Navahine Case Lawyers Honored
Lawsuit Challenges Commercial Fishing in PIHMNM
Last month, Kāpaʻa, the Conservation Council for Hawaiʻi (CCH), and the Center for Biological Diversity, represented by Earthjustice, filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration challenging the April 17 executive order that would allow U.S.- flagged vessels to fish commercially in the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument (PIHMNM). They are also challenging the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service’s (NMFS) attempt to implement the proclamation.
The executive order would strip vital protections around Jarvis Island, Wake Island, and Johnston Atoll that bans commercial fishing in those waters.
On April 25, the NMFS sent a letter to fishing permit holders giving them a green light to fish commercially within PIHMNM’s boundaries even though the longstanding fishing ban remains on the books.
“This threatens to destroy one of the world’s last healthy, wild ocean ecosystems. Commercial fishing removes large numbers of fish, sharks, turtles, and other marine life as both intended catch and unintended by-catch, completely disrupting the underwater ecosystem and wreaking havoc on the food chain,” said CCH Executive Director Jonee Leināʻala Kaina Peters.
Earthjustice asserts that both Trump’s initial proclamation and subsequent actions by the NMFS violate the law, citing the Antiquities Act of 1906 which allows presidents to designate and protect public lands as national monuments, but does not grant them the authority to strip vital protections from established monuments, and that this action exceeds the president’s constitutional authority and infringes upon powers reserved to Congress.
The NMFS’s attempt to green light commercial fishing violates several key American environmental laws, including the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, the Endangered Species Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act.
Even short-term commercial fishing can inflict long-term, irreparable harm on pristine marine environments. The monument designations, and associated ban on taking marine resources, provide needed protection to scientific and historical treasures in one of the most unique ocean ecosystems on earth.
“The practice of commercial fishing is an affront to Native Hawaiian practices and beliefs. This proclamation threatens the ability of future generations to survive and thrive,” said Kāpaʻa founding member Solomon Kahoʻohalahala.
Yim Wins School Leadership Award
Babā Yim, poʻo kumu (principal) of Ke Kula Kaiapuni ʻo Ānuenue in Pālolo Valley, was named the winner of the 2025 Masayuki Tokioka Excellence in School Leadership Award at the Public Schools of Hawaiʻi Foundation annual dinner on April 17.
Yim impressed the judges with his innovative leadership and ability to navigate challenges around operating a standalone Hawaiian immersion school serving students in grades K-12 from across Oʻahu.
“Principal Yim leads with heart and purpose. His ability to unite people around a shared vision for Hawaiian education makes him an exceptional school leader,” Superintendent Keith Hayashi said.
Yim received a $10,000 personal cash award and $15,000 toward a school project of his choice.
Yim will use the school award to maintain the loʻi that run along the neighboring stream, expand the school’s performing arts program, and work with a local artist to beautify the campus by having students, their ʻohana and the community help paint murals inspired by the students.
“Instilling the importance of language and culture [at Ānuenue] is about giving students a sense of stewardship so that we’re making better choices about how we take care of this place,” Yim said.
The annual Tokioka Excellence in School Leadership Award honors the late Masayuki Tokioka, founder of Island Insurance Company, Ltd., and a Hawaiʻi public school graduate.
Raising Awareness of MMIWGM in Hilo
Hawaiian Football Festival in June
The Hawaiian Football Federation is sponsoring the King’s Hawaiian Football Festival 25 at UH Hilo, June 5-8. This celebration of culture, sport and identity will unite top Native Hawaiian football (soccer) players from across Hawaiʻi and the diaspora for a week of connection and competition.
A highlight of the festival will be a match between Nā Wāhine 17s of Nā ʻĀlapa Hawaiʻi and the Sāmoa U-17 Women’s National Team on June 5, and then again on June 8. The event will also include a workshop on Awakening Identity Through Sport on June 6. On June 7, college and professional scouts will attend a team training event, offering players valuable exposure and providing the public with an opportunity to witness rising ʻŌiwi athletic talent in action.
Established on the island of Maui in 1975, the Hawaiian Football Federation is a grassroots nonprofit organization dedicated to representing the Hawaiian Kingdom on the global football stage.
It has formed national teams both to showcase some of the brightest Native Hawaiian talent, as well as to educate players, families, and supporters on the national history and culture of the Hawaiian nation-state and to rebuild Hawaiian national character and identity by representing 21st-century symbols of Hawaiian national pride.
All events and matches are free to the public. For more information go to hawaiianfootball.com/.
McKeague is New G70 President
Kawika McKeague is the new president of G70, a multi-discipline design firm specializing in architecture, civil engineering, interior design, planning and environmental design. McKeague brings nearly 25 years of experience in facilitating local and national planning efforts, most of which support Native Hawaiian community-based initiatives.
McKeague joined the company in 2001 as an entry-level planner. For nearly a decade he promoted the integration of a Native Hawaiian perspective into environmental planning and architectural design. He briefly left G70 to serve for a year at Kamehameha Schools as a senior cultural resource manager, then returned to G70 in 2012 as a senior planner and cultural specialist.
