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Daily Smile

[{"type":"text","text":"Not a fan of bees..."}]

Smile 26 6 4

<title>Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026</title>

Not a fan of bees...

Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

[{"type":"text","text":"Now, let's all enjoy a hamster enjoying an omelette..."}]

Smile 26 6 13

<title>Daily Smile: Saturday, June 13, 2026</title>

Now, let's all enjoy a hamster enjoying an omelette...

Daily Smile: Saturday, June 13, 2026

Stephanie Salmons Headshot

Stephanie Salmons

Business & Tourism

Aloha Spirit

Changes are in the works for two organizations focused on improving Waikīkī.

Starting July 1, the Waikīkī Business Improvement District, or WBID, and Waikīkī Improvement Association, or WIA, will align management in an effort to streamline operations, reduce overhead and enhance efficiency.

It's not a merger; WBID, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, will continue to operate independently under the umbrella and management of WIA, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit, joining three other nonprofits that already do so: Waikīkī Beach Special Improvement District Association (WBSIDA), the Waikīkī Transportation Management Association (WTMA) and Aloha Festivals. Each organization will maintain their own boards, funding and decision-making abilities.

"It's important because what we wanted to do was bring together and make more efficient the way that these organizations operated," Trevor Abarzua, president and executive director of WBID told Aloha State Daily this week. "They're all in Waikīkī. They all have similar but different missions, but there isn't necessarily a need for the duplication of staff, the duplication of resources, whether that's accounting or lawyers or everything that goes into overhead for a company or an organization. The reason we want to do the management alignment was to consolidate the overhead and then consolidate some of the roles."

[{"type":"text","text":"Here's what that looks like:"}]

Abarzua will become the president and CEO of WIA, replacing retiring CEO Rick Egged. John Zerfas, currently director of strategic initiatives for WBID will become the vice president of operations for WIA and a new position will be created for the vice president of community engagement. WBID's Administrative Director Suzanne Kirio will carry that role over to the WIA. There's also an opening for an events and member services position, replacing a vacant WIA communications director role.

Those five positions will be under the auspices of and paid from WIA funds.

That consolidation means "a savings across the board, not only for the WBID, but for all the other organizations, [as well as] consolidating who that leader is in Waikīkī, or who you go to for things," Abarzua says. "What we want to do is have a one-stop shop, that the WIA is a one-stop shop where you could get anything done in Waikīkī, whether you want to meet with the business community, you want to meet with the Neighborhood Board, you want to talk about the beach replenishment projects, you want to talk about the [Aloha] Ambassador program. You could reach out to one entity and they'll have the answers for everything, rather than having different spokespeople or different staff for all these different things. It made sense."

Abarzua says WIA will also be a bridge between the broader community and government.

[{"type":"text","text":"Meanwhile, Each 501(c)(3) nonprofit will have a day-to-day director."}]

WBID Deputy Director Dave Willard will oversee WBID operations under the new structure while Dolan Eversole and Blaine Kia, alongside other cultural and community leaders, will continue in their roles with WBSIDA and Aloha Festivals, respectively. There's currently an opening for a full-time position with WTMA.

According to a timeline on its website, WIA actually established the WBID in 2001 — but the organization branched off on its own a few years later.

"Now's a great time to bring it back together under this management alignment, under this umbrella of services, just based on the growth of Waikīkī, the growth of the initiatives that both the BID and WIA have worked on, and I think it just makes it more aligned for the organizations to be working hand-in-hand," Abarzua says.

[{"type":"text","text":"According to Abarzua, the nonprofits each pay a management fee to WIA."}]

WBID will pay an annual fee of about $345,000, about 6% of its budget, to WIA, "providing executive leadership, board support and coordinated communications," according to information provided during WBID's annual meeting in May. Meanwhile, a 25% cost share, about $76,000, will support the two VP roles.

"By taking the executive director and admin director salaries off the WBID books, and paying only a 25% cost share of the new VP of operations and a 25% cost share of a new VP of community engagement at the WIA level, WBID is able to generate significant administrative savings," the information noted. 

All told, WBID stands to save nearly $170,000. The money saved will be reinvested for more community services, Abarzua says.

