Church's Construction Halted For Removal Of Buried Human Remains

POSTED: 9:35 pm HST December 2, 2011
UPDATED: 10:28 pm HST December 2, 2011

HONOLULU -- A state judge Friday ordered Kawaiahao Church to stop any construction work on a controversial project that's being built on top of an old cemetery there.Kawaiahao Church has already poured some of the concrete for a $17.5 million multipurpose building planned to house Sunday school classrooms, a nursery, social hall and meeting rooms.But Paulette Kaleikini filed suit against Kawaiahao two weeks ago, claiming the church violated a state permit that requires removal of all human remains at the site before construction. Kaleikini said three members of her family had been buried at the site when it was previously used as a cemetery.Circuit Judge Edwin Nacino ruled in Kaleikini?s favor Friday."That prevents them from doing any construction work on top of any burials. They have to ensure that the burials are removed," said attorney David Kimo Frankel of the Native Hawaiian Legal Corporation, who represents Kaleikini."The court even found that, in Hawaiian culture, iwi are of immense cultural significance, whether they're in a Christian cemetery or not," Frankel said. Iwi is the Hawaiian term for human remains.Kawaiahao Church Kahu Curt Kekuna released a written statement that said: "We will comply with the court's decision and continue to work with the appropriate state agencies."That means the church will now have to decertify the cemetery before re-starting construction work, running newspaper ads for three weeks about those plans and holding a court hearing."They're going to have to go through a process where they notify the public and they have to ensure that there are no burials where they want to build," Frankel said.And the church faces a second lawsuit to stop the disinterment of any further remains from the cemetery and force the church to re-inter the 80 or so sets of remains that have already been removed from the construction site."We believe there are a significant number of burials still to be encountered,? Frankel said.If the plaintiffs in the second lawsuit are successful, they could force the church to radically redesign and possibly downsize the project so it wouldn't be built on any remains."If they can do the building in a different way that doesn't impact the iwi, fine. But as long as they're impacting the iwi, the project should not move forward," Frankel said.A hearing in that case is set for Jan. 13.This is the second time the church had to stop construction since early 2009, when work began on the new building. The 159-year-old church is known as ?the Westminster Abbey of Hawaii.?The church said it?s building the new facility to better provide for education, reaction, outreach, community affairs and protection of archives and artifacts.

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