Maui fires aftermath: Concerns over 'climate gentrification' rise in Hawaii

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3,000 buildings in Lahaina were damaged by fire, smoke or both. Insured property losses alone already total some $3.2 billion, according to Karen Clark & Company, a prominent disaster and risk modeling firm.

With a housing crisis that has priced out many Native Hawaiians as well as families that have been there for decades, concerns are rising that the state could become the latest example of “climate gentrification," when it becomes harder for local people to afford housing in safer areas after a climate-amped disaster. It's a term Jesse Keenan, an associate professor of sustainable real estate and urban planning at Tulane University School of Architecture, first started lecturing about in 2013 after he noticed changes in housing markets following extreme weather events.

Jennifer Gray Thompson is CEO of After the Fire USA, a wildfire recovery and resiliency organization in the western U.S., and worked for Sonoma County during the destructive Tubbs Fire in October 2017. Thompson said Maui is one of the “scariest opportunities for gentrification" that she’s seen because of “the very high land values and the intense level of trauma and the people who are unscrupulous who will come in to try to take advantage of that." Thompson predicted potential developers and investors will research who has mortgages and said Maui residents should expect cold calls.

“You won’t be able to go to a grocery store without a flyer attached to your car," she said. Hawaii Gov.

Josh Green said Wednesday his state attorney general will draft a moratorium on the sale of damaged properties in Lahaina, to protect local landowners from being “victimized" by opportunistic buyers as Maui rebuilds. Thompson said she supports that “wholeheartedly." But