500 signatures reached
To: Billionaires who have taken over Hawaii
Make Billionaires Donate to Protect Maui
The fires in Maui have claimed 114 lives making it the deadliest fire in modern US history, and many more people are still missing. As people on the island await desperately-needed funds, mutual aid and volunteer efforts have sprung up, coming together to provide food, water, supplies, and housing to their friends, family and loved ones.
Hawai'i has become a magnet for the ultra-rich over the past few years, with many celebrities buying up real estate in people's ancestral homes. It's time they give back to this island and people's communities as their homes have been destroyed.
Why is this important?
A fight over the future of Maui is coming. Opportunists are already seeking to capitalize on Lāhainā and Maui’s crisis to profit as Maui rebuilds. The Big Money special interests who have held back progress in our islands for too long and helped create the conditions for our current mess can not be the ones to profit or lead us on the way out.
We know that as we rebuild, we need to return the power, and rights to our land and water, to the people who give life to Lāhainā. Government and developers need to empower us to decide what’s next, and if they don’t, we will rise up together to fight for what's ours.
Image credit: Tiffany Kidder Winn | AP