As mortgage, rent and utility payments become due on homes that were lost in the Maui wildfire, anxiety is the overriding tone in the voices of thousands of Maui wildfire victims applying for assistance from two Catholic organizations.
Catholic efforts toward the recovery of historic Lahaina are undergirded by two separate funds set up by its Diocese of Honolulu, which heads 65 parishes in the state, and the nonprofit Catholic Charities Hawai‘i. Applicants were not required to be members of any church to receive assistance from the two funds.
Toni Rojas, director of the diocese’s Maui Disaster Relief effort, notes the distress in each voice as she processes applications at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church in Wailuku, the district headquarters. The Maui Disaster Relief Fund fund started Oct. 1 in partnership with the Hawaii Catholic Community Foundation but was suspended just 10 days later as the volume far exceeded expectations, said Rojas. More than 1,500 individuals and families have signed up.
About 90% of the applicants have lost their homes completely or found them uninhabitable from a safety standpoint. From the beginning, St. Anthony church has also distributed food, water, toiletries and clothing to disaster victims.
“The church is looked at as a sanctuary, a place to get some healing,” Rojas said, and its volunteers make a point of treating each person with compassion. “Some feel a little embarrassed, but all are so very grateful that we’re taking the time to listen to them.”
Now that their immediate shelter and basic necessities have been taken care of since the Aug. 8 inferno, people are really worried about making payments on their homes, credit cards and utility bills.
“You can hear a lot of anxiety in how they’re going to make it financially,” as the three-month forbearance periods on their mortgage or rent payments are over, she said. The fund can’t pay for all three months of payments due, but can contribute enough to offset the balance.
Moreover, applicants are apprehensive about where they are going to live for the next few years. With so few options for long-term housing, people are still living in limbo at hotels or with relatives.
“I do feel myself the anxiety of getting the payments and gift cards out as quickly as possible,” said Rojas, who has two family members similarly affected by the fire. The fund started out with $200,000 to dispense, but the amount could triple with expected donations from the Hawaii and mainland Catholic communities, she said.
Much of its money is on hold because many applicants are having difficulty obtaining W-9 tax forms, lease agreements from their landlords or mortgage statements from their lenders. In the next few weeks, volunteers will contact the applicants to help them get the documents they need.
Tina Andrade, chief operating officer of Catholic Charities Hawai‘i, often comes face to face with the overwhelming needs of some 1,800 Maui families who applied for help, largely at the Family Assistance Center, which is now at the Lahaina Civic Center, and at other resource centers in West Maui.
“There was this one woman I think about,” who was struggling with two children while waiting in different lines to obtain help at the Family Assistance Center in Central Maui, Andrade said.
“She had a little baby in a carrier, and she had another young child she was watching, and she had to navigate through all these different services to find out what she qualified for. It was heartbreaking watching her.
“She had no one. She had no housing; she was just staying with a friend for a short time. She had no transportation. She had to find a way to get there and then to her next place. You just almost wish they (survivors) could go to one place so everything could be taken care of. And they’ve already been through this horrible trauma, and then they’re trying to navigate all this stress and try to rebuild their life.”
The social service agency has received $1.5 million from its parent Catholic Charities USA to jump-start its Maui fund, and $2 million from the Maui Strong Fund of the Hawaii Community Foundation. The money and additional community donations will go toward temporary housing, financial assistance, counseling, everyday essential needs and rebuilding homes, Andrade said. Catholic Charities USA has a partnership with Airbnb to place families temporarily at no cost to the local chapter.
Her nine staffers and a handful of volunteers are processing the paperwork as fast as they can and are now concentrating on case management for each applicant in coordination with different agencies.
“There is a lot of anxiety building; a lot of families tell me they have to leave their hotels and are not certain about what their future is going to be. That’s a different level of vulnerability than in the beginning. They’re being put up in hotels or Airbnb Inc., but now they’re leaving and it’s another transition. Very traumatic … awful, devastating,” Andrade said.
Support from both funds is ongoing. Both Andrade and Rojas said the applicants’ needs are great, continuing and change with the circumstances.
To donate or to learn more, go to hawaiicatholiccommunityfoundation.org and catholiccharitieshawaii.org.
