Island residents’ hopes rest on billionaire owner

The 3,200 people living on a rural Hawaiian island that will soon be purchased by billionaire Oracle Corp chief executive Larry Ellison have a laundry list of what they’d like to see him provide.

Working-class residents on Lanai want stable jobs. Affordable housing. No onerous restrictions on hunting or fishing. A return to agriculture. Improved transportation to Maui, Oahu, and other islands given an airport with limited flights. Even simple things like the re-opening of the community pool. They hope he’ll be willing to sit down, listen to their concerns, and be sensitive to the unique culture of Hawaii.

But on Lanai, an island paradise unscathed by urban annoyances such as traffic lights, residents’ lives are largely dependent on whoever owns 98% of the island’s 365sq km. Without tourism, the economic engine that’s driven the island under its current billionaire owner, the “pineapple island” doesn’t have much.