By Jessica Puff, State Historic Preservation Division Architectural Historian
Management of cultural and historic resources would be impossible without having an idea what resources are where. Archaeologists conduct Archaeological Inventory Surveys to find what cultural resources are located within a specific project area (see “Ask An Expert” May 2014). Architectural historians conduct this same type of study for architectural historic resources. For the State Historic Preservation Division (SHPD), survey and inventory is the foundation of everything that the office does. It provides them with the information needed to document the history of a place, build special educational and outreach programs that share that history, apply for grants that may help a community use the programming developed by SHPD, nominate the site(s) to the State and National Registers of Historic Places and help those sites become eligible for Federal Historic Tax Credits, while providing guidance for the preservation or restoration of places surveyed.
Architectural Surveys are regulated by the same laws and standards as Archaeological Inventory Surveys, such as the Secretary of Interior’s Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties. There are a number of reasons to conduct a survey, including identification of resources within a project area under the National Historic Preservation Act Section 106, or Hawai‘i Revised Statutes Chapter 6E.
Surveys are also conducted for planning purposes; land managers must have an idea what resources are within their management areas in order to effectively plan for the future. Once the purpose of a survey is clarified, the architectural historian decides which type of survey best fits; reconnaissance level survey (RLS) or intensive level survey (ILS). Both RLS and ILS collect the same type of data, but ILS provides additional information to inform nominations to the State or National Register. Methods of conducting surveys vary depending on project needs, area to be surveyed, and reasons for the survey.
Surveys begin with background research of the study area, followed by field work for data collection. Once surveyors are in the field (aka the project area) they photograph the structures to be included in the survey and record information such as the architectural style of the buildings, materials used in construction, condition of the resource, and most significantly, which resources are eligible for the State or National Register.
Survey data can then serve as an inventory of what historic resources are in an area, which ones are eligible for historic designation, and what history is represented with the remaining resources. Inventory is a major research and planning tool; it allows for clarification and prioritization of resource categories. Land managers responsible for historic resources under state, county, or federal regulations must know what resources are under their management. Surveys most importantly can serve as a starting point to incorporating our historic properties into the future development and planning of the future. Inventories are not static and must be updated as change and development takes place.
Survey and inventory management is a continuous process. Realistically, the life of a survey is only about ten years. After that, the survey should be completed again to identify whether or not buildings, structures, or places still maintain their historical integrity; and to document any changes that have occurred. A lot can happen in ten years. It’s SHPD’s responsibility to be diligent and constantly update
State surveys and inventory to reflect the reality of what’s around us. By working with communities and interested groups to initiate their own surveys SHPD can better identify and document places and resources that haven’t documented before. The Hawaii State Historic Preservation Division has a set of guidelines that provide the requirements for surveys SHPD conducts and those accepted from outside agencies. These guidelines are based which are based on the National Register Bulletin 24 “Guidelines: Architectural Historic Resource Surveys.” Before initiating a survey of your area, contact SHPD for those guidelines to ensure that the data can add to the overall inventory of historic places.