MauiTime

About MauiTime

MauiTime is a free alternative newspaper published in Maui County, Hawaii, serving the islands of Maui, Molokai, and Lanai with independent local journalism, arts and entertainment coverage, and community features. Founded in 1997 by Tommy Russo and Mark D'Antonio, it has remained independently owned throughout its existence and is distributed every Thursday. After a pandemic-forced pause in 2020, the paper relaunched in 2021 under the MauiTimes nameplate with expanded circulation, continuing its role as Maui's independent alternative voice.

Two musicians from Chico

The paper's origin story begins in Chico, California, where Tommy Russo and Mark D'Antonio played together in the band Sunset Red, a college band that routinely sold out shows and venues across California. Russo was also the morning show host of Maui's alternative rock station, The Point 101.1 FM. When Sunset Red came to Maui for its first live tour, playing at Lahaina's legendary World Cafe on Front Street, Russo and D'Antonio shared their vision of relocating to Maui and launching an island lifestyle alternative newspaper, a publication in the spirit of the alternative weeklies that were the voices of college towns and hip cities across the country. Roughly a year later, that vision became MauiTime, which released its debut issue in 1997 as a free bi-weekly newsprint magazine. D'Antonio, who had been the band's drummer and percussionist, died in 2018, and the paper published a remembrance honoring its co-founder.

Growing into a weekly

Publisher Russo grew MauiTime from a bi-weekly magazine into a weekly publication with Maui news, community features, and arts and entertainment as its focus. The paper established its offices in Wailuku, the county seat, at 33 North Market Street, and built a circulation of about 18,000, distributed free across the island every Thursday. In 2004 the publication was admitted into the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, the national trade organization for the alternative press, a mark of its arrival as a serious journalistic institution. Throughout its existence the paper has remained independently owned and operated, a rarity in an industry dominated by chains.

Editorial philosophy

MauiTime describes itself not as a “paper of record” — a daily journal of government meetings, ribbon-cuttings, and corporate announcements — but as a publication that decides what is interesting and newsworthy and then does whatever investigation is necessary to get the story. Its editors have said they do not wait for official press releases to appear at the office before deciding what constitutes news, and they believe that even important stories need to be interesting and easy to read, rejecting the dry inverted-pyramid style in favor of narrative leads. The paper provides insightful analysis and in-depth reporting on issues it considers too important for superficial treatment, and its stated mission is to bring news, culture, music, dining, and Maui's most comprehensive calendar to island-wide readers every Thursday.

Regular features

The paper developed a roster of distinctive regular features. LC Watch monitors the Maui County Department of Liquor Control, reflecting the paper's long-running attention to the intersection of government regulation and the island's hospitality industry. The Rob Report, written by former Maui mayoral candidate Rob Parsons, concentrates on environmental matters, a subject of intense concern on an island where development, water, and land use are perennial controversies. Coconut Wireless provides a satirical, sardonic roundup of the week's events, and the paper carries Chuck Shepherd's syndicated column, News of the Weird. Regular columns with opinionated views delve into local government and politics, and the paper's coverage of the local music scene, combined with daily listings of more than a hundred island events, made it an essential guide for both residents and visitors.

Serving the whole island

MauiTime serves all of Maui, and its coverage reflects the island's distinctive character: a place where Native Hawaiian culture, a large visitor industry, agricultural traditions, and a growing population of transplants and retirees intersect. The paper's reporting has covered county government and politics, the island's environmental challenges, the local arts scene, and the community life of towns from Lahaina and Kihei to Paia, Makawao, and Hana. Its annual “Year in Review” issues have become a tradition, chronicling the island's political dramas, cultural milestones, and absurdities with the paper's characteristic irreverence. For visitors, the paper has offered practical information — dining guides, event calendars, and music listings — alongside the investigative journalism that distinguishes it from tourist publications.

The pandemic pause

The COVID-19 pandemic devastated Hawaii's tourist-dependent economy, and MauiTime was not spared. Businesses closed or limited their hours, and without tourist dollars, most of those businesses stopped advertising, including with the paper. During May 2020 the fiercely independent newsweekly could not generate any income as the flow of advertising dollars stopped, and in June 2020 the paper paused publication and laid off its entire staff. The closure was a gut punch for the island's alternative press: critical stories, especially about the pandemic, needed to be told, but there was no way to get the truth out, as Russo later said.

The 2021 relaunch as MauiTimes

Fifteen months later, the paper returned. Russo partnered with J. Sam Weiss, chairman and owner of 6035 Media, a Colorado company that publishes eight newspapers and companion digital platforms, who relocated to Maui to coordinate the relaunch as the paper's publisher and executive editor. The relaunched paper added an “s” to its name — MauiTimes — to signify that it would offer everything MauiTime had always offered, plus expanded business, education, sports, and community coverage, alongside investigative reporting and the most comprehensive arts, culture, and calendar coverage on the island. The first edition appeared in September 2021, with circulation of more than 78,000 copies: 56,000 sent to every residence and business on Maui and the nearby islands of Molokai and Lanai, plus 22,000 copies available free at 240 high-traffic locations, making it Hawaii's largest-circulation news publication at the time. A companion daily digital platform provided current civic and cultural coverage for locals and visitors alike.

A digital and print presence

The relaunched organization operates both a print weekly and a daily digital platform, reaching island residents and the millions of visitors who pass through Maui each year. Its websites, including mauitime.com, carry the paper's reporting, cultural coverage, and event listings, while the print edition continues to be distributed free across Maui County. The paper's sister brands over the years have included MauiFeed, MauiDish, MauiGanic, and MauiVents, reflecting its reach into the island's food, environmental, and entertainment scenes. Its social media presence extends that reach to readers who follow the paper on Facebook and other platforms.

Place in Hawaii's media landscape

Maui's media landscape is small and has been shaped by the same economic pressures that have battered community journalism across the country, compounded by the islands' dependence on tourism. MauiTime's survival — its independence, its comeback from the pandemic closure, and its expansion under new investment — makes it an outlier. As Maui's only independent locally owned newspaper, it occupies a distinctive position: not the paper of record, but the paper that asks the questions the institutions would rather not answer, covers the music scene the dailies ignore, and keeps an irreverent eye on the county's politics. For more than a quarter-century, from its origins in a Chico band's Maui tour to its status as the island's largest-circulation news publication, MauiTime has been a singular voice in Hawaii's alternative press. Visit the official website at mauitime.com.