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As a member of Lahaina’s homeless community, Rex Cole may have gone unnoticed by many of the visitors and residents who frequented the historic town, but Jelena Dackovic has not forgotten him.

Dackovic, who for years has done outreach to Maui’s unsheltered homeless population, sometimes visits the roadside memorial along a stretch of the Lahaina Bypass where a poster-size photo of a bearded, smiling Cole hangs on a fence below a simple wooden cross in a long line of crosses honoring the 100 people known to have died in the Aug. 8 wildfire.

She joined a handful of other volunteers Saturday in sprucing up the site, which has become a poignant symbol of the close-knit community’s losses and its resilience.

“I came to give back to the community and so I can visit Rex,” Dackovic said. “For years he’s my favorite person. He was beyond awesome.”

Cole, 64, used a walker and often hung out across from Lahaina’s 150-year-old banyan tree. Dackovic described him as a “very mellow” person who loved the ocean.

“I wish he was in a shelter. Maybe he would be alive,” she said.

Sunya Schlea, who spearheaded the rushed effort to erect the makeshift memorial to coincide with President Joe Biden’s Aug. 21 tour of the destruction in Lahaina, was at the cleanup, too, along with Soakai Taufa, who made each of the crosses and organized the event. Many of the volunteers were from the Rotary Club of Lahaina Sunset, where Taufa had recently spoken.

The memorial displays along the fence are as varied as the people they honor. Lei of red, black and white yarn and ribbon adorn most of the crosses. There are also photos, ballcaps, cans of favorite beverages, solar lights, fishing poles and other mementos of full lives now lost.

Taufa also helped create an adjacent memorial for pets and crafted separate tributes for couples who perished in the fire and for a Tongan family of four.

Besides applying a fresh coat of white paint and sealant to the crosses, Taufa said he was planning to replace the now-faded flags tied to long bamboo poles representing the nationalities of those who died in the inferno.

Upon learning of the cleanup on social media, relatives of some of the victims messaged Schlea and Taufa with concerns their loved one’s memorial would be disturbed. In one case, the 7-year-old granddaughter of a couple killed in the fire had handwritten her grandparents’ names on their crosses and her parents wanted to ensure her contribution would be preserved.

After conferring before the start of any work Saturday morning, Taufa and Schlea agreed that dried-out lei, flowers, ti leaf garlands and other flammable material would be discarded, and artificial lei and flowers and other tributes would be temporarily removed for painting and then meticulously put back in place.

Taufa used blue painter’s tape to cover the handwritten names on crosses and then removed the tape when he was done painting, applying sealant as protection against the elements. With such a small group of helpers, he vowed to work through the weekend and longer if necessary to finish the job.

Schlea said she stops by the memorial at least once a month, usually to refresh some of the seasonal decorations. On her last visit, she hung holiday garlands and small wreaths along the fence.

During his weekly visits, Taufa straightens things up and waters the avocado, mango and kukui trees he planted along the fence that he hopes one day will provide shade and a place for families – and even perhaps the departed – to gather and talk story.

“Even though they pass away sometimes their souls will come hang out. That’s my belief,” he said.

Word of Saturday’s cleanup effort spread all the way to Conroe, Texas, where Mandy Haney is still mourning the loss of her beloved aunt, Linda Vaikeli, 69, who lived in the 112-unit Lahaina Surf apartments for low-income families.

“I thought it was such a great idea to go back over there and fix those up and add a little bit more love around them,” she said in a telephone interview. “It’s kind of a way to remember. We’re not going to forget our people.” 

Vaikeli’s funeral was held Oct. 21 in Giddings, Texas. Haney said her family is still experiencing acute grief, especially Vaikeli’s husband who was in Central Maui when the fire started and was unable to get home after Honoapiilani Highway was shut down.

“It’s just so hard. We are all still in shock. It’s such a horrible way to go,” Haney said. “She did not want to be cremated and that’s how she left us. It’s been hard to kind of wrap that around our heads.”

Community leaders and government officials have talked of eventually establishing a permanent memorial to those lost in the Lahaina wildfire, perhaps in the heart of the old town or at the Olowalu disposal site where debris and ash, some of it mostly likely containing human remains, will be deposited.

Civil Beat’s coverage of Maui County is supported in part by grants from the Nuestro Futuro Foundation.