Board of Directors
Hawaiʻi Alliance for Progressive Actionsʻs Board of Directors serves on a volunteer basis.
Gary Hooser
President & Board Member
Gary Hooser spent 8 years serving as a Hawaiʻi State Senator - 4 as the Senate Majority Leader. He was appointed Director of the Office of Environmental Quality Control under Governor Neil Abercrombie, and also served 8 years as a member of the Kaua‘i County Council. Prior to serving in public office, he owned and managed several small businesses. Gary is a graduate of the University of Hawaiʻi. See Gary address the Syngenta Shareholder's meeting in Basel, Switzerland, in 2015: "Withdraw your lawsuit against the County of Kaua'i!" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0zz7cV_Qe8)
Andrea Brower
Co-Vice President & Board Member
Andrea Brower is an activist and scholar from Kaua‘i. She is an assistant professor in the Solidarity & Social Justice Program with Gonzaga University's Department of Sociology. Her research, writing, and teaching on capitalism, colonialism, the environment, food, and agriculture is embedded in social movements for justice, equality, liberation, and ecological regeneration. She recently published a book on the agrochemical industry in Hawaiʻi.
Ikaika Hussey
Co-Vice President & Board Member
Ikaika Hussey teaches in the journalism program at University of Hawaiʻi, Manoa. He established The Hawaii Independent, an award-winning civic affairs website, in 2008, and Summit, a cosmopolitan Hawaiʻi lifestyle magazine. Hussey won awards for his coverage of homelessness, and has interviewed leaders such as Alice Walker and Desmond Tutu. His writing has appeared in The Nation and Reuters, and he has been quoted in Democracy Now and Al Jazeera. He speaks widely on media, social justice, and education, including the US Social Forum, the Block by Block journalism conference, and the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations. Ikaika is a volunteer board member on nonprofits dedicated to education, social justice, culture, women's rights, and the environment. Hussey lives with his family in Honolulu and is a performing musician.
Kim Coco Iwamoto
Treasurer & Board Member
Kim Coco Iwamoto serves as a Commissioner on the Hawai'i Civil Rights Commission. Prior to that, she was an elected member of the Hawai'i Board of Education and served as Chair of the University of Hawai'i's Career & Technical Education Coordinating Advisory Council. In 2013, Kim Coco was honored by the White House as one of 10 LGBT elected or appointed officials who are “Harvey Milk Champions of Change.” She is active in many progressive issues across the islands.
Kaleikoa Ka‘eo
Board Member
Kaleikoa Ka‘eo is an associate professor of Hawaiian Studies, Department of Humanities, at the UH Maui College. Ka‘eo is a proud graduate of Baldwin High School on Maui and the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. Prior to returning to his hometown, Ka‘eo was a lecturer in Hawaiian language at UH Manoa, a teacher at the Hawaiian Language Immersion Program at King Kekaulike High School and the culture and education program manager for the Kaho‘olawe Island Reserve Commission. Ka‘eo was born and raised on Maui. He and his family reside in Waiohuli.
Michael Miranda
Secretary & Board Member
Michael Miranda has several years of experience in the non-profit sector, specifically in the labor movement and facilitating and developing after school programs. For the past four years, he has been working as a social worker with the State of Hawaii, Judiciary. Michael has keen interests in Filipino culture and volunteers on several local boards with a focus on education and capacity building. Michael lives on Kauai and hunts for free shipping in his free time.
Pualiʻiliʻimaikalani Rossi is from the ahupuaʻa of Wailua on the mokupuni of Kauaʻi. She holds a B.A. in Hawaiian Studies and in Anthropology from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo and an M.A. in Hawaiian Studies from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. She is an assistant professor of Hawaiian Studies and Hawaiian Language at Kauaʻi Community College. Understanding that we must look to the past to be successful in our future, Pua has a specific interest in natural resource management and restoring our traditional food production systems. With the same intention, she also works towards the preservation of Wailuniaho'āno and serves as president of I Ola Wailuanui. She is also a mom of two boys.
Pualiʻiliʻimaikalani Rossi
Board Member
Walter Ritte Jr. is a hunter and Hawaiian activist now working on the restoration of traditional fishponds and educational programs based Hawaiian culture. He was involved in stopping the bombing by the US Navy of the Hawaiian Island of Kahoʻolawe and was one of the Kahoʻolawe Nine who made the first protest landing on Kahoʻolawe on January 4, 1976. Ritte also served in the 1978 Hawaiʻi State Constitutional Convention which established the recognition of Hawaiian Gathering Rights and he was also one of the first elected trustees to the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Ritte is married with four children and seven grand children and resides on the island of Molokaʻi, Hawaiʻi.
Walter Ritte Jr.
Board Member
Karen Shishido is a sustainability consultant in Honolulu working in design and construction. Raised in Waipahu, she attended Occidental College (A.B.) and the University of Delaware, where she received a master's degree in Energy and Environmental Policy. Her research focused on land use and environmental justice in Hawaiʻi. Karen has previously worked as a coastal zone planner and energy analyst for the State of Hawaiʻi. She is passionate about food security, energy, and recovering the democratic process through community empowerment. She has served on the boards of several Hawaiʻi environmental and good government organizations.
