The Hawaii County Fire Commission on Thursday named Deputy Fire Chief Daniel Volpe — who has been acting chief since the Dec. 14 death of Chief Kazuo Todd — temporary fire chief as the search for a permanent first firefighter begins.

The vote was 6-0, with Commissioners Les Hanano and Rick Porter absent and the commission down a member after the Nov. 26 death of Vice Chairman Steven Hirakami at age 79.

At Thursday’s meeting in the County Council chambers in Hilo, Volpe told commissioners he’s “honored” to continue in the department’s top spot until a new chief is named.

Testimonials and tributes were offered for Todd, Hirakami — the director of Hawaii Academy of Arts and Science, a Pahoa charter school — and Dr. Judith Fitzgerald, a Hilo Benioff Medical Center emergency room physician who also served as the HFD’s medical director prior to being killed by an allegedly impaired driver in a head-on traffic collision Christmas Eve on the Daniel K. Inouye Highway.

Volpe testified that Dr. Terrence Jones, also an emergency room physician, is now HFD’s medical director, supervising the department’s emergency medical services.

Chairman Gerald Kosaki, a retired HFD battalion chief, said commission rules require a notice about the search for a new chief be published “in one or more newspapers in general circulation in the state of Hawaii once a week for three consecutive weeks.”

Kosaki said the notice must have information about the application process and qualifications for the position. Those qualifications include a minimum of five years experience and training in fire control, including “at least three years in a reasonable administrative capacity,” Kosaki said. “So, that is subject to interpretation.”

The county’s Department of Human Resources will screen applications and forward the information all applicants who meet the minimum qualifications to the commission, which will determine which applicants will be interviewed.

Qualifications also include U.S. citizenship and residency in the state of Hawaii for at least the previous year preceding the appointment.

Deputy Corporation Counsel Cameron Takamura added that the County Charter specifies that the fire chief “shall have a combination of education and experience substantially equivalent to the possession of a bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university” and that the commission “may waive any residency requirement during the fire chief selection process.”

Takamura told commissioners that HR will make the judgment on whether an applicant’s combination of education and experience make them a viable candidate for the job — which currently pays $201,204 yearly, with incremental raises approved to increase the salary to $225,888 on July 1, 2028.

“I think it would be a good idea for you guys to work on the first step, which is what to put in the notice …,” Takamura said.

Kosaki recommended “that we look at the previous notices for the fire chief.”

“Why reinvent the wheel, you know?” he asked, rhetorically. He added the commission could get the notices and other pertinent information from HR “so we can review it at the next meeting.”

That meeting is scheduled for 9 a.m. Thursday, Feb. 26, at the West Hawaii Civic Center’s Council Chambers in Kailua-Kona.

“At any point before we start the interview process, can Human Resources come and give us a brief class on conducting interviews?” asked Commissioner Brian Cushnie.

New business at Thursday’s meeting also included whether to proceed with the annual performance review of Todd, who was only 45 when he died of an aneurysm, but Kosaki declared that a post-mortem on Todd’s final year on the job would be “moot.”

“I don’t feel that it’s appropriate anymore, due to the circumstances,” said Kosaki. “I think that there’s going to be emotions that’s going to be involved … and it’s going to be hard to provide recommendations on things that he had challenges with. I would feel hard being critical of certain things, under the circumstances. I wouldn’t want to do that.”

HFD Assistant Chief John Bertsch, a longtime former police commissioner, testified from a different perspective.

“I think that when we look at the fire chief’s evaluation as an individual — because of the current set of circumstances — you’re correct, it’s moot,” Bertsch said.

“But as you guys move forward and you look to select a new chief, oftentimes those evaluations … provides a road map for a different chief down the road and allows them to look back and see what was important, what was successful, and what might be meaningful, moving forward,” he continued. “And it helps to outline to those individuals and that potential candidate for that new position kind of where they need to focus on what would be important to the commission. So, we do an evaluation of the chief’s position … the performance of that position and that individual associated with that position.

“And it’s very helpful for potential candidates to use that information in a framework to address some of the concerns the commission has.”

The commission went into executive session, closed to the public and media, for legal advice from Takamura before taking a vote on whether to evaluate the performance of the late chief.

When the commission emerged, there was a 5-1 vote against evaluating Todd’s performance, with only Commissioner Shon Magsalin, whose term on the commission expired Dec. 31, voting to do the evaluation. Magsalin and Commissioner Wesley Mattos, whose term also ended on Dec. 31, both attended the meeting and voted, as there was no December meeting and replacement appointments to their seats have yet to be made by Mayor Kimo Alameda.

