Hannah Kihalani Springer

Hannah Kihalani Springer is a Hawaiian scholar, communicator, environmentalist, and storyteller. She is a former trustee of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, and an advocate of the "Try Wait" initiative as a member of the Kaʻūpūlehu Marine Life Advisory Committee (KMLAC).

Springer has advocated for the expansion of the Papahānaumokuākea National Monument, and is a council member of Kuaʻāina Ulu ʻAuamo and the president and board member of the Akaka Foundation for Tropical Forests.

Career

Springer is an educator on indigenous Hawaiian culture and advocate for the protection of the Hawaiian environment. She is an author of Kōkua aku, kōkua mai: an indigenous consensus-driven and place-based approach to community led dry land restoration and stewardship, which details the forced relocation of many Indigenous people of the Hawaiian land, coupled with the disruption of the natural ecology. Springer has worked with multiple outlets to publish stories of Hawaii, including through the Kona Historical Society, the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo, the Hawaiʻi Tourism Authority's Kūkulu Ola—Living Hawaiian Culture Program, and joined multiple podcasts, including Ka Leo o ka Uluau.

In 1979, Springer began work at the Pu'ukohola Heiau National Historic Site, and was an employee as well as a volunteer at the annual cultural festivals. and was a planner for the County of Hawaii.

In November 1996, Springer was elected trustee to the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. In 2001, as president of the nonprofit ʻAhahui o Puʻu Waʻawaʻa, she advocated for the protection of endangered plants during a campaign to encourage the state Board of Land and Natural Resources to assume the lease of 21,000 acres at Puuwaawaa in a proposal that would allow Hawaiians and non-Hawaiians to act as stewards and create some limits on ranching and hunting.

As a member of the Kaʻūpūlehu Marine Life Advisory Committee (KMLAC), Springer was an advocate of the "Try Wait" initiative for fish restoration, which was a proposal to create an area without fishing to restore declining fish populations, with the title based on "a play on a colloquial term uttered when requesting patience." The area was increased in size by Presidential Proclamation on September 25, 2014.

Springer is a council member of Kuaʻāina Ulu ʻAuamo, and president and board member of the Akaka Foundation for Tropical forests. Her home, Kukuiʻohiwai, was historically part of Huʻehuʻe Ranch. She has said that her native Hawaiian lineage can be traced back for 93 generations. and has two children.