Kula Community Watershed Alliance

08/27/2026

We’ve always believed that Kula’s recovery would take more than projects. It would take people. Neighbors, volunteers, landowners, crews, students, partners...all helping care for the same landscape.

Now KCWA's Kula Fire Restoration Project is reaching one of its most rewarding stages, as years of preparation are making way for more planting, tending, and the slow return of native forest.

There is a place for you in this work! Come volunteer with KCWA and help restore Kula—one plant, one hillside, one morning together at a time. Sign up here: https://dash.pointapp.org/events/670471

Hope to see you Sunday at Pūlehunui Sanctuary!

08/21/2026

Maui County is asking residents and businesses affected by Hurricane Lala to file a damage report. Reports will help officials document and understand the extent of damage and identify needs.

08/18/2026

POST-STORM UPDATE FROM THE KULA FIRE BURN SCAR 🌿

Our hearts are with all communities across Hawaiʻi impacted by Hurricane Lala, especially Kaʻū. Many Upcountry Maui residents are still without water or power, and roads are continuing to be cleared for safe residential access.

There are hundreds of large trees and utility poles down, and crews from all sectors of our community have been working ‘round the clock. As always, we are grateful for the power of community-based mutual aid and rapid response. Please continue to kōkua: check in on one another, especially kūpuna.

Yesterday, our field crew completed an initial assessment of the KCWA nursery and baseyard at Pūlehunui Sanctuary, including recent plantings in our first large burn scar restoration management unit. Overall, we are lucky these sites held up well:

🌱 Nursery plants are all safe. Some wind damage and a few windblown koa, but no major breakage.

🌳 In our restoration areas, the winds broke several plants, including several larger koa and a large hibiscus. They were not fully uprooted, and we are assessing what can be saved.

🔧 We also inspected all fencelines across the site and found them intact except for one stretch that was hit by a fallen wattle tree.

🌊 Our team collected data from riparian areas and stream beds to better understand how water moved through the landscape during the storm. We’re seeing that plantings of ferns and ‘a’ali’i along the high water mark held up well in the stream flow, and all of our stabilization work on the slopes has held up and captured sediment (to be measured this week).

We are also continuing assessments across the entire Kula Fire burn scar to understand how these systems are responding to both fire and storm impacts, helping guide long-term restoration and resilience work.

Storms are both threats and teachers. What held, what failed, and what we learn now will shape how we care for this ʻāina moving forward.

If you can safely observe your surroundings, share your kilo below: What did the wind and water do where you are?

08/15/2026

**BEFORE THE STORM.**

These are some of the places KCWA will be watching closely as Tropical Storm Lala moves through Upcountry.

Our watershed is still in transition—from unmanaged invasive wattle infestation, to severely burned soil, to mulch blankets and soil treatments, log erosion barriers, wattle wattles, deer-proof fence, herd management, and now roughly 20 acres of young restoration plantings.

A major rain event gives us a chance to see what is working.

Where does water slow down and soak in? Where does it concentrate?
Where does soil move? What holds—and what needs more work?

Sure, storms are threats, but they are also teachers. For watershed restoration practitioners, events like this reveal things we simply cannot see on an average day.

Upcountry residents: please kilo (observe) with us! Prepare your homes and properties first, check in with your neighbors, and of course STAY SAFE, and observe from a safe location.

If you can, tell us in the comments what you’re noticing where you live: runoff, erosion, ponding, overflowing drains, new springs or seeps, sediment—or places where the land is holding water especially well.

📷 These photos are our **before-the-storm baseline.** We’ll be coming back to these same places afterward to see what the watershed teaches us.

08/15/2026

Fire-affected community members from Kula are so grateful for the opportunity to access Kaho’olawe, to learn histories from the caretakers of this singular place, and to contribute to its restoration with our voices, our hands, and our sweat. A true honor. Mahalo nui to everyone at Kaho'olawe Island Reserve Commission - KIRC for inviting us. 🙏🏽

08/13/2026

LAST-MINUTE CALL FOR MAUI ARTISTS 🌿

Friday, August 14 | 9am–12pm | Kula Fire Restoration Project, Pūlehunui, Upper Kula
*Weather permitting*

Tomorrow morning (Friday, 8/14), we’re opening the gates to Pūlehunui Sanctuary for "Mālama Wao Akua Artist Huakaʻi: A Forest Rising" — and we still have space for a few artists who would like to join us.

