Hawaii hotels could help LA wildfire survivors, governor says

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Gov. Josh Green says he’s working on plans to offer relief for Los Angeles wildfires survivors and first responders.

He shared those details with Hawaii News Now Sunrise Monday morning.

Green told Sunrise he spoke to California Gov. Gavin Newsom and his chief of staff about two different avenues of support.

The first is to offer hotel package deals to survivors who lost their homes in the fires.

Green said impacted residents would be able to rent hotel rooms for up to 90 days to help alleviate the housing shortage California faces in the aftermath of the fires.

“The goal would be to make sure that as they begin to remove the debris and look for housing, that there will be less pressure on their housing market like we saw,” Green said, referring to the housing crisis that arose following the Lahaina wildfire in 2023.

The governor says Hawaii has around 25,000 hotel rooms statewide. He says thousands of those rooms are empty and could be used to house displaced fire survivors.

Funding for this plan would be covered by insurance or by a rental assistance through FEMA, the governor said.

“Remember, people are going to get insurance, just like we did in Maui, or they get this rental assistance from the FEMA guys, the federal government,” he said. “They will get some kind of median market value against rentals in California so we wouldn’t be putting up our money we just be making available our vacancies.”

Green said he reached out to four other governors for assistance.

“It’ll be four states and we would find a price point that met their needs, we fill in our you know empty units which frankly would actually be good the state of Hawaii, and we would avoid having them come and take our long-term rentals, which is always a concern,” Green said.

The governor also touched on a plan to support California first responders.

Green said he’s working on an “Aloha for LA” program that would offer free flights and reduced hotel rates in Hawaii for first responders to decompress and seek respite once the fires are over.

The governor said he’s speaking with Hawaiian and Alaska airlines about the idea.

The Hawaii Tourism Authority confirms they have been in talks with the governor but so far, it’s just a possibility.

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