Today marks an important milestone for the organizers of the Hawaii Island Portuguese Chamber of Commerce Cultural and Educational Center — they will be inking signatures on a construction contract for the long-envisioned facility at the corner of Komohana and Ponahawai streets in Hilo.
“We’re working feverishly right now with Heartwood Pacific LLC, who is our general contractor, and our architect, Blaise Caldeira, who is donating his time,” Marlene Hapai, president and executive director of the center, said Thursday.
The center is being funded by a $1 million grant-in-aid the group received in 2016, plus more than $300,000 from fundraising and $150,000 in capital improvement money released in November by Gov. David Ige.
The $150,000 must be encumbered by June 30. According to Hapai, that means a construction contract must be in place by then — although it’s not quite that simple.
“They dropped a bomb on us,” Hapai said, referring to the state government. “They said they’ll be closing the books on June 20. That curveball means we have to have the contract in place. … We’ll be transmitting it to them electronically and dropping a copy of it in the mail to them, postmarked (today).”
With the current estimate of $1.7 million to build a scaled-back version of the cultural and educational center that’s been in the works since a nonprofit corporation was established in 2002, $150,000 is a considerable chunk of change. And Hapai doesn’t want to see the funding suffer a similar fate as grant-in-aid money the project received in 2018.
“We lost a $200,000 GIA because they wanted us to be shovel-ready. And we weren’t. And that was during COVID,” Hapai said.
The original plan for the Portuguese center included a 4,500-square-foot facility with a main hall, a Hall of Explorations, restrooms and storage.
“It’s been really tough raising funds, but we have raised funds. People have been so generous,” Hapai said.“But we scaled back. We got to the point to where we just said, ‘Let’s make a little one-room structure. Let’s build something, and then we can always add to it.’”
And it appears as though they’re going to be able to do just that.
“There are angels, and we had an angel step forward. We are going to be honoring her this Saturday, Theresa Perreira Zendejas,” Hapai said. “She willed her home and property to us when she was in the fourth stage of terminal cancer, and she passed away.”
Hapai said when the property Perreira Zendejas donated to the center is sold, the proceeds will go into the construction contract, allowing them to go back to a previous stage of planning, with three restrooms, a storage room, an archive room and a kitchenette.
“Not as huge as our original dream, but much more functional,” Hapai noted.
Hapai and her committee are conducting a campaign to raise the final $150,000 to meet their fundraising goal.
The group is holding an event called “Summer Festa” from 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday at Mooheau Park Bandstand in downtown Hilo.
There will be cultural and historical exhibits; food including Portuguese bean soup, Portuguese sausage dogs, sweetbread and malasadas; a living history of Perreira Zendejas featuring actress and playwright Jackie Pualani Johnson; music by ‘ukulele master Brittni Paiva, Portuguese fado singer Ramona Viera, and the Hawaii County Band; and a live auction of a “Stella Dias” ‘ukulele at 11 a.m.
Asked about a timeline for completion of the center, Hapai waxed optimistic.
“We’re going to try to finish it by next year, maybe even this year,” she replied. “It just depends on whether Mother Nature cooperates and we don’t have too much Hilo rain.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.