Some residents in the Kalihi Valley area have been without power for days, which they say could come at a significant cost.
On Monday afternoon about a dozen residents were charging their phones from a large portable battery in a single-room community hub called the Kalihi Valley Station. The generator belongs to Rep. Ikaika Hussey, who brought it to help neighborhood residents, who have been without power for days.
“ For some of my constituents, it's been… almost at three days now without electricity,” he said at the station. Hussey’s district includes Kalihi Valley and a portion of Kalihi.
He described the space, located in a building that used to house an illegal game room, as a “positive place for kids to come and hang out and do homework after school and just feel safe.”
Now it’s being used for residents who haven’t had electricity since Hurricane Lala swept through the state over the weekend.
As of Monday at 11 a.m., Hawaiian Electric said more than 69,000 residents were without power on Oʻahu. The utility’s outage map showed multiple power outages along Likelike Highway, where the Kalihi Valley Station is located.
The outage has been some of the longest in recent memory, according to residents.
“This (is) the longest. Maybe some storms we do lose power, but (they) don't go off like this,” said resident Jason Cardenas, who lives next to the station. “Hawaiian Electric, they gotta hurry up. People (are) going to lose money, because all the food (is) going to spoil. Then we’ve got to throw away all the food, then later on we’ve got to refill up the ice box again.”
Cardenas, who was one of the residents charging his phone using Hussey’s battery, said his refrigerator was full, and could have had hundreds of dollars of food in it.
Windy Kim, who owns the K-Phat Oriental Market, has two freezers full of ice cream and two others full of frozen food and meat. Her convenience store also has cold drinks, including milk. Kim said there’s about $1,000 in each cooler.
She said power outages might last an hour or so, but never multiple days like it has following Lala.
“But now, oh man, look. I cry, I lose business,” Kim said.
On Monday afternoon her windowless store was pitch black, lit only by her open door and a handheld light at the store’s register. The power outage also meant she couldn’t accept credit cards.
She can’t afford to stay closed, though, because she has bills she still needs to pay.
“I need to make the money for bills, because my rent come in already. That’s why I have to try,” Kim said.
Hussey said the outage has exposed inequity against residents in the Kalihi area.
“To me, there's equity issues. Why is it that the folks that are in the wealthier neighborhoods get their power first?” Hussey said.
He wants to introduce legislation next session to bring more solar energy to his constituents.
