HONOLULU -- Should taxpayers be forced to pay more for the failures of the Hawaiian Homeland programs? That was the question at the heart of a trial that began Tuesday with the testimony of an elderly woman.

The past mismanagement, corruption and abuse of the Department of Hawaiian Homelands has been documented. The trial will determine whether elderly Hawaiians, who waited decades for homesteads, are entitled to money for their losses.

Caroline Bright from Kaneohe was 4 years old when Congress passed the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act and she applied for a homestead the same month Hawaii became a state.

"I thought that, you know, they might look at mine and give me something anyway," Bright said.

While waiting, the single mother with three children lived in poverty, fought eviction and even offered to take a farming homestead on Molokai.

"I am not sure, but I could put a cow in there, or ducks or something," Bright said.

Lawyers for Bright and 2,000 others said their clients waited while the state ignored starved and abused the program.

"Instead of using trust resources for the beneficiaries the state effectively looted the trust for its own purposes," homestead applicants' attorney Thomas Grande said.

"The plaintiffs present a sympathetic story, but no more," Deputy Attorney General Randolph Slaton said.

The state's lawyer said the waitlisted Hawaiians cannot prove both a violation of trust and specific money losses.

"The language that the plaintiffs want the law to contain simply does not exist," Slaton said.

Money began to flow into homelands about a decade ago and subdivisions began to appear, but those who applied in the 50s and 60s had missed their chance.

"An entire generation has been denied the benefits of homesteads," Grande said.

"It's too late for me anymore," Bright said. "It's too late. At 87, how would I make a loan to pay millions of dollars?"

The waiting will not end anytime soon. The trial is expected to last about five weeks, and whichever way the judge rules, it will be appealed.