So what will the people who live, work and visit Waikīkī notice with this change?

"With the alignment itself, one of the things they will notice is more efficiency in the way these organizations are run," Abarzua says. "But what the vision is for WIA is that we want to really reimagine what the organization does and how it's portrayed."

[{"type":"text","text":"That means a rebrand."}]

"We want to, again, rebrand WIA, with a new brand, a new name, a new look, new feel ... and we're going to do that over the next six to 12 months, starting in July, to be more community-facing," Abarzua told ASD. "Waikīkī Improvement Association's been around for a number of years, but we wanted to not only manage these key, crucial nonprofits, but I think this is a really great opportunity for the organization to really lead on how is Waikīkī branded?"

For his part, Abarzua, 33, says he couldn't be more excited to step into his new leadership role.

"There's a lot of momentum right now and I stand on the shoulders of giants that I've been able to learn from," he says. "Rick Egged in particular has been a staple in Waikīkī for 27 years. ... I've been able to learn under them for three-plus years in this role at the WBID, and being able to see what works and to learn from these guys that have so much wisdom, but then what I'm excited for, too, is to bring my own touch to it. I'm a younger guy. I have fresh ideas. I have fresh energy, so to take the things I've learned and to take the historical aspects of what's been going on, but then to really drive the idea of 'hey, we want to do new things. We want to really grow what Waikīkī  is doing,' just to make it the best possible destination in the world and the best possible community, not only to come to visit, but also to live in, to work in, to hang out and surf in. We want this to be for everyone."

, WBID was formed to help supplement city services and is supported by grants, donations and commercial property assessments on nearly 3,800 commercial properties in the Waikīkī Special District.

Part of WBID's efforts to keep Waikīkī clean and safe include the Aloha Ambassador Program, Safe & Sound Waikīkī, houseless and mental health outreach, and disaster preparedness training, its website notes.

(ICYMI: Read about Aloha Ambassador General Manager Solomon Kaimimoku 

Meanwhile, Abarzua says that WIA's main focus is representing the entire community of Waikīkī, not just businesses, but the residential community, the workforce, "just anything Waikīkī related."

WIA "works to enhance Waikīkī's physical, economic and cultural environment," its 

Trevor Abarzua Talking to an Ambassador

<title>Waikīkī Business Improvement District, Improvement Association to align management</title>

The move aims to streamline operations, reduce overhead and enhance efficiency and goes into effect July 1.

Waikīkī Business Improvement District, Improvement Association to align management

Lopaka and Tanya Kapanui

Lopaka Kapanui and Tanya Kapanui

Hawai‘i History

Columnists

If you could step back in time, you’d find that this area wasn’t always a bustling urban neighborhood. Before Western contact, Kamō‘ili‘ili was a marshy, fertile land, fed by underground springs and a natural karst, a system of hidden channels, caves, and freshwater streams within its porous limestone bedrock.

Meaning “the pebble lizard,” after the battle in which Pele’s younger sister, Hi’iakaikapoliopele, destroyed a giant mo‘o, leaving the pieces of its body to turn to stone, the name was later shortened to Mō‘ili‘ili. The area was a thriving agricultural hub, with carefully maintained lo‘i kalo (taro patches) stretching across the land. Alongside kalo, people grew mai‘a (bananas), nui (coconuts), and ‘ulu (breadfruit). Early European visitors were struck by the organization and abundance of these fields.

Two hundred years of change saw the conquest of Kamehameha and the formation of a unified kingdom, the rise of Christianity, the boom of sugar and pineapple, the overthrow of Queen Lili‘uokalani, and annexation by the United States. Chinese farmers who settled in Mō‘ili‘ili introduced rice paddies. At the same time, Japanese laborers worked at places like the Mō‘ili‘ili Quarry, where stone was blasted out of the ground to be used for island construction projects.

As Honolulu modernized, streetcars and trolleys connected students to schools and families to jobs. Local taxi drivers often knew every family by name. Eventually, cars and family-run auto shops took over, and in 1953, the construction of the H-1 freeway cut through Mō‘ili‘ili, changing its landscape forever.

