The city in November 2021 forced Hawaii’s original and oldest substance abuse treatment center to move, and the Sand Island Treatment Center now hopes to get financial relief from $36,000 in monthly lease and utility costs to continue to help chronically homeless clients who often suffer from mental health and substance abuse issues.
Mayor Rick Blangiardi and Gov. Josh Green are working together to address homelessness at all levels. But the Sand Island Treatment Center focuses on 123 of the most hard-core, chronically homeless adult women and men. They have been on the street the longest, overuse the 911 system, tax first-responder resources and make costly emergency room visits — only to return back to the streets, where they often commit crimes and enter the criminal court system.
Administrator Kevin Konishi, a 1980 ‘Iolani School graduate, ended up as a client at Sand Island Treatment Center in 1995 after becoming homeless in Mililani.
He described the program’s clients as “the ones that are the most burdensome on taxpayers. These are the ones that are yelling at stop signs and causing trouble.”
They’re often court-ordered into Sand Island’s two-year residential treatment program, where they receive help for everything from resume writing, job training and financial literacy to substance and mental health treatment. Others are referred from the Hawaii Paroling Authority and federal probation office.
Some, like Konishi, enrolled voluntarily to change their lives.
Konishi said he sought help at the urging of his father, who was heartbroken at seeing his homeless son wandering around Mililani.
The founders of the Sand Island Treatment Center began helping island residents with their addictions on Oct. 15, 1961 — turning on vehicle headlights to hold meetings in an abandoned chapel at the site of a former World War II internment camp for occupants of Italian descent on Sand Island.
The organization has the Pacific region’s first treatment license, No. 0001, and held Hawaii’s first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous.
Over the years, the city faced fines and penalties for violations of the federal Clean Water Act and needed to expand its Sand Island wastewater treatment plant.
So in 2021 the city forced the 53-bed treatment center into a bigger, three-story, 123-bed facility it owns on Kaaahi Street in Iwilei behind the Institute for Human Services’ homeless shelter for women and children.
The program had no lease costs on Sand Island. But the new arrangement came with a $20,000-a-month city lease, on top of $8,000 in monthly energy costs and a new $8,000-per-month payment to the owner of the building’s photovoltaic system.
At the same time, Sand Island Treatment Center has requested a state grant-in-aid for $446,800 in renovations to its on-site kitchen to turn it into a commercial kitchen for culinary job training and to cook three meals a day for its clients.
Currently, Sand Island pays to have residents’ meals cooked off-site and transported to the program, with no opportunity for culinary job training.
Mason Henderson, Sand Island’s CEO, wants the city and state to rely on the organization to help reduce the number of Hawaii’s hard-core homeless, who often generate the most complaints from residents and businesses.
About 20 to 30 clients come to Sand Island Treatment Center from the neighbor islands, where there are no similar residential programs.
“We look for the toughest cases,” Henderson said. “If we don’t help them, who will? If the answer is no one, then we have to.”
Asked how much hope he has for some financial relief, Henderson said, “You have to move forward with faith. … If you’re doing the right thing, God’ll find a way.”
Council member Tyler Dos Santos-Tam represents the Council district that includes the new Iwilei location but said he does not have all of the details on the organization’s financial pressures.
Santos-Tam hopes to get more information to explore financial solutions by working with the city and state.
“We keep saying mental health is an important community priority,” Santos-Tam said. “We keep saying that drug abuse is an important community priority, along with addressing crime. We need to support people who are making progress, and $36,000 a month (in new costs) seems awfully high. … I’m willing to work with the administration and work with the state. And I give this drug treatment (facility) credit for doing this as a private organization when this area is really the government’s kuleana.”
Strict rules
There is no shortage of rules at the Sand Island Treatment Center.
Staying clean and sober is a must. But to prevent potential problems, even basic niceties are prohibited, such as male and female clients saying hello or good morning to one another.
Clients who are eventually allowed into a limited area around Iwilei for no longer than four hours at a time must provide a written plan and timetable and bring back receipts if they buy anything, such as a plate lunch.
Those who cannot even afford a hot dog at nearby Costco are not allowed to borrow money from fellow clients, to prevent a power imbalance.
Fighting and even verbal threats of violence are grounds for immediate expulsion.
Sand Island has three psychiatrists on staff who provide one-on-one mental health treatment.
A staff of nearly 50 are former clients who returned to help others just like them, said Konishi, lead tech Cathy Ahana-Rose and intake supervisor Tyrone Spears, who all graduated from the program.
About 40 are also certified substance abuse counselors.
Clients who find jobs while still living at Sand Island turn over their paychecks and receive an allowance of $50 a week, with the rest placed in savings while they learn money management. They also receive help applying for government benefits, Social Security cards and other government IDs.
Those who complete their two years at Sand Island receive follow-up case management to ensure they’re not drinking, using drugs or committing crimes, while remaining good employees and in stable housing.
There are also alumni meetings to keep graduates in touch with the program.
Finding employment
Graduates have found jobs as landscapers, painters, unionized stevedores and unionized laborers, Konishi said.
Employers who have concerns about Sand Island clients on the job receive support from case managers who will investigate issues, such as whether an employee who does not show up for work is really sick.
Shane Mizusawa has hired at least 10 Sand Island Treatment Center clients and graduates, mostly for his plumbing company.
“The reason I do give people an opportunity from Sand Island is because I was in their shoes, and I am forever grateful for them for changing my life,” Mizusawa said.
Before he entered Sand Island about 15 years ago at the age of 27, “I was a menace to society,” he said. “I wasn’t a productive member of the community. I learned how to be a plumber while I was in the program after they told me I had to find a job.”
His uncle had gotten help at Sand Island, followed by his mother.
“They got me into the program, and I’m forever grateful to them,” Mizusawa said.
Not all of Sand Island’s clients have worked out for him.
But he urged other employers to take a chance during a tight job market that includes tax incentives for hiring people who have been incarcerated.
“They would be good additions while they’re in the program and punctual,” Mizusawa said. “I’m willing to give anybody a chance if they’re willing to change their life.”
