Volunteers food servers from the Newman Center at the University of Hawaii line up for a photo outside Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen at St. Augustine Church in Waikiki in this file photo. (Photo courtesy of Dann Ebina)
By Anna Weaver
Hawaii Catholic Herald
Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen at St. Augustine by-the-Sea Parish in Waikiki has been giving out free hot meals on weekdays to the hungry for going on 50 years.
But after pressure from Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi’s office, St. Augustine’s pastor is temporarily stopping the program, which serves about 50 people a day and 1,800 meals a month.
Sacred Hearts Father Lane Akiona said Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen stopped giving out its free lunches July 14, for about a week, while the parish tries to figure out an alternative way to serve those who are hungry.
Volunteers prepare plates for Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen free meal service. (Photo courtesy of Dann Ebina)
About a year and a half ago, the mayor first met with the church to get its perspective. Then in October 2022, he came back with the Honolulu police chief and other police representatives. Father Akiona also asked Blessed Sacrament Father Robert Stark, director of the diocese’s Office for Social Ministry, and the Institute for Human Services, which has worked with the church in the past to offer wraparound services to Aunty Carmen’s patrons, to attend that meeting.
The mayor opposed the lunch program because a minority number of the people coming for meals had criminal records and had been recorded committing petty crimes in Waikiki.
“He’s encouraging us to shut down because we only enable them by continuing to feed them,” Father Akiona said.
Other issues included trash left behind by those getting meals and their visibility to hotel guests in the area. Food has been given out at the church gate on Ohua Avenue which is directly across the street from the entrance to the Waikiki Beach Marriott Resort & Spa.
Only around 10 out of the 40 or 50 people who come to the lunch program are the issue, Father Akiona said.
“It’s just a handful of people [with criminal records], but the other people who really need our service are the ones who will suffer,” the priest said of the food service ending.
After a July 12 Hawaii News Now report by Eddie Dowd on the closure of Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen, Father Akiona said he heard from local organizations like IHS and River of Life Mission who wanted to see how they could help.
He’s also seen a large number of positive comments online in support of Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen.
“It’s the wider community that’s concerned about it,” Father Akiona said. “We’re just a small little church trying to do our bit. So, I think it just proved that, as much as the mayor might say people are opposed to us, there’s much more people who are in favor of what we’re doing at a very small scale.”
St. Augustine is looking for alternative ways to help those who are hungry now.
Father Akiona said that before the COVID pandemic and shutdown, food was given out in the parish parking lot. But to allow for social distancing, they switched to giving out food at the church gate.
He said one solution may be to move the pickup line so it’s entirely on the church property again and there’s no chance of impeding any public area. He added that those who come to eat don’t linger long. Set up starts at 10:30, meals are given out at 11, and everything is packed up at noon.
In a July 14 statement about the St. Augustine’s soup kitchen closure, Bishop Larry Silva wrote, “I am grateful to all who have been involved in taking care of our brothers and sisters at Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen at St. Augustine Church, Waikiki.”
“I understand that some homeless people have problems that make their presence in the community a challenge,” he added. “As others have done, I am confident that some alternative ways to reach out to those who are in need will be developed, and that they will be even more effective. It is always our kuleana to care for those who are most in need.”
Volunteers benefit too
It isn’t just those receiving the meals who get something from Aunty Carmen’s Kitchen.
In an October 2022 Hawaii Catholic Herald column that mentions the meal service, Father Stark of the diocese’s Office for Social Ministry said that parish volunteers who help with the meals “experience the presence of Christ by serving the vulnerable.”
“They also talked story about how volunteering with vulnerable persons helps them become more patient, compassionate, loving persons by recognizing all belong to One Ohana, one human family.”
The mayor’s office did not respond to a request by email for comment by this story’s deadline.
But in a June 29 One Oahu podcast, Mayor Blangiardi said that he recently met with Father Akiona and told him if the church didn’t shut the program down, he’d likely find a way to do it himself.
The mayor said in the podcast that the city had video of people leaving the church lunch program and going nearby and “hanging out and not even being good.”
He said the church had been able to clean up the street area litter issues he’d talked to them about last fall but that he still wanted the program to leave Waikiki.
“Having that go on in the middle of Waikiki is not good for business,” he said. “If you feed and give them money, if you do either of those, you’re enabling them. Especially when you have bad guys lurking in the homeless population, which they are in Waikiki because of what it affords them in the way of petty crimes and other things they can do. That’s not good. And that’s what we want to stop.”
In 2022, the mayor’s office worked with the River of Life Mission to move its longtime feeding program from Chinatown to a new, city-run Homeless Resource Center in Iwilei.
The city didn’t offer St. Augustine another specific alternative like this when asking it to close the program.
Father Akiona is meeting with staff volunteers and other resources to see how to restart the program in a safer environment.
A slightly different version of this story first appeared on our website. This is the print edition version.
