Telescope: Belated Follow-Up

Back in mid-January, we noted that when our regents were meeting, so, too, were the regents of the University of Hawaii.* The latter were going to make a decision about the Mauna Kea site where the proposed new telescope was to be built (and where other telescopes are located). This issue keeps coming up at the UC Regents since UC is part of a consortium to build the new telescope and there have been protests by native Hawaiians about the plan. The issue comes up from time to time in the public comment period of the UC Regents. In addition, they at one point put the issue on the agenda as a discussion item and heard testimony about it. 

We neglected to follow up on what happened in Hawaii. So, belatedly, now we do:

After five years of debates and rewrites, the University of Hawaii Board of Regents approved Mauna Kea's master plan.

Hawaii News Now, Jan. 20, 2022

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Following hours of testimony Thursday, the UH Board of Regents voted to approve a new master plan for Mauna Kea. The 7-to-1 vote is the culmination of years on debate on the issue. The plan outlines the University of Hawaii’s vision for the summit and management guidelines for the next 20 years. And while it limits the number of telescopes, it doesn’t specifically mention the Thirty Meter Telescope. “The Thirty Meter telescope is a fully permitted project. The master plan does accommodate completion of the project,” said Greg Chun, executive director of Mauna Kea stewardship. “It also accommodates a situation or scenario in which the TMT is not built.” The regents received about 1,400 pages of testimony on the plan.

Meanwhile, there is a push at the state Legislature to transfer the management of the summit to a new entity. Some regents said Thursday that might be a good idea.

Healani Sonoda Pale, a TMT opponent, urged the BOR before their vote to “listen to the voices, our voices, the voices of the kanaka maoli people and the kiai of Mauna Kea.” But astronomy professor emeritus Alan Tokunaga said stopping TMT will do more harm than good. “I am saddened by the controversy of astronomy development on Mauna Kea,” he said. “However, stopping the TMT and even stopping all of astronomy in Hawaii will not resolve the underlying issues raised by the key movement and it will not yield a better future for the next generation.”

Source: https://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/2022/01/21/after-years-debate-uh-board-regents-approve-new-mauna-kea-master-plan/.

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/01/the-other-regents-are-also-meeting-week.html.