In 2019 he was named planning principal. Now as president, he will lead the firm’s cultural and community engagement initiatives while overseeing the principal team and company departments, guiding company operations and implementing its strategic vision.
McKeague has a bachelor’s degree in political science and government and a master’s degree in urban and regional planning, both from UH Mānoa. He is also a haumana of Kumu Hula Victoria Holt-Takamine, who trained him both in hula and community advocacy. He is also the board president of the PAʻI Foundation and in 2020 was named to Hawaiʻi Business Magazine’s “20 for the next 20” – an annual celebration of emerging leaders into the next two decades.
Puana to be Performed in Aotearoa
UH Mānoa’s Hana Keaka (Hawaiian Theatre Program), founded by Dr. Tammy Hailiʻōpua Baker, will be taking its most recent production, Puana, to an international audience. Baker and the cast of Puana have been invited to perform at the Kia Mau Festival’s He Ngaru Nui program at Te Whaea Theatre in Wellington, Aotearoa, June 11-14.
Written and directed by Baker, and performed in ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, Puana premiered last September and stars Theo Baker, Ikaika Mendez, and Joshua “Baba” Tavares. It explores the deep connections between Kānaka Maoli and their kūpuna through song.
Puana celebrates our musical heritage and legacy, a reminder that poetic compositions from the past serve as a foundation and guideposts for our contemporary artistic journeys.
This original production is a collaboration between Hana Keaka and Ka Waihona a ke Aloha, a project of UH’s Kawaihuelani Center for Hawaiian Language. Along with Baker, it brings together other renowned artists including Kumu Hula Keawe Lopes, Kumu Hula Tracie Lopes, composer Zachary Lum, playwright Kaipulaumakaniolono Baker, and award-winning Māori composer and recording artist Tawaroa Kawana.
He Ngaru Nui is a performing arts feature of Kia Mau – a biennial, contemporary Māori Indigenous arts festival – and a statement about the value and significance of Indigenous narratives. This programming strand honors and amplifies the storytelling traditions of Māori, Pasifika and global Indigenous cultures, taking Indigenous stories and sharing them with the world in a way that is both respectful and revolutionary.
Rogers Receives STACY Award
Mālia ʻAlohilani Kuala Rogers, a Hawaiian immersion and resource teacher at Kawaikini Public Charter School on Kauaʻi, was recently honored with the 2025 Hawaiʻi State Teachers Association’s STACY Award for Teaching Excellence.
The annual award recognizes a teacher who has demonstrated leadership, dedication, and passion in five categories: scholarship, teaching, advocacy, community, and youth.
Rogers has dedicated 30 years to advancing Hawaiian language education. She has been teaching at Kawaikini in Puhi, Kauaʻi, siince the school opened in 2008. She currently serves as the school’s cultural specialist and is currently teaching a course in kapa-making, sharing this traditional art form with a new generation of learners.
Prior to joining the staff at Kawaikini, Rogers taught in the Department of Education’s Hawaiian Immersion Program for 16 years at Kapaʻa Elementary and Kapaʻa Middle Schools.
Originally from Oʻahu, her ʻohana moved when she was young and Rogers was raised on Kauaʻi.
In addition to her work in the classroom, Rogers has served as the secretary on the Board of Directors of ʻAha Pūnana Leo since 2002, is a board member for Namahana Public Charter School – set to open on Kauaʻi in August – and recently became a board member of Mālama Māhāʻulepū in February 2020.
Rogers has a BA in Hawaiian Language and an elementary education teaching credential from UH Mānoa.
HILT Honors Herb Lee
Hawaiʻi Land Trust (HILT), a local nonprofit that protects, stewards, and connects people to the land, will honor Herb Lee, Jr. as its 2025 Kahu o ka ʻĀina (guardian of the land).
Lee, the former president and chief executive officer of the nonprofit Pacific American Foundation, led innovative education projects benefitting 150 schools, training over 7,000 teachers and forming over 200 partnerships during his 25-year career.
“HILT honors Herb’s tireless dedication to ʻāina-based education,” said Hilt President and CEO ʻOlu Campbell. “Curriculum he developed decades ago is still guiding educators today. Herb has shaped the kiaʻi ʻāina of today and tomorrow.”
A community advocate and cultural practitioner, Lee founded the Waikalua Fishpond Preservation Society in 1995. A member of Culturally Responsive Evaluation and Assessment Hawaiʻi, he helped develop Nā Hopena Aʻo (HĀ), adopted by the Hawaiʻi Board of Education in 2015.
His numerous awards include the Historic Hawaiʻi Foundation’s Preservation Honor Award; Ka Mana o ke Kanaka, the Spirit of the Hawaiian Award; and the ʻŌʻō Award. In 2014, he was recognized as a Cesar Chavez Champion of Change by President Obama. In 2022, he earned the Distinguished Kamaʻāina and the Lighting Our Way awards, and in 2024, he received a Luce Fellowship from the First Nations Development Institute.
Lee will be celebrated at HILT’s annual Malama ʻĀina Kākou event on October 4. Learn more or purchase tickets
The Making of the Hae Hawaiʻi Quilt on Permanent Display at OHA