Karen Shishido
Board Member
Malu Shizue Miki
Board Member
Malu Shizue Miki is the owner of Abundant Life Natural Foods in Hilo. She was born and raised on Oʻahu, but has lived on Hawaiʻi Island for the last 48 years. Malu is a passionate advocate for healthy agriculture and protecting our natural environment.
Councilmember Keani Rawlins Fernandez
Board Member
Councilmember Rawlins Fernandez a kupa’aina of Molokai and mother of a 14-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter, who drive her passion for creating a world better than she found it. She was raised by a family intimately connected to 'āina. which instilled in her the importance of the reciprocal relationship between people and place.
She's a graduate of Molokai High School, with her Bachelor’s Degree in Public Relations, a Master's Degree in Business Administration, and a law degree with certificates specializing in Environmental Law and Native Hawaiian Law.
She is honored to serve the people and ‘āina of Molokaʻi, Maui, Lāna‘i, and Kaho‘olawe and is working to ensure that our community’s voice is centered in decision-making, that our ‘āina is protected, and that our people are cared for.
Kaiea Medeiros
Board Member
Kaiea Medeiros is an aloha ʻāina champion, maoli cultural practitioner, and mahiʻai born and raised in Pukalani, Maui. He serves as the Maui County Department of Agriculture’s Agriculture Advocate, where he champions legislation and policy change at all levels of government. The purpose of his hana is to secure and sustain the health, healing, and well-being of our kānaka maoli, immigrant, minority, and most dispossessed farmers, agricultural producers, and aloha ʻāina champions here in Hawaiʻi and across Papahanaumoku (Mother Earth). All while developing a resilient, sustainable, and pono food system that is circular, hyper localized, and economically viable. Moreover and most importantly, he puts mauka to makai stream flow, a thriving endemic ecology, kupuna ʻike, land back, and water back at the forefront of this effort and kuleana. Additionally, he currently serves as the co-lead for the Natural and Cultural Resources Branch of the Maui County’s Office of Recovery for both Lahaina and Kula. Kaiea is an alumnus of Kuleana Academy’s 7th cohort.
Ua Mau Ke Ea O Ka ‘Āina I Ka Pono. The Life, Breathe, and Sovereignty, of the Lands and Waters that Feed and Sustain, are Perpetuated, Protected, and Proliferated, in Balance, Symbiosis, and Reciprocity. Aloha ‘Āina ʻOiaʻiʻo. Ea ‘Āina ʻOiaʻiʻo.
Dyson Chee
Board Member
Dyson Chee is a youth advocate living on the Hawaiian Island of Oʻahu. In 2018, Dyson founded Project O.C.E.A.N. Hawaii to take on single-use plastics, and from 2019 to 2024 he served as a director for the Hawaiʻi Youth Climate Coalition (HYCC), a youth-led community advocacy organization dedicated to fighting for climate justice. Dyson has been active in the community since the age of 14 and has been recognized for his volunteerism by a variety of entities, including the Hawaiʻi State Senate and the White House. Now in his early 20s, Dyson is a recent graduate from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, and his degree is in Interdisciplinary Studies with a focus on Communicology, Economics, and Political Science. In his free time, Dyson loves playing tennis, drinking boba tea, and chilling at the beach.
The HAPA Team
Executive Director
☎ (808) 212-9616 x1
✉ anne@hapahi.org
Anne Frederick
Anne Frederick has served as the Executive Director of the Hawaii Alliance for Progressive Action (HAPA) since 2015. HAPA grows out of the movement to protect communities from the harmful and extractive practices of the agrochemical industry in Hawaiʻi. Her work centers on honoring people’s connection to place and organizing in support of community-led decision making for neighborhoods, land use, natural resource management, food ways and systems of governance. Prior to her time at HAPA she co-founded and directed the community planning and design non-profit, Hester Street from 2002-2014.
Fair & Sustainable Food Systems Director, Photographer, & Environmental Scientist
☎ (808) 212-9616 x2
✉ fern@hapahi.org
Fern Holland
Fern Ānunenue Holland was born and raised on Kauaʻi and has been active in local issues relating to heavy pesticide use, land management, native ecosystem restoration, food sovereignty, and regenerative agriculture locally for over a decade. She received her Bachelor of Science with triple majors in Wildlife Management, Environmental Science and Marine Biology from Griffith University’s School of Environment on the Gold Coast in Australia in 2009.
Since then, Holland has worked professionally as an environmental scientist and consultant for ecological, contaminated land and other environmental assessments, both in Hawaiʻi and overseas.
Holland was an integral part of the development and passing of Kauaʻi County Bill 2491 for disclosure, buffers and protections related to biotech experimental research practices. She also organized the 2013 March in March in Poipu and later the September Mana March in Lihue for the passing of Bill 2491. Holland worked closely on and is featured in the award winning documentary, Poisoning Paradise. She has worked for over 15 years on environmental justice issues associated with industrialized agriculture and biotech pesticide and GE experimentation in Hawaiʻi and globally.