Today, Mō‘ili‘ili remains a place shaped by water, culture, and resilience. Beneath its busy streets, the spring-fed karst still flows quietly—a reminder of the life that first brought people here.

Tucked behind a quiet elementary school in the heart of Mō‘ili‘ili sits a solemn and storied burial ground filled with granite and marble monuments rising from concrete platforms. Approximately 10,000 souls are interred beneath 2,008 monuments in the Mō‘ili‘ili Japanese Cemetery. The graves are aligned with purpose and reverence, an asphalt pathway that leads to the farthest reaches of the silent community. But behind that serenity lies a deep, sometimes disturbing history.

In the early 1900s, stemming from a dream to establish a final resting place for the Japanese Hongwanji community, the Board of Health received a request to establish a cemetery in the Mō‘ili‘ili area. After much debate, the Board finally approved the necessary permits on the condition that the cemetery be open to the entire Japanese community, not just the Hongwanji congregation. It became known as the Kyōdō Bochi, or Japanese Community Cemetery.

By the 1930s, over 1,800 people had been buried there. The cemetery eventually expanded in 1956 and was renamed Mōʻiliʻili Shin-Bochi, the Mōʻiliʻili New Cemetery.

Among the thousands of stone monuments in the 3-acre parcel, one stands out from the rest. While every other vertical pillar is carved and polished from black or gray marble and granite, this one is quite different. Taller than almost every other grave marker in the cemetery, the rough, unpolished, reddish-colored boulder, shaped almost like a teardrop, sits upon a wide dais. Inscribed on the stone are Japanese characters which say In-ga-zu-ka or In-ga-chou—heap of misfortune.

It is the grave of Myles Yukata Fukunaga. His life was indeed one of misfortune.

In 1928, Honolulu was shaken to its core when 10-year-old George Gill Jamieson was brutally murdered.

Fukunaga, just 19 years old, impersonated a hospital orderly who was sent to Punahou School to retrieve a boy whose mother was in a serious car accident. However, there was no accident. Fukunaga drove the boy away from his school in the middle of the day, intending to ransom him to his father, Frederick Jamieson, vice president of the Hawaiian Trust Company. Then, before any money was exchanged, Fukunaga murdered Gill behind the old Seaside Hotel in Waikīkī in a fit of panic.

The brutality of the crime stunned the Islands. Outrage poured in from every direction, and Fukunaga was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. While Nippu Jiji, a Japanese-language newspaper, called for a retrial and questioned racial fairness in the proceedings, others pointed to Fukunaga’s full confession and disturbing premeditation. His execution by hanging was carried out swiftly on November 19, 1929.

[{"type":"text","text":"Decades later, I found myself standing at his grave."}]

That night, a small group of us stood there in the dark, discussing the case, recounting the trial, and the media frenzy. I remembered something Professor Dennis Ogawa once told me about Fukunaga:

“For such a small guy, he had big hands. The hands he used to strangle Gil Jamieson.”

The wind moved gently through the trees, and the stones around us seemed to lean in. I looked up at the marker... and I saw him.

[{"type":"text","text":"It was just for a second, but unmistakable."}]

The thin, straight-shouldered image of Myles Fukunaga appeared on his own headstone. Shirt sleeves rolled, tie slightly askew, face as still and blank as in those old courtroom photos. His expression wasn’t angry. It wasn’t sad. It was... expectant. Then he was gone.

At first, I said nothing, I just stared. But the others had stopped talking. They could feel it.

[{"type":"text","text":"“What’s wrong?” someone asked."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"I didn’t answer. I just pointed."}]

A few people gasped, but as the others turned and looked, the silence deepened. Some claimed they saw only stone. But others described a faint image in the rough pattern of dirt on the rock. His face. Watching. Waiting.

[{"type":"text","text":"I was convinced it was my imagination, but then the others saw it too."}]

“Pareidolia,” I muttered. “Our brains pulling shapes from shadows.”

[{"type":"text","text":"But the cemetery felt different now. Not threatening, just unsettled."}]

Some believe Gil’s ghost still lingers near the spot in Waikīkī where his life was taken. But others say he’s long gone and it’s Fukunaga who remains trapped on earth, bound to his grave by guilt, regret, or something more eternal.

