The theme for the Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement’s Native Hawaiian Convention, held this week at the Sheraton Waikiki Hotel, was hulihia, which means change or upheaval.

“It references a time in which we can look at a renewed place. It’s a time to reset and re-form,” CNHA CEO Kuhio Lewis said in an email to the Honolulu Star- Advertiser.

The group’s 21st annual convention — its first large-scale in-person gathering since the pandemic surfaced in 2020 — attracted some 1,700 attendees to discussions about issues affecting Hawaii’s communities, weighing various problems and potential solutions.

“The gathering allowed us to reassess our cultural, economic, political and community needs following the unprecedented events and challenges of the last few years, and created a space for us to re-vision the possibilities for the future of Hawaii,” Lewis said. Thursday was the last day for the registered public to attend the event, and CNHA members took part Friday in panels on intellectual property and strategic planning.

The panels open to nonmembers ranged from regenerative and mindful tourism to affordable housing and Red Hill. 2021’s water contamination crisis tied to the Navy’s underground Red Hill fuel facility sickened hundreds of military families and sparked widespread public outrage.

For Cody Pueo Pata, attending the convention was valuable for learning more about Hawaiian issues and for building pilina, or relationships. Pata, a kumu hula who works in the Maui mayor’s office assisting on Native Hawaiian topics, was the recipient of this year’s CNHA ‘Oiwi leadership award.

Another attendee, Daniel Ito, a marketing manager for Kona Brewing, said he appreciated the diverse backgrounds of panelists “not only from a tourism or hospitality background, but also sports, the business sector and the intellectual industry.”

While waiting in line to attend a panel on reimagining relationships with tourists, Ito recognized several other attendees and greeted them with a hug or handshake. “I think it’s really cool to see a lot of us borderline- generation millennials be on panels” as they “share a different perspective than I think the previous generation had before,” Ito said. “A lot of them I’m blessed to call peers and friends, so it’s really been good to see that passing of the guard.”

Among attendees representing an older generation was Ipo Mossman, a community liaison in the Maui mayor’s office and active in Hawaii politics for more than five decades.

Mossman, who has attended many Native Hawaiian conventions, said, “To me it’s a paradigm shift that we’re going in this direction.” He added, “I think this is the first time the community engagement has been so focused and targeted.”

To Mossman the Red Hill panel effectively shed light on the seriousness of the water contamination problem. The discussion covered topics pertaining to the defueling plan in the works and efforts to monitor environmental conditions. The Red Hill facility, which funnels petroleum to ships and jets, is perched 100 feet above Oahu’s drinking water aquifer.

Melissa Waiters, a diversion specialist for the nonprofit Kinai ‘Eha, and several of her co-workers attended the convention, chaperoning a group of boys they work with. Translated from Hawaiian, “Kinai ‘Eha” means “to extinguish pain.” The program aims to provide an alternative education option to youth as well as instill Hawaiian cultural identity and workforce training in construction and the trades, community service and leadership.

Waiters said a discussion about empowering a homeless population in Waianae — Pu‘uhonua o Wai‘anae — was particularly impactful to their group. The community now consists of about 250 individuals who support one another. Due to their success, they’ve been given permission to live on the government’s property until they’ve completed developing land they’ve purchased in the back of upper Waianae Valley.

Although Waiters and the group of boys chose to wait outside of the ballroom during the panel discussion due to the large crowd, Pu‘uhonua o Wai‘anae’s leader, Twinkle Borge, later stepped outside to speak directly to them.

“Anyone she’s seen that needed something more than she did, she would give all her stuff to them,” said 20-year-old Evan Goad, who was among the group of eight boys. “I feel like that’s an important part, to show everybody else that they could do the same.”

Being at the convention gave the boys an opportunity to learn about various current Hawaiian issues, Waiters said. And having the opportunity to speak with Borge was like talking to someone who had once been in their shoes.

“Some of (the boys) are homeless from the Waianae Coast, so that really affected them,” Waiters said. “It gives them ideas for their future.”