It's been 15 months since the Lahaina wildfire, and we are absolutely open. I hope everyone hears that loud and clear. We've cleared the debris and are building transitional homes -- many hundreds are up, which gets people back into the community and helps the workforce. The hotels are ready to accept people. We're like 75% recovered. When people come back, they're going to see a rebirth. From the ashes, houses are rising.
There was obviously an impact from the wildfire, but tourism as a whole is at 97.3% recovery as compared to prepandemic. We're seeing some return of international travelers; we got the Global Entry program to expand between Japan and the U.S. Even though the yen is quite weak, it's important to us to be able to bring in business groups and maybe more affluent travelers.
I've authorized $64 million for the Hawaii Tourism Authority. That's an increase so that they can market to more regions, and I'll increase that even further if necessary. We're on track to have 9.5 million visitors this year. We're getting a lot from the U.S. mainland and Canada, but we're still recovering the Japan market, China market, Korea market.
We're expanding in the Los Angeles area. We're entering into a partnership with the Los Angeles Rams, and we hope that some sports tourism is going to result from that. We're expecting 35,000 for the marathon, which normally draws about 25,000 -- a big increase.
We're investing some capital and making things nicer at the airport. We expect that to be noticed, especially by our international travelers. We've entered into a partnership with Tokyo's Haneda Airport to advise one another on what a beautiful airport should look like.
Hawaii is extraordinary. I spent time yesterday talking to the leadership from all the hotels to make sure that the beaches are being replenished, that we're not seeing erosion. That's the kind of things people deserve if they're going to come and have a premier vacation. We have a lot of young legislators, and we need to be mindful of our need to invest in tourism, invest in shoreline preservation, invest in the beaches, so that when people come, they want to continue to come.
There's going to be a lot more cultural focus in some of our tourism, [but] I've asked our leadership to revamp our message to say that people are welcomed in Hawaii, rather than overemphasize some kind of social message. We just want people to know that our family welcomes theirs.
I'm bullish on tourism for Hawaii. Yes, it sometimes takes a little time to get to your hotel, but you should be able to take in a rainbow along the way.
This interview was conducted by Arnie Weissmann.