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County Veterans Cemeteries — a Duty on Three Counties, Not a Grant You Apply For

HRS §363-5 obliges the councils of Hawaii, Kauai and Maui counties to establish, maintain and provide interment at veterans cemeteries in their own counties. A spouse, minor children and unmarried disabled adult children who predecease the veteran are named in the statute.

Verified August 23, 2026

What this benefit is

HRS §363-5 obliges the councils of Hawaii, Kauai and Maui counties to establish, maintain and provide interment at veterans cemeteries in their own counties. A spouse, minor children and unmarried disabled adult children who predecease the veteran are named in the statute.

What it's worth: Interment at a county veterans cemetery on Hawaii, Kauai or Maui

  • The statute directs the councils of the counties of Hawaii, Kauai and Maui to establish the cemetery or cemeteries in their own counties, and to provide for their maintenance and upkeep.
  • Interment is provided for service members who died while in the armed forces; for eligible veterans who entered service after 7 September 1980 as an enlisted person or after 16 October 1980 as an officer and served twenty-four continuous months or the full period called; for eligible veterans discharged under conditions other than dishonorable with peacetime or wartime service; and for a wife, husband, minor children or unmarried disabled adult children who predecease an entitled service member or veteran.
  • The cost of transporting the remains to the county of interment is borne by the family or the estate — that sentence is in the statute, and it is the one cost the statute pushes back.
  • Eligibility for burial within any state veterans cemetery is determined under current Veterans Affairs and National Cemetery Administration regulations, not by a separate state test.
  • No dollar figure for any fee appears in §363-5. The statute is silent on charges, so ask the county cemetery office directly.

Who is entitled to it

  • The statute reaches discharges under conditions other than dishonorable.
  • Your home is in this state.

Not sure whether that describes you?

Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.

How to claim it

  1. 1Ask the county cemetery office on your island what it needs to pre-qualify a record, and do it while the discharge papers are easy to find.
  2. 2Plan for transport. The statute makes moving the remains to the county of interment the family or estate’s cost, and inter-island transport is the expense people do not see coming.
  3. 3If a spouse or an unmarried disabled adult child may need interment, raise it at the same time — the statute names them, and the county has to have been told.
  4. 4Where a county has not built a cemetery, take it up with the county council: §363-5 puts the obligation on the council, not on the state veterans office.
File with
The county cemetery office for the island of interment
Documents you will need
dd214
No renewal
Once granted it does not need renewing.
Worth knowingRead §363-5 alongside §363-4, which is the establishing section for cemeteries on Hawaii, Kauai, Maui, Molokai and Lanai. §363-4 was not read in full this session; the interment duty and the eligibility list quoted here come from §363-5.
Worth knowingSubsection (c) gives the office of veterans’ services a veto over county action that would hurt the state’s fiscal obligation for these cemeteries or conflict with the federal conditions on cemetery grant money. If a county proposes to close or reduce a cemetery, that subsection is the lever.

Sources

This finder provides an informational match, not a government eligibility determination. The responsible agency decides your application.