Projects mentioned in this story: Kupu 'Āina Corps

From Civil Beat:

Hawai‘i paid hundreds of unemployed tourism workers to learn new job skills last year. Now state lawmakers want to create a permanent jobs corps — but no one knows how to fund it.

Mariah Haʻo had worked in the hospitality industry for eight years when she quit her job as food and beverage manager at the Outrigger Reef Waikiki Beach Resort to join the protests over the construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope on Mauna Kea in 2019.

Nine months later, when the coronavirus pandemic prompted protesters to disband their camps on the dormant volcano in March 2020, Haʻo found herself a changed woman with a renewed connection to the natural world.

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