The TMT project is a response to recommendation in 2000 from the US National Academy of Sciences that a thirty-meter telescope be a top priority, and that it be built within the decade. Urgency in construction is due to the competitive nature of science with the European-Extremely Large Telescope also under construction. The two projects are also complementary, in that the EELT would only view the Southern Celestial Hemisphere, while Mauna Kea offers the best views of the Northern Celestial Hemisphere. However, Mauna Kea's summit is considered the most sacred of all the mountains in Hawaii to many Native Hawaiian people. Native Hawaiian activists such as Kealoha Pisciotta, a former employee of the Mauna Kea Observatories, have raised concerns over the perceived desecration of Mauna Kea posed by TMT construction and presence. Pisciotta, a former telescope systems specialist technician at James Clerk Maxwell Telescope, is one of several people suing to stop the construction and is also director of Mauna Kea Anaina Hou.