Clear explanations on Marpi clearing

I rescind my rant (see Letter to the Editor, April 6). Thanks to information provided through some admittedly belated dialogue with John Scott, president of Ampro, the firm doing the clearing in Marpi, and some fancy footwork on the part of the administration and its spokesperson Franz Reksid, my perspective has changed, and the only remaining question on my mind is “why now?”

A number of people had congregated at the Marpi clearing late last week to participate in an interview with KSPN’s Lanni Walker. Scott explained to the group that the site contained the most concentrated collection of unexploded ordnance in the CNMI because it had been a munitions storage area in preparation for the bombing of Japan during World War II. Though a fire in the ’60s had burned for two weeks, that only served to scatter the munitions that were there, and though a collection effort was made during Trust Territory times, there remained, said Scott, so much ordnance that he’d had to stop the collecting effort this week because Ampro’s bunker/storage area was already full. A first detonation is scheduled for April 24.

Though there is no risk of the ordnance exploding if stepped on, Scott said it contains volatile explosives and therefore is a danger if the ordnance catches fire or is tampered with in any way. It also presents a security risk, he noted.

The Ampro contract includes a re-seeding of the area upon completion of the clearing. Scott said they’d cleared the mostly tangan tangan and other weeds in the area, but left most of the indigenous trees standing. He assured his listeners that that was the extent of the Ampro involvement—clearance of unexploded ordnance under an EPA-funded Brownfield grant.

While early information had tied the clearing to homestead development, Franz Reksid of the Department of Public Lands reminded the group that the DPL director has already publicly stated that there is no money for homestead development, nor is any likely for the next several years. A DPL staffer said DPL intended to keep the area groomed like a golf course in the interim—a rash promise indeed given the costs involved and the present state of the economy!

The fundamental question of why it was decided to clear that area now was, of course, not answered, though two possible answers—both of which could apply—have surfaced. One says that the Brownfield grant provides enough slack (extra dollars) to provide continuing funding for some DPL staff; the other says that the homestead angle was deliberately invoked as an election ploy. Public light on the matter has made it clear that the two issues are separate and independent of each other; the clearing will continue, but whether homestead development will follow is not at all certain.

Hopefully, between Ampro and DPL, billboards will now be erected to inform the public—and tourists—as to why the clearing is taking place, and that restoration of the area will occur as the clearing is completed.