City-owned plantation homes crumbling in Ewa Villages

Added: 2026-05-26

[00:00:00]All new tonight, H&N investigates city-owned houses deteriorating in a former plantation camp. Our Daryl Huff says after years of neglect and scandals, the city now wants to get rid of the properties.

[00:00:15]This house was part of the ambitious Eva Villages renovation project that promised affordable housing in renovated plantation homes. But as you can see, this is one of a number of homes that have been left behind.

[00:00:28]>> $35. nice neighbors, good people, and uh but the house just kept crumbling and crumbling and crumbling. Bert Charlton has been living next to this deteriorating plantation house for 30 years. It really began falling apart after the elderly residents left. The city didn't fix it or find a new tenant, and it was left to the elements and vermin. The cats were going up through the roof, going and living inside. The rats, they were chasing the rats inside the house. The cats were breeding in there.

[00:00:58]>> The city bought the plantation villages in the 1980s when the plantation shut down. In the early 90s, Mayor Jeremy Harris led the EA village revitalization project, aimed to renovate about 270 plantation homes and sell them at affordable prices to the remaining plantation workers and middle inome buyers.

[00:01:18]>> I think their hearts were in the right places, but it was a massive undertaking. From the start, it was plagued by optimistic expectations, underestimated costs, and finally, conviction of city housing manager Michael Cahapea for stealing millions in business relocation expenses.

[00:01:36]The scandal led the city to get out of the housing business entirely until Mayor Balangiardi formed a new housing and land management department a year and a half ago, but it's focused on bigger multi-unit and high-rise projects near public transit. But from our perspective, um, the city really shouldn't be in the business of single family home.

[00:01:58]>> Unlike the vast majority of Eva Villages houses that have been renovated and sold to new owners, the seven abandoned units were mostly rented from the city by former plantation workers or family members who couldn't or didn't want to buy them. But they are still city property and Bert Charlton has been pushing 20 years for action trying to have them rehabilitate these houses or sell the lots. I mean affordable housing. We could someone would want to buy this lot and build another uh plantation home here, but they just seem to really they they don't want to do anything about it. So, we're doing everything that we can to clean this up.

[00:02:37]>> It's not easy. The entire village is designated historic. So, a buyer would have to follow strict rebuilding guidelines, and the city is now beginning a long process to sell them, offering them first to other city departments, then offered to the highest bidder. And it all needs council approval. So, maybe next year.

[00:02:56]>> It would absolutely be in the best interest of the public and the city if we could clear them out and sell them and and put them to better.

[00:03:03]>> The city and county, the mayor is the worst neighbor I've ever had in my life.

[00:03:08]As it figures out what to do with properties like this one, the city needs to learn lessons because there are other plantation villages around Aahu that will need similar renovation. Reporting from Eva, Daryl Huff, Hawaii News