LIHU'E, Kaua'i — About 50 people packed a Kaua'i-Ni'ihau Island Burial Council meeting yesterday, urging the advisory body to not allow construction of a house over an ancient Hawaiian graveyard.

After hearing five hours of testimony, the eight-member panel adjourned without making a decision on what to do about a house Joseph Brescia is building on a 15,600-square-foot beachfront lot that contains at least 30 burials.

Several Native Hawaiian groups yesterday said they want to be parties to deliberations that the council is expected to make at its November meeting, which has not been scheduled.

"I hope they follow the letter of the law and preserve the burials in place and stop the building of the house," said Kai'ulani Huff, who camped on the beach by the property for 16 weeks starting April 3 in an effort to protect the burials.

Although Huff and others are accused in a lawsuit by Brescia of trespassing on his property, Huff said she camped on the public beach.

On April 3, the council voted 4-2 (with several members absent) to preserve the burials in place. Since then, at least two council members have said they didn't believe that vote would allow the landowner to build.

Brescia proceeded with building the foundation of the house over the summer, based on state Historic Preservation Division approval of a burial treatment plan for the site.

The matter returned to the council yesterday at the order of 5th Circuit Judge Kathleen Watanabe, who ruled last month that the Historic Preservation Division failed to follow state law regarding Native Hawaiian burials.

Watanabe ordered the agency, which has oversight over citizen burial councils on each major island, to consult with the Kaua'i-Ni'ihau Island Burial Council, any lineal descendants of the remains, interested Hawaiian organizations, and the landowner about a revised burial treatment plan.

That step in the process was improperly omitted before, Watanabe said, after hearing three days of testimony in her courtroom on plaintiff Jeff Chandler's request that the building be stopped. The judge did warn Brescia's attorneys that the burial council could decide to remove the burials from underneath the house, or to grant descendants access to them.

Yesterday Kaua'i resident and former burial council member Louise Sausen presented a list of Hawaiian scholars to the council who object to building over a graveyard.

"I want to make clear that as a burial council, you have the power to do more than vote to preserve in place or relocate burial sites," said Chandler's attorney, Alan Murakami.