A vote was held to elect a new chair, with Kosaki receiving four votes to continue presiding over the panel, and Commissioner Wayne Perrin receiving two votes.

Kosaki received the votes of commissioners Cushnie, Mattos and Carlene Wolf, as well as his own, while Perrin received Magsalin’s vote, as well as his own.

Takamura said, however, that five votes — a majority of a fully seated commission — are required to elect a new chair, so that business, the election of a vice chair, and the consideration of implementing an employee survey as part of the fire chief’s yearly evaluation process, all were shelved until the next meeting.

Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.

OLOWALU (HawaiiNewsNow) – A team of shark researchers from the University of Hawaii at Manoa have solved a longstanding mystery.

Biologists from the the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology Shark Lab have identified the first-ever documented tiger shark mating hub.

Six years of acoustic tracking data led the team to pinpoint the area at Olowalu, Maui, leading them to new discoveries about the nature and timing of tiger shark mating and its correlation to Maui’s whale calving season.

This new finding challenges the understanding of tiger sharks as purely solitary animals.

“To our knowledge, no group mating site for tiger sharks has ever been identified. This paper adds an important piece to the puzzle of tiger shark reproduction,” said Carl Meyer, co-author of the study and principal investigator of the HIMB Shark Lab.

Researchers were able to show evidence that tiger sharks have a predictable seasonal gathering of mature males and females that coincides with humpback whale calving season in Hawaii.

Until this discovery, it was unclear how or if tiger sharks came together to reproduce or if mating was just a result of random encounters.

“Tiger sharks typically roam widely in what can seem like random patterns, so finding such a strong and consistent seasonal trend in their movements around Maui was unexpected,” said Paige Wernli, lead author of the study and a graduate student in the HIMB Shark Lab.

The years-long tracking data showed a predictable seasonal presence of both mature male and female tiger sharks at Olowalu, as well as physical evidence of mating activity.

The apparent mating hub happens during the time of year when humpback whale mothers and newborn calves arrive in the area.

The Shark Lab team says the correlation could mean that the sharks are positioning themselves near foraging opportunities, like vulnerable calves or placental falls.

“Mating and foraging on humpback whales may not be mutually exclusive,” Wernli said. “And both could influence tiger shark movement patterns in Hawaii.”

The tiger shark gatherings they observed were not dense but rather diffuse, spanning several kilometers over multiple months.

“This study expands our knowledge of tiger shark mating and challenges our conventional understanding of the term ‘gathering,’” said Meyer. “Together, the results suggest that both reproduction and food availability play key roles in shaping tiger shark movements in Hawaii.”

During the six-year study, the team was able to safely catch and implant transmitters in large sharks, then keep a vast network of underwater listening stations across the main Hawaiian Islands.

In the future, the Shark Lab team plans to use tags with cameras and other data collecting capabilities to document both their mating behaviors and shark-whale interactions.

This work was funded by the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources and the Pacific Islands Ocean Observing System.

Copyright 2026 Hawaii News Now. All rights reserved.

More than 10 hours after taking his first swing in a match on Wednesday, Justin Todd was ready to play even more.

Fortunately for the third-ranked Rainbow Warriors, no more volleyball was needed after Todd’s kill ended a long day with a 25-21, 25-19, 23-25, 25-13 victory over Rockhurst to complete a doubleheader at Bankoh Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.

A crowd of 3,721 came through the turnstile to see Hawaii improve to 5-1 after an earlier sweep of Roberts Wesleyan with six reserves playing in the starting lineup.

The second match took a bit longer after a combined 15 hitting and service errors briefly set the Rainbow Warriors back in the third set. It was the first set UH has dropped in a win this season.

“We got progressively worse until we got really good,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said. “I think everybody deserves a little frustration. Guys aren’t making errors on purpose, but we’ve got some work to do.”

Playing with the regular starters at opposite, outside, libero and setter, UH hit .382 for the match but committed 24 service errors.

Kristian Titriyski and Adrien Roure each had a match-high 15 kills and libero Quintin Greenidge had a match-high 10 digs.

Todd, who switched positions back to middle from the outside a week before the season began, remarkably looked like he barely broke a sweat after playing all seven sets.

UH had two healthy middle blockers listed on the official roster. Mitchell Croft, a 6-foot-9 sophomore outside and opposite, has practiced in the middle after playing there for the Australian senior national team over the summer.

“Mitch has been taking reps so we have another in there and Trevell (Jordan) is getting better. We will see about Friday. It’s still a question,” Wade said.

Todd finished with six kills, two aces and two blocks and wasn’t overly concerned about playing more.