This is a rare opportunity to spend the morning inside an active native restoration zone in the Waiakoa watershed, where the land was badly burned in the 2023 Kula Fire and a new native forest is now beginning to rise from the ashes, providing moisture and shade for the landʻs renewal.

Bring your paints, sketchbook, camera, or other portable creative setup. After a short introduction and walk through the restoration project, you’ll have at least two hours to settle into the landscape and create—among regenerating native plants, young restoration plantings, old burned trees, and the textures and contrasts of a watershed in transition.

We’ll also visit the KCWA Community Restoration Nursery at Pūlehunui Sanctuary, with its two large hoop houses filled with plants being grown for the restoration of Kula’s fire-affected lands.

Shade, restrooms, and drinking water will be available.

Come spend a morning observing a landscape at an extraordinary moment in its recovery—and perhaps find inspiration in what returns after fire.

REGISTER AT THE LINK IN OUR BIO.

**Space is limited. Maui-based Artists participating in the Mālama Wao Akua art exhibition are welcome to join us! Featured painting by Maggie Sutrov for the 2024 Mālama Wao Akua exhibition. This piece, painted at a community gathering where Kulaʻs fire survivors planted koa trees, was given the "Art of Conservation" award.

08/13/2026

LAST-MINUTE CALL FOR MAUI ARTISTS 🌿

Tomorrow morning (Friday, 8/14), we’re opening the gates to Pūlehunui Sanctuary for "Mālama Wao Akua Artist Huakaʻi: A Forest Rising" — and we still have space for a few artists who would like to join us.

Friday, August 14 | 9am–12pm | Upper Kula
*Weather permitting*

This is a rare opportunity to spend the morning inside an active restoration zone in the Waiakoa watershed, where the landscape burned in the 2023 Kula Fire and a new native forest is now beginning to rise from the ashes, providing moisture and shade for the landʻs renewal.

Bring your paints, sketchbook, camera, or other portable creative setup. After a short introduction and walk through the restoration project, you’ll have at least two hours to settle into the landscape and create—among regenerating native plants, young restoration plantings, old burned trees, and the textures and contrasts of a watershed in transition.

We’ll also visit the KCWA Community Restoration Nursery at Pūlehunui Sanctuary, with its two large hoop houses filled with plants being grown for the restoration of Kula’s fire-affected lands.

Shade, restrooms, and drinking water will be available.

Come spend a morning observing a landscape at an extraordinary moment in its recovery—and perhaps find inspiration in what returns after fire.

REGISTER HERE: https://dash.pointapp.org/events/688326

**Space is limited. Maui-based Artists participating in the Mālama Wao Akua art exhibition are welcome to join us! Featured painting by Maggie Sutrov for the 2024 Mālama Wao Akua exhibition. This piece, painted at a community gathering where Kulaʻs fire survivors planted koa trees, was given the "Art of Conservation" award.

08/12/2026

Coming up this Friday, space still available!

Mālama Wao Akua Artist Huakaʻi: A Forest Rising
Friday, August 12th
9am - 12 noon
Kula, HI

Maui-based artists are invited to explore an active restoration landscape in Upper Kula, where native plants are returning to lands impacted by the 2023 Kula Fire. Walk through the Waiakoa watershed and witness a landscape in transition—charred tree trunks standing alongside emerging ʻōhiʻa, ʻaʻaliʻi, and other native species reclaiming their place on the hillside. Participants will also visit the KCWA Community Restoration Nursery at Pūlehunui Sanctuary, where thousands of native plants are being cultivated for future restoration.

SIGN UP HERE: efforts.

08/09/2026

Each August 8th, we pause to remember, to reflect, and to plant trees in the burn scar with our fire-affected community. In honor of all that was lost, and all that continues to take root. 🌱💚🌱

08/05/2026

Big congrats to our friends and partners at Kupu!

Kupu, Hawai‘i’s leading conservation and youth education organization, announced today that it received a grant of $1.75M from AmeriCorps, the federal agency for national service and volunteerism.