By Dave Davis
For Variety

A TAXPAYER lawsuit filed on Monday with the Guam Superior Court will bring renewed interest and sharper focus on a plan that would burden taxpayers for decades, providing tax-free benefits to a select group of GovGuam retirees — a scheme requiring a loan payback of some $200 million over 15 years. This travesty was spawned by flawed legislation crafted 13 years ago by elected officials more interested then, as they are today, in re-election prospects than public service.
The legislation is flawed in that it lacks mechanisms and controls necessary to anticipate and forestall the predictable actions of succeeding gaggles of windsock politicians with similar attributes: distain for the electorate and disregard for the public good. In the absence of such controls, the fundamental concept and original intent of cost of living allowance for retirees has, over the intervening years, been manipulated and subjected to what Guam Supreme Court Justice Carbullido recently referred to as ‘legislative whim’, in final result creating the monstrous legacy before us today.
Under a recent judicial ruling, current and future generations would be burdened by a huge debt to GovGuam retirees: in some cases, well over $100,000 payable to millionaires. Conversely, many retirees who are destitute or barely managing financially would get nothing, or owe the government. How did this come about? The answer to that question, and others, could be a long time in coming.
There will be those who view this action as an unwarranted attack on what they perceive to be a just and due entitlement. There will also be many who welcome it as a long-overdue attempt to redress wrongs perpetrated by public officials through politically motivated giveaway schemes. There’ll be many a slimy rock overturned on the way to an equitable and definitive ending. There’ll be sufficient revelations of self-interest, conflict and dereliction to provide media fodder for a long time. Whatever the outcome, this action by a small, multi-ethnic group of outraged and fed up citizens carries a message for all those to whom we look for honest and honorable public service.
The message is this: if we would count ourselves as responsible citizens, we must recognize and assert that we have not only the right to challenge unreasonable and onerous actions by our government, but an inescapable moral obligation to do so when our civil and other rights are compromised or threatened. Public servants, take heed. There’s more to come.