KAHANA — Residents ordered out of Kahana Valley have been given an extra week to find a new home, but the families, who have ancestral ties to the land, said they would not move and will appeal to the governor for help.

The state Department of Land and Natural Resources said an attorney general's interpretation of a law that permitted the families to stay there as part of a living cultural park expired and no new leases could be issued. A previous interpretation said the opposite, according to families being evicted.

Now they are asking Gov. Linda Lingle to step in and stop the eviction.

"She declared a state of emergency for homelessness and now she wants to make us homeless," said Thoren Evans, who is among those being evicted.

Lingle is on the Mainland campaigning for Republican presidential candidate John McCain. Her office did not return a call for comment.

Laura H. Thielen, DLNR director, issued a written statement yesterday saying she would extend the deadline for eviction but that the residents still have to go.

Thielen said the development of the living park concept was a means to accommodate a limited number of private residential leases in the park so families that had lived there for generations could stay. But the law limited the number of leases that could be issued to 31 and no new leases could be issued after that, she said.

"This agreement struck a balance between the interests of the original valley residents and the broader public park purpose where educational opportunities would be provided to visitors by the residents," she said.

"The balance recognized that the number of lots could not increase, otherwise the public park would eventually become a private subdivision. The families recognized that as their children grew up, not all of them would be able to remain in the park or build new homes there."

Some of the adult children moved out but six families remained in hopes of receiving a lease, Thielen said. When three leases were defaulted, 28 families applied for them.

However, the March decision by the attorney general ended any hope for new leases.

Thielen also offered help to relocate the families and said she would try to meet with them.

For the second day in a row yesterday, supporters gathered at the entrance to Kahana Valley to block any evictions. By afternoon, only about a dozen remained at the entrance under a protective tarp to stand guard.

Signs carried their message of the struggle and people honked as they passed.

Residents said Thielen's statement was inaccurate and pointed out where the state failed to follow the lease agreement that led to residents losing their leases. They also claimed that the leases were set up for failure and wondered about the state's true goal.

"It's to eliminate everybody, that's their goal," Evans said. "They slowly dwindling the numbers. They keep kicking us out."

Of the 31 leases available, 28 remain, Evans said.

Lena Soliven, whose family also faces eviction, said she will stay. She has no place to go.

"We want to remain where we're at," she said. "We want to renovate our house, bring it up to par, at no cost to the state," she said.

DLNR spokeswoman Deborah Ward said the state is moving ahead now out of respect for the original "living park" agreement and to be fair to all the adults who moved out of the valley in accordance with the agreement.

"It is unfair to reward people who didn't respect the agreement and penalize the 22 families who would like to return," Ward wrote in an e-mail. "The department must respect the general public's right to the public park, and we can't keep continuing to issue new leases to children as they grow up because the area will become a subdivision."