Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is seeking community input about the potential future use and stewardship of the remote Great Crack and Ala Wai‘i areas.
HVNP will host a community “talk story” meeting from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 23, at the Pahala Community Center.
“We actually had scheduled this meeting for 2020, right before the pandemic,” said HVNP spokesman Ben Hayes.
The park accepted stewardship of the 1,951-acre Great Crack in 2018, and the adjacent 2,750-acre Ala Wai‘i area in 2022 because of their unique geologic, biological and cultural resources and public concerns for the areas to be protected from future development.
The rugged areas — while mostly barren lava rock, with no surface water, few trees and little shade — are examples of the geologic forces that shape the Southwest Rift Zone of Kilauea volcano and are known to contain cultural and natural resources, according to HVNP.
The park is working to create a long-term plan for managing the Great Crack and Ala Wai‘i areas.
The Great Crack, an 18-mile long fissure up to 50 feet wide in some places, was designated as potential wilderness in 1978 while under private ownership.
Over the years, various commercial developments were proposed by the previous landowner, including a space launch facility, but none were implemented.
Ala Wai‘i, meanwhile, needs to be evaluated for wilderness eligibility.
Both areas are currently managed by the park as wilderness backcountry and are open to the public for day hiking. Overnight use is allowed with a backcountry permit obtained through HVNP’s Backcountry Office, although Hayes said no such permits for either area have ever been requested.
Hayes said that, outside of backcountry permits, HVNP doesn’t track how many visitors travel to either area, but added that patrolling rangers do occasionally detect signs of vehicles traversing the area illegally.
The meeting in September will spell out what the park knows about each parcel, the park’s legally required mandates for managing each parcel, and allow residents to say what they want to see happen to the land — and, Hayes said, possibly come up with a better name than “Great Crack.”
The public can submit comments via mail or email to the park superintendent via these addresses:
Attention: Superintendent Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, P.O. Box 52 Hawaii National Park, HI 96718, or email havo_superintendent@nps.gov.
For more information on the Great Crack and Ala Wai‘i, visit the park website at https://tinyurl.com/ynwjuaft.