Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011

Floor Speech

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Ms. HIRONO. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of the amendment offered by my colleague Congresswoman COLLEEN HANABUSA that would restore funding for the Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant program.

The Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant is an authorized program under title VIII of the Native American Housing Assistance and Self-Determination Act.

The block grant is used to carry out affordable housing activities for Native Hawaiian families who are eligible to reside on Hawaiian Home Lands, which were established in trust by the United States under the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920.

In 1903, Prince Jonah Kuhio Kalanianaole was elected to serve as Hawaii's delegate to Congress. One of his most notable achievements was the passage of the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, which set aside some 200,000 acres of land for Native Hawaiians. The reason for the legislation was the landless status of so many Native Hawaiians, who were displaced by newcomers to the islands and became the most disadvantaged population in their native land. Congress passed the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, which is still in force, in recognition of its responsibility toward Native Hawaiians.

As with other indigenous people, Native Hawaiian views on land tenure were different from that of the newcomers, resulting in loss of much of the land that had been traditionally occupied and cultivated by Native Hawaiians to these newcomers.

Despite the good intentions of the Congress and the State of Hawaii, progress in meeting the goal of delivering land to native Hawaiians was slow. Most of the Hawaiian Homelands were located in areas far from jobs and infrastructure like roads and utilities, were nonexistent. There are currently 23,000 native Hawaiians on the waiting list for residential, farm or ranch lots. Some families have been on the waiting lists for decades.

I want to share the story of the Lincoln family. Aloysius Lincoln first applied for Hawaiian Home Lands in 1949. In 2006, a wait of 57 years, his daughter, Frances Segundo, claimed a lease for a Department of Hawaiian Home Lands home in Kapolei on the island of Oahu. Frances claimed the lease because her father had unfortunately passed away two years earlier. Frances herself was just a baby when her father signed up for the program.

The $13 million that the amendment restores to the Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant program provides the opportunity for Native Hawaiian families to live the dream of homeownership.

The Department of Hawaiian Home Lands (DHHL) is one of the most efficient users of funds provided under the Native American Housing Assistance and Self-Determination Act. The majority of these funds have been used for infrastructure development on Hawaiian Home Lands benefiting low-income residents. DHHL has also been able to use these funds to: Assist families in applying for FHA mortgage insurance and HUD loan guarantees; operate a direct loan program to provide new housing units and improve existing structures; support local housing and housing service providers such as Habitat for Humanity; and initiate highly successful pre- and post-purchase homeownership counseling programs.

I urge my colleagues to support reinstating funding for the successful Native Hawaiian Housing Block Grant Program.

Mahalo nui loa (thank you very much).

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