OHA land deal shows promise

The state and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs remain some distance from the finish line in closing out OHA’s past claims, but both parties took a significant step forward in striking a tentative deal over 25 acres of Kakaako land.

The unsigned deal was announced Wednesday. It won’t be signed until it undergoes a vetting process that includes OHA’s own due-diligence evaluation of the property, comprising 10 parcels estimated at $200 million, at or near the waterfront.

In addition, lawmakers seem intent, as they should be, to roll out the deal to OHA’s beneficiaries for their comments as well. Nobody knows what kind of endorsements, misgivings or other reactions are likely to emerge at this stage.

But the offer does seem "credible," as state Sen. Malama Solomon describes it. These are prime properties with what appears to be significant development potential. Even if the deal falls through, the offer is a serious one, and it at least communicates that the state wants to do right by the Native Hawaiians who are owed back payment in ceded-lands revenues.

The claims stem from years during which the state halted its payments to OHA, because of legal disputes over the amount. The payments are seen as Native Hawaiians’ share of revenues from "ceded lands," the property once known as Hawaiian crown and government lands during the kingdom era, ceded to the U.S. government, and then the state, upon annexation and statehood.

The OHA share was set after the agency was created in 1978, fixed at roughly 20 percent because the Statehood Act lists "the betterment of conditions of native Hawaiians as defined in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920" as one of five beneficiaries of ceded lands. The other four were public education, development of farm and home ownership, public improvements and land for public use.

The matter was always contentious, and not least among the objections was the argument that the legislative language reserved the money for those with 50 percent or more of Hawaiian blood, and not the broad constituency of OHA.

Payments were put on hiatus during the Cayetano administration as a court case raged, primarily over the amounts due from airport revenue (the Honolulu Airport is built on ceded lands).

Payments resumed in 2006, and then-Gov. Linda Lingle reached a settlement with OHA two years later over the back payments, a package amounting to about the same $200 million figure but a mix of cash and property, largely commercial and industrial parcels on Oahu and Hawaii island.

The state Senate rejected that deal, however. Among other criticisms cited, some feared the deal would extinguish future claims on resources.

The biggest problem with that proposal, however, seemed to be the sense that the broad Hawaiian community wasn’t consulted. That’s an error that the state, correctly, now seems determined not to repeat.

Lawmakers and OHA trustees and beneficiaries have their work cut out for them in the months ahead. But given the fact that the proposed parcels are part of the lucrative Kakaako redevelopment district, with the prestigious frontage on Kewalo Basin, this tentative deal marks an auspicious beginning, the latest effort to resolve a longstanding dispute.