If you ever visit Mōʻiliʻili Japanese Cemetery, you’ll see the care taken by the community to preserve and protect this sacred space. But when the sun goes down and you find yourself near that oddly shaped stone, don’t stare too long.

[{"type":"text","text":"You might see something staring back."}]

For the latest news of Hawai‘i, sign up 

Myles Fukunaga grave Moiliili

<title>Heap of Misfortune in Mō‘ili‘ili Cemetery</title>

Nearly a century ago, the Islands were stunned by the case of Myles Fukunaga, who kidnapped and murdered 10-year-old George Gill Jamieson, and was executed for his crimes. Does his guilty spirit haunt his gravesite?

Heap of Misfortune in Mō‘ili‘ili Cemetery

Kelsey Kukaua Medeiros Headshot

Kelsey Kukaua Medeiros

, the state’s oldest wooden Episcopal church constructed in 1867, recently underwent a glow up.

The project scope included both interior and exterior repairs to the walls, roof and steeple, along with upgrades to electrical, flooring, ADA-compliant ramps and more.

See the exterior transformation in the gallery below.

Construction work on this 19th-century frame church building with a steep gable roof and bell tower bearing a cross began several years ago and wrapped last November. It is listed in the Hawai‘i Register of Historic Places

, with ties to Queen Emma during a time when the Anglican faith was flourishing in the Islands.

More recently, the church was rededicated and unveiled to the Kona community, according to one of its staff members.

“The community was thrilled about it. We’re a small church and almost everybody pitched in redoing the carpets, painting and donating monetarily,” Office Administrator Janet Britt told Aloha State Daily.

She said the current congregation size is between 50 to 90 people, not including guests who visit from across the globe. “We welcome everybody with open arms.”

The church holds Sunday services at 7:30 a.m. and 10 a.m., which includes readings from the Bible, prayer and song. The Rev. Canon Dwight Brown serves as a part-time vicar for the church, which is governed by the Bishop’s Committee.

“Christ Church is a Christian Community responding to the love of God by worship, spiritual nurture and active social concern,” its mission statement reads.  

Bishop's Warden Nathan Smith and People's Warden Jeanne West kept the restoration project on track. 

Mark Hummel Construction was the contractor. Construction paused during the peak Covid years, Britt said, adding that the total cost of the project was about $300,000.

She helped secure funding via grants and donations. Grants were awarded from the 

 and the Freeman Foundation in cooperation with the 

The church property also includes a cemetery, Wallace Hall, two housing rentals and the Queen Emma Community Center, where the church met during the renovation.

This church is a treasure for all of Hawaiʻi's people and we hope to restore it for current and future generations,” Britt wrote in grant application. “As Queen Emma found so many years ago, this church exists solely to provide love and care for the generations of families who live and worship in Kona, including Kealakekua, Captain Cook and as far away as Waimea and Ocean View.

“One of the most important things weʻve learned from this phased approach to renovations is that as people see the progress of the work, enthusiasm continues to grow among our parishioners. ... We see Christ Church growing and that is the most exciting outcome!”

So, what does a restored historic church mean for its surrounding community and beyond? In short, safe and renewed spaces for celebrations, gatherings and other events.

Cultural groups meet to practice weaving, quilting and ukulele. Vendors utilize the certified kitchen on campus for their businesses. ʻAha Punana Leo O Kona Hawaiian immersion school convenes in Wallace Hall, while Partners in Development Foundation’s Tūtū & Me program provides much-needed early childhood education and parent support.

“There are so many community members who depend on Christ Church for spiritual renewal, but we are also there to lend a helping hand to pay a utility bill, to provide diapers and food, and to provide families with non-perishable food items,” Britt said. “The community needs Christ Church and we need your help.”

81-1004 Konawaena School Road, Kealakekua

Hero image Mauka Complete 16x9

<title>Historic Kona church gets rededicated after several years of renovations</title>

A virtual visit with Christ Church Episcopal in Kealakekua: We share before and after photos of the 158-year-old buildingʻs transformation and community sentiment since its completion of this restoration project.

Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

ASD Staff

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Daily Smile: Thursday, June 4, 2026

Authors

ASD Staff

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