Six months after Maui wildfire, 5,000 survivors still stranded: ‘We’re tired of broken promises’

Last year’s fire killed 100 people and razed more than 2,200 structures, mostly working-class family homes. Photograph: Phil Jung/The Guardian

Every afternoon Diana Tevaga rushes back from work to her hotel room to feed her pitbull, Pe’a, and tabby cat, Kenzie, bracing herself for another dispiriting evening searching online for an affordable apartment in Maui.

Tevaga, 41, has been living in a hotel since losing her home – a rent-controlled apartment she’d shared with her mother and pets – in the catastrophic Lahaina wildfire on 8 August. Before the fire, she spent evenings with her nephews and nieces, who lived in the same neighborhood. Now, Tevaga watches reality TV and eats Red Cross meals with other survivors who have no place else to go.