Civil Beat Survey: Maui Residents Say County Response To Lahaina Fire Falls Short
Civil Beat recently asked hundreds of Maui residents a number of questions about policies and confidence in county leaders.
About two-thirds of Maui County residents responding to a Civil Beat survey say Mayor Richard Bissen and the County Council have not done a good job helping the island recover from the deadly Lahaina wildfire a year ago.
Most residents polled also think private property rights should be the top consideration in rebuilding Lahaina and a wide majority cite housing they can afford as the primary issue facing the county. Most support Bissen’s plan to turn 7,000 short-term rentals into long-term housing.
The online survey was conducted from July 19 through Sept. 3 by Anthology FINN Partners, a Honolulu communications, marketing and research firm. The survey was completed by 560 Maui County residents plus 288 residents from the rest of the state, drawn from Anthology’s research panel, voter contact, consumer and Civil Beat reader lists.
Results relying only on Maui respondents have a 4.14% margin of error and a 95% confidence rate. The smaller survey size from elsewhere in the state has a margin of error of 6.49% and the same 95% confidence rate.
Civil Beat asked questions about confidence in government and proposed policies as part of a larger survey that also looked at online news consumption on Maui. About 80% of both groups — Maui residents and others statewide — say they get their news from online sources every day.
But the current events section of the survey sought to find out from Maui County residents as well as people living elsewhere in the state how they thought the administration and the council were doing on issues that have been heavily featured in news reports since the August 2023 Lahaina fire that destroyed much of the town and killed 102 people.
In the year since the fire the Bissen administration and the council have done much to address both immediate and long-term issues including setting up community advisory panels, holding numerous public meetings and, with the help of the state and federal government and nonprofits, putting in place a number of social services programs.
But the county political leadership has also proposed ideas — housing solutions, tax programs, rebuilding strategies, to name a few — that have been hotly debated with supporters and critics on both sides. Only one house has been rebuilt in the past year in Lahaina and the town has remained off-limits to most people. The cost of rent throughout the island has skyrocketed making housing that people can afford even more scarce. Tourism and the economy are still depressed, businesses have closed and large numbers of residents are simply leaving the island. The Bissen administration is also seen as secretive and inaccessible.
It’s against that backdrop that only about a third of Maui residents surveyed feel the mayor and County Council have done a good or excellent job responding to issues that have come up in the aftermath of the Lahaina fires. Bissen did a little bit better (33%) than the council (29%) and residents of other islands thought even less of the mayor’s performance (27% good or excellent) as well as the county’s (20%). However, non-Maui residents were also more likely to say they were uncertain.
Generally, both the mayor and council did better among women, government workers and older residents. People who said they were born and raised in Hawaii thought better of the mayor and the council than did people who had moved to the island from outside of the state.
In terms of overall favorability, fewer than half of Maui residents — about 47% — feel favorable to some degree toward Bissen. More — about 52% — feel favorable toward the council.
Bissen did better among registered voters and people who identify as liberal as well as among women, government workers and people who are born and raised in Hawaii. That demographic trend held true for the County Council as well.
Still, the mayor’s proposal to turn 7,000 short-term vacation rentals into long-term housing for Maui residents has solid support. About 56% strongly or somewhat supported the plan while only 23% expressed some degree of opposition and 21% said they weren’t sure. His idea had less support from people who live on other islands (47%).
The proposal garnered more support among women and liberals and higher opposition among transplants. The highest percentage of support came from Native Hawaiians (67%) and people who earn less than $75,000 a year (63%).
The survey also asked people to rank four considerations when it comes to rebuilding Lahaina. For Maui residents, private property rights were ranked as the top priority (36%) followed by cultural considerations (29%), environment and climate change (23%) and tourism and the economy (5%).
Statewide, residents ranked property rights at the top, followed by environment and climate concerns, then cultural considerations and tourism.
Survey takers were also asked an open-ended question: To list what they believed to be the most pressing issues facing Maui.
By far, at 56%, Maui residents named housing and affordable housing. The rebuilding of Lahaina and recovery from the fire was a distant second at 22%. Those were followed by the cost of living/inflation (19%), economy/jobs (14%), homeless issues (14%), tourism (11%), wildfires and prevention (7%), the government and mayor (5%), helping Lahaina fire victims (5%), water issues (5%), people moving away (4%), crime/drugs (4%) infrastructure (4%), vacation and short-term rentals (3%), health, medical and insurance (3%) and environment and sustainability issues (3%).
People elsewhere in the state put rebuilding Lahaina and fire recovery at the top of the list, followed by housing, the economy and jobs and tourism.
Read Section 1 of the survey on current events here:
