HIKAʻALANI
Restoring 'Āina and Identity in Kailua

Hikaʻalani is a community-based non-profit organization founded in 2010 by Hawaiian cultural leaders of Kailua, Koʻolaupoko, Oʻahu, who refused to sit in idle consternation* over the loss of places and practices that once defined Kailua as a land of abundance and excellence. 

* Our original call to action can be found here.

Our Mission

is to reestablish centers of stewardship and learning at storied places in the ahupuaʻa of Kailua where we can again gather, as Hawaiians did in centuries past, to practice the culture that sustains and defines us.
​

Our Vision

is one of a thriving Hawaiian cultural presence in Kailua – of a community guided by master teachers dedicated to sharing with our children, at sites of abiding ancestral significance, the ʻike of our kūpuna.
​

Our Programs

is currently focused on establishing a canter of stewardship and learning at the Waiʻauia entrance to Kailua Town. We are also deeply invested in assisting two partner-organizations, Kauluakalana and Kailua Kau a Hoʻoilo in their respective efforts at restoring pono at Ulupō Nui and at caring for the iwi kūpuna of our ahupuaʻa.  Please see our Waiʻauia and Kailua Kau a Hoʻoilo pages – as well as our Kauluakalana Announcement and the Kauluakalana website – to learn about these culture-, ʻāina-, and kūpuna-based programs as we envision and practice them in Kailua-i-ke-oho-o-ka-Malanai. 

Our Name

Hika'alani means “to look to the heavens.”  It honors a Kailua woman who, in 1895, testified before the Ko‘olaupoko Water Rights Commission.  She remembered being a girl when the first missionaries arrived.  She spoke of how her people had once prospered in a land of fishponds and taro fields that fed all of Kailua and “supplied the [O’ahu] chiefs when they called for ho‘okupus.”  Near the end of the proceedings, when asked if other Kailua Hawaiians could corroborate her testimony, Hikaʻalani answered:  “No, there is none of these old folks living.  They are all dead excepting myself and my foster mother …. There is no one … all dead.” 
​
We have given ourselves Hikaʻalani’s name in defiance of the extinction she feared and as a promise to her that we will neither give up nor go away.  We accept, in her memory, the challenge of thriving again as Hawaiians in our ancestral home.
​

​Our Board and Staff

​President:  Melody Kapilialoha MacKenzie, Kumu Hula; Professor of Law Emerita, UH William S. Richardson School of Law

Vice President:  Kahulu De Santos, Kumu Hula; Director of ʻImipoʻokela, Kaʻanpsli Beach Hotel

Secretary: Resha Momilani Ramolete, Principal, Kalnalu Elementary School

Treasurer:  Tierney Hōkū Morikawa Rostron, Vice President, Enterprise Credit Risk Analyst, Bank of Hawaiʻi

Director:  Kauka de Silva, Professor (Retired), Fine Arts Department, Kapi‘olani Community College

Director: Lani Maʻa Lapilio, Attorney and Owner/Principal, Aukahi Consulting (Cultural Resources)

Executive Director:  Māpuana de Silva, Kumu Hula, Hālau Mōhala ʻIlima; Chair, Council of Pacific Arts and Culture

Administrative Director:  Charlene Kaʻolu Luning, Kumu Hula; OHE Hawaiian Studies Kūpuna

Cultural Advisor:  Kīhei de Silva, Writer-Researcher; Co-founder and Director, Hālau Mōhala ʻIlima

Hika‘alani is a 501c3 non-profit organization
Contact us at: halauhikaalani@gmail.com 
or at: Hika‘alani, PO Box 342020, Kailua, HI 96734
or by calling Kaʻolu Luning at: (808) 554-5868​