Maui Recovery and Emergency Management Reform: Three Years After Lahaina

Summary of the paper

Three years after the August 8, 2023 Lahaina wildfire killed more than 100 people, this Hawaii Policy Research paper asks whether Hawaii's county emergency management frameworks have actually been reformed, or whether the more than $2 billion in federal recovery funding has gone mainly to reconstruction while the framework failures of August 8 remain in place. The paper reviews publicly available county emergency management plan documentation, congressional testimony on the Lahaina response and Hawaii Emergency Management Agency (HIEMA) post-incident records, and assesses the documented failures against ISPI's Island Emergency Management Framework.

Its central argument is that recovery investment and framework reform are different activities that need different policy attention. Rebuilding does not by itself change how warnings, evacuation, mutual aid or emergency operations are designed, and the paper concludes that the reform needed to prevent the same outcomes in the next island emergency has not yet been completed.

What the paper finds

• Mass notification architecture failed. The notification system was designed for the loss of a single channel, not the simultaneous loss of cellular, internet and broadcast infrastructure. When the fire degraded the primary channels, the backup channels failed at the same time.
• Evacuation route capacity failed. Evacuation protocols had no viable alternative routing for the fire-blocked primary route, because no viable alternative existed in Lahaina's road network.
• The mutual aid timeline failed. The nearest mainland mutual aid was 2,500 miles away, and federal resources arrived after the critical acute response window had closed.
• EOC information architecture failed. Emergency operations center coordination depended on the same commercial telecommunications infrastructure that went down.
• Post-Lahaina reform has targeted other things. Equipment procurement, staffing additions and wildfire mitigation are critical investments, but they do not address the four framework design failures.
• The gap is implementation, not knowledge. Standard FEMA guidance does not ask what a county's mutual aid assumption is when help is 2,500 miles away, how communications work when primary infrastructure fails, or how people evacuate when primary roads are compromised. The paper argues these questions have answers, and that continental design assumptions left in place will fail again in island conditions.

What it recommends

• HIEMA: commission an independent policy brief examining whether Maui and Hawaii county frameworks have addressed the four August 8 failures, with full access to county documentation.
• Hawaii State Legislature: mandate an island-specific framework review for every county, documenting how each plan addresses ISPI's five first principles and certifying island-specific compliance as part of annual plan recertification.
• FEMA: develop island-specific compliance standards for Hawaii and Pacific territory plans that replace continental mutual aid, geographic redundancy and 72-hour self-sufficiency assumptions with island-calibrated alternatives.
• Maui County Emergency Management Agency: conduct a documented response time assessment for each Maui geographic area and recalibrate plan assumptions for mutual aid timelines, mass notification and EOC communication protocols.

Limitations the paper notes

Not all county emergency management plan details are publicly available. The paper notes that a commissioned assessment with full access to county documentation would produce a more comprehensive analysis.

Who it's for

State and county emergency managers in Hawaii, county council members and state legislators preparing for the next legislative session, FEMA staff responsible for Hawaii and Pacific territory plans, and anyone tracking whether Lahaina recovery spending has changed how the next emergency will be handled.

Further reading

• State and Local Governments in Island Communities and the Research Gap
• HI-09: Hawaii's Aging Population, Healthcare Infrastructure, and Island Security
• HI-01: Hawaii Housing Affordability and Island Community Resilience
• HI-06: Hawaii's Infrastructure and Island Emergency Resilience

Cite as

Pulley, Warren (2026). Maui Wildfire Emergency Management Reform: Three Years After Lahaina — An Independent Assessment of Framework Reform Progress and Remaining Gaps (ISPI HI-04). Island Security Policy Institute, Honolulu. https://ispiglobal.com/papers-landing/hi04-maui-recovery https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.23449957

@techreport{ispihi042026,
  author      = {Pulley, Warren},
  title       = {Maui Wildfire Emergency Management Reform: Three Years After Lahaina — An Independent Assessment of Framework Reform Progress and Remaining Gaps},
  institution = {Island Security Policy Institute},
  address     = {Honolulu, HI},
  number      = {ISPI HI-04},
  year        = {2026},
  url         = {https://ispiglobal.com/papers-landing/hi04-maui-recovery},
  doi         = {10.5281/zenodo.23449957}
}

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