope have been allowed to do so for more than two months, maintaining a 24-hour presence outside the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station.
In an email response Monday, Deborah Ward, spokeswoman for the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, said the department is in frequent communication with the campers to ensure that impacts to the surrounding natural resources are minimized and that public safety is a priority.
“At this time, we have allowed them to remain and peacefully express their right of free speech while we assess the situation,” she said.
Protest organizer Kahookahi Kanuha said his group considers the state itself to be illegal, and that he does not consider his actions camping.
“We are here protecting Mauna a Wakea because it is our responsibility, and this protection requires 24/7 watch,” he said.
Kanuha added that DLNR is not requiring anything specific of his group, but that he and others have made it a priority to keep the area clean. Trash from their camp is taken off the mountain daily, recyclables and compost are sorted and discarded, and the area is raked periodically, he said.
“We’ve had days of even pulling some of the fireweed,” he said. “Just keeping the area around us a lot better than we found it.”
Kanuha said park rangers have even complimented his group on how well kept the area looks.
The camp is located on DLNR land, across the road from the visitor station.
Dan Meisenzahl, spokesman for the University of Hawaii, which manages the Mauna Kea Science Reserve and the visitor station, said in an email Tuesday there was “nothing significant to report” with the small group of protesters.
“No incidents. No trouble,” he wrote.
“I think the fact the rangers have a consistent presence has kept things relatively mellow,” he added. “Also, the numbers (of campers) have been really low since the moratorium on construction was announced.”
DLNR has not always used such a soft touch with protesters camping on state land.
In 2013, DLNR officers arrested 11 people for camping at Wailoa River State Recreation Area in Hilo. The campers had planted a “kanaka garden” near the King Kamehameha statue in protest of the overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom.
The protest lasted for about four months before the taro patch was removed.
The DLNR declined to answer the Hawaii Tribune-Herald’s follow up questions about why the protesters atop Mauna Kea are being treated differently than any other illegal campers.