Holland is also a graduate of HAPA’s 1st cohort from the Kuleana Academy and ran for the House of Representatives in District 14 in 2016 and Kauaʻi County Council in 2022. She is a founding board member of I Ola Wailuanui, the Kauaʻi based non profit that is working to restore the Wailua fishpond and agricultural systems and protect the former Coco Palms parcels for the betterment of community and the environment.
HAPA Co-Founder / Kuleana Academy Director & Program Advisor
☎ (808) 212-9616 x3
✉@ariajuliet@hapahi.org
Aria Castillo
Aria Castillo is a keiki ʻo ka ʻāina (born and raised) on the island of Kauaʻi. After graduating from college and living in Los Angeles for a few years, she returned home to work in marketing but found a passion for local politics instead. Since 2014, she has worked on various campaigns on the state and county levels for political movements, candidates, and PACS. Aria was a founding board member of HAPA, the co-founder of Kuleana Academy, and serves as the Program Advisor and head of KAʻs selection committee.
Communications Organizer
☎ (808) 212-9616 x5
✉ kencho@hapahi.org
Kencho Gurung
Kencho Gurung grew up predominantly in South and Southeast Asia and belongs to a tribe Indigenous to the Himalayas.
Since childhood, Kencho has been a fierce advocate for equality. The struggles for racial justice, LGBTQ+ justice, climate justice, animal justice and a free Palestine are near to her heart. Kencho’s biracial identity and adolescence spent in three continents have taught her to value intersectionality, and she nurtures a tireless ambition to dismantle white supremacy.
Kencho is a Kuleana Academy graduate, food justice advocate, organizer, volunteer and educator and hopes to continue helping to strengthen the progressive movement in Hawaiʻi. Kencho is motivated to action every single day by her love for Black and Brown communities, and for Hawaiians and Indigenous People across the world fighting against systems of colonialism and white supremacy.
Kaiakahinaliʻi Kaʻōpua-Canonigo
Lead Organizer
✉ hina@hapahi.org
ʻO Kaiakahinaliʻi Kaʻōpua-Canonigo kēia, mai ʻāina i ka ihu o nā moku, ʻo Mānoa nō ia.
Kaiakahinaliʻi is from Mānoa on the island of Oʻahu. She is a wahine Hawaii, product of a Hawaiian-culture based education, and lifelong advocate for mālama ʻāina, and a demilitarized, independent Hawaiʻi.
She is a graduate of Hālau Kū Māna PCS, a learning environment founded on principles of Aloha ʻĀina, ʻIke Kūpuna, and Kuanaʻike Hawaiʻi. These lessons not only welcomed, but actively encouraged and cultivated the development of her identity as a Kanaka Maoli, as a steward of this ʻāina, and eventually as a citizen in this world working to create positive systemic change.
Administrative & Programs Associate
✉ jaela@hapahi.org
Jaela Henderson
Jaela was raised by the fruitful ʻili ʻāina of Kūkanono in Kailua, Oʻahu. She studied Political Science and Ethnic Studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, devoting her time to understanding Transformative Justice in Hawaiʻi. Jaela continues to draw from her Black and Native Hawaiian genealogies to explore the practices that promote accountability and nourish our communities. Prior to her role with HAPA, she served as the Executive Director of Hui Mauli Ola on Oʻahu. As a new makua, Jaela feels her most notable contribution to the Lāhui Hawaiʻi is striving to raise her keiki through the language and practices of her kūpuna.
Nadia Alves
Kuleana Academy Program Coordinator
✉ nadia@hapahi.org
Nadia Alves is a first generation immigrant to the United States. Born in Cape Verde, an island nation on the west coast of Africa, she immigrated to the US along with her family at the age of twelve. Growing up in a working class family, Nadia is acutely aware of the challenges people face due to our societal shortcomings and the importance that politics play in shaping the realities of countless families like hers. She is a Kuleana Academy alum, a passionate advocate for racial, economic and social justice, and a campaign manager for various local campaigns and causes. Nadia has served as co-chair on the board of Young Progressives Demanding Action (YPDA), the organizing director of Wolf-PAC Hawaiʻi, and currently serves as an office manager at the State Legislature.
Cris Romento
Visual Storyteller & Journalist
✉ cris@hapahi.org
Cris Romento is a Kanaka Maoli Filmmaker telling healing, joyful stories through a feminist lens. Her work celebrates women, indigenous stewardship, and the planet. Before joining HAPA, Cris worked overseas in Saudi Arabia and Europe, directing and editing films on innovative science and startups for worldwide audiences. She has created content globally with TEDx and the United Nations, as well as organizations promoting responsible tourism and ocean conservation. Cris is grateful to be a part of telling Aloha ʻĀina stories in her hometown.
Read About What The HAPA Team Has To Say!
Mahalo nui to all who joined HAPA in celebration of our 10th anniversary in September. What a wonderful opportunity to celebrate our growing community of changemakers across Hawaii, all we’ve accomplished together, and our vision for the future.
It was great to take a walk down memory lane with our partners who have been with us since the beginning, catch up with our Kuleana Academy alumni, and introduce our movement to new friends who believe in a Hawaiʻi that puts our ʻāina and people over profits.