The Hawaiʻi Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the state broke the law when it took control of the Mauna Kea Access Road on the Big Island and turned it into a state highway before the 2019 Thirty Meter Telescope protests.
The state Department of Transportation closed the highway during the demonstrations that sought to prevent the construction of the new telescope on a mountain summit many Native Hawaiians consider sacred.
Law enforcement arrested 38 kūpuna, mostly Native Hawaiians, during the demonstration. Thirty had their cases dismissed after a 2021 Hawaiʻi Supreme Court ruling clarified the process for filing criminal complaints and said authorities had been following the incorrect procedure.
Two of the 38 were among the Hawaiian Homes Trust beneficiaries who sued the state, claiming the DOT wrongfully took control of the road without compensating the state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, which owns the land under the road.
The court ruled that the DOT improperly designated the road as a state highway.
The court also said DHHL should not have relinquished control without consulting the beneficiaries as required in the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act.
If the state wants to maintain control of the road, it will have to work with DHHL to get permission from the beneficiaries. If granted, the state must provide adequate and proper compensation.
The case will be sent back to the lower state court where damages or compensation for use of the road will be determined.
Meanwhile, the National Science Foundation has until September to decide on advancing the Thirty Meter Telescope to the final design stage. The TMT is competing against a telescope project in Chile for limited NSF funding. The price tag of each is now approaching $3 billion.
