The Maui Food Bank has purchased 8 acres of land in Central Maui. The parcel will become a hub to expand food access, increase storage capacity and strengthen disaster resilience.
It’s a vision nearly 10 years in the making.
“It's always something that has been a need, because our expansion of programs to the community has grown and grown and grown so much so that we now have three separate facilities that we are operating out of due to the lack of chiller freezer space and dry storage space,” Maui Food Bank CEO Lisa Paulson told HPR.
“This land is so imperative for our future for generations to come, because we will have that expanded chiller space, freezer space, actually have loading docks, which we've never had, and then just a great amount of financial efficiency and not paying rent for different facilities across the island.”
The new campus will consolidate those three facilities into a centralized location.
Emergency preparedness is also top of mind for the new campus. It’s designed to transition into a disaster aid distribution hub.
“This facility will be all state-of-the-art, and everything will be backed up with generators, PV panels, and so our campus will be fully secure in being able to handle keeping those chillers and freezers running for well into, you know, week two, week three after a disaster,” Paulson said.
The daily need for food assistance remains huge.
After the Maui fires
Paulson said that after the COVID pandemic, they saw the need for food drop. But since the 2023 Maui wildfires, those numbers jumped and have remained steady.
During the pandemic, they saw a spike in need, then it decreased afterwards. But after the 2023 wildfires, the need for food has remained steady, Paulson said. They have the same numbers now that they had in 2023.
Da Market supplemental food marketplace program in Lahaina is still operating for those in temporary housing, to make sure they have access to food and fresh produce, free of charge.
“For fiscal year '25, we distributed 7.6 million pounds,” Paulson said of their county-wide efforts. “That's equivalent to 17,000 meals a day, and that includes 38% fresh produce, which we do source from our farmers and our ranchers.”
According to a recent report commissioned by statewide food banks, almost one-third of households in Hawaiʻi experience food insecurity. That’s even higher in Maui County, where over 40% of families don’t have enough food.
“We see more and more of our families struggling to put food on the table,” she said. “It's a trend that is, I will say, a bit frightening, and that we do need to pay attention to.”
Unique geographical challenges
The Maui Food Bank also serves Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi, and Paulson said the organization is looking towards building storage facilities there in the future.
“We are looking at disaster resiliency for Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi as well, working with our federal partners in achieving some storage facilities on each island so that they have disaster resiliency as well,” she said.
“Currently, when we have shipments arrive on either one of those islands, our amazing volunteers go to the dock, gather the goods and distribute it immediately, because they have no facility. They have no place to store and then distribute out.”
Shipments go out to Molokaʻi and Lānaʻi once or twice monthly, and Paulson said the new Maui facility will help store food for these islands as well.
Maui County’s food bank holds a claim to fame that can present some challenges.
“Fun fact is, we are the only food bank in the United States that distributes to our agency partners over water.”
Paulson said the new facilities will also support local food production.
“It would also increase our capabilities of accepting more donated and purchased local products from our farmers and our ranchers,” she explained. “So that's an added component to this facility that we're really looking forward to. … We already work with 29 farmers and ranchers [across Maui County], and we want to expand that.”
The new campus property was purchased by the food bank for over $9 million. That comes from funds donated after the fire that were balanced between meeting immediate needs and long-term planning.
The organization will launch a capital campaign in the coming months to support construction and long-term sustainability of the campus.
The project is in the early stages of planning for construction, which will happen in several phases, starting with a main warehouse.
Paulson said getting building materials is the biggest hurdle, and they anticipate phase one completion in early 2030.
Hawaiʻi Public Radio exists to serve all of Hawai’i, and it’s the people of Hawai’i who keep us independent and strong. Donate today. Mahalo for your support.
