Yesterday, Guam’s governor Eddie Calvo signed a “Programmatic Agreement” allowing the US Dept. of Defense to begin work on a project to turn historic Pagat village into five live-firing ranges. This undeveloped area is of great cultural, historic, and environmental significance, and is listed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation as one of America’s Most Endangered Places.
Guam’s Pacific News Center published an uncharacteristically well-written (and hard-hitting) article yesterday on what this means for Guam, and for the lawsuit recently filed against the DoD to save Pagat. It ends with a poignant quote from Cara Flores-Mays, a prominent member of the community group We Are Guahan:
“At some point, we all have to ask ourselves: what kind of Guam do we want to leave for our children and for our grandchildren? Times may be hard. But there is no amount of money that can buy back our land or our culture.”