“I’m always excited to play some more volleyball. I was happy to get the ending kill, but I wouldn’t have been upset if we were playing more. I need the reps,” Todd said. “I felt bad for AP because it would have been a great chance for him to get in the game and get him experience. Seeing him go down, I just felt bad for him.”

AP, in reference to Alex Parks, was injured in practice Tuesday and had his ankle wrapped as he sat on the UH bench. Jordan has missed the last three matches and freshman Roman Payne isn’t expected to debut anytime soon.

Roure’s one-on-none smash kill from the back row ended an opening set in which UH got off to a slow start.

Rockhurst led as late as 11-10 before UH cut down on its hitting errors and went to work. Hawaii put down its last six kills without an error and hit .450 despite the six service errors.

UH’s serving issues continued in the second set and Wade used a timeout with his team ahead 20-17 after the Rainbow Warriors gave up four consecutive points that included a service error, an ace and an out of rotation violation.

Hawaii scored five of the final seven points with Todd finishing it off with an ace.

Rockhurt beat Hawaii to the 15-point media timeout in the third set with a triple block of Titriyski putting the Hawks ahead 15-14.

The Hawks stole the set with their final four points coming on either hitting errors or service errors by the Rainbow Warriors, who upped their total to 20 serving errors in three sets.

“We’ve got to come out with some more fire from the beginning,” Todd said.

Hawaii responded with a commanding victory in the fourth set. UH had kills in nine of its first 11 attempts to lead 15-6 at the media timeout. Roure served three consecutive aces to give him five in the match.

Hawaii will play both teams again on Friday in reverse order with Rockhurst the opponent in the opening match at 11 a.m. UH is likely to roll with the same lineups in the morning and evening matches.

NO. 3 HAWAII DEF. ROCKHURST 25-21, 25-19, 23-25, 25-13

HAWKS (1-3)

NO. PLAYER SP K E TA H% K% A SA SE RE D BS BA TB BE BHE PTS

7 Spadaro 4 8 5 23 .130 .348 2 0 5 2 5 0 3 3 0 0 9.5

8 Sutphen 4 8 4 20 .200 .400 0 1 2 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 9.5

24 Tran 4 8 6 28 .071 .286 1 1 6 2 1 1 0 1 0 0 10.0

11 Deroy 4 5 0 7 .714 .714 0 0 0 1 2 1 2 3 1 0 7.0

10 Yusk 4 3 2 10 .100 .300 0 0 3 0 0 0 3 3 0 0 4.5

3 Jacques 4 1 0 1 1.00 1.0028 3 2 0 5 0 3 3 0 0 5.5

1 Massey 2 0 0 0 .000 .000 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

4 Soto 1 0 0 0 .000 .000 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

12 Mccue 2 0 0 0 .000 .000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

15 Huhman 1 0 1 1 -1.00 .000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

17 Collins 4 0 0 0 .000 .000 1 0 0 5 5 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

Totals 4 33 18 90 .167 .367 32 5 20 10 19 2 12 7 1 0 46.0

RAINBOW WARRIORS (5-1)

NO. PLAYER SP K E TA H% K% A SA SE RE D BS BA TB BE BHE PTS

7 Roure 4 15 5 24 .417 .625 0 5 5 0 7 0 1 1 0 0 20.5

10 Titriyski 4 15 6 25 .360 .600 1 0 3 0 6 0 3 3 0 0 16.5

23 Sakanoko 4 9 3 19 .316 .474 1 0 1 3 1 1 2 3 0 0 11.0

9 Todd 4 6 2 13 .308 .462 0 2 4 0 2 0 2 2 0 0 9.0

16 Hazan 4 3 0 4 .750 .750 0 0 0 0 2 0 4 4 0 0 5.0

13 Rosenthal 4 2 0 4 .500 .50044 2 7 0 2 1 1 2 0 0 5.5

4 Wade 4 0 0 0 .000 .000 0 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1.0

11 Kearney 3 0 0 0 .000 .000 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

22 Greenidge 4 0 0 0 .000 .000 3 0 0 1 10 0 0 0 0 0 0.0

Team 1

Totals 4 50 16 89 .382.562 49 10 24 5 30 2 13 8 0 0 68.5

T — 2:05. A — 3,721. Officials — Dickson Chun, Randy Rubonal, Kerwin Stenstrom,

Hunter Haliniak.

Key — SP: Sets played; K: kills; E: hitting errors; TA: Total attempts; H%: Hitting percentage; K%: Kill percentage; A: Assists; SA: Service ace; SE: Service error; RE: receiving error; D: Digs; BS: Block solos; BA: Block assist; TB: Total team blocks; BE: Block errors;

BHE: Ball-handling errors; PTS: Points (kills plus blocks plus aces).