By Mar-Vic Cagurangan
Variety News Staff

DAVID Cohen, deputy assistant secretary of the Department of Interior’s Office of Insular Affairs, says the federal government is ready to provide more support for Gov. Felix P. Camacho’s fresh administration and guide the local government through the challenges posed by the military’s influx into the island next year.
“Like what the governor said, it is going to be a season of transformation because of the tremendous changes that will be brought here by the military,” Cohen said in a brief interview with Variety after the administration’s inaugural ceremony in Hagatna on Monday.
“I just want the governor to know that Department of Interior is there to provide support and work toward a proper future for Guam,” said the federal official, who briefly visited Guam for the inauguration.
The relocation of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa, which begins in 2008, is touted to stir a construction boom, business expansion and other economic opportunities.
Cohen said DOI has offered a program that would help Guam meet business standards and improve its business climate. “We offer that to the administration. I provided a copy of a report to the governor. It’s our way of making contributions to the administration” he said.
In his inaugural address, Camacho defined the new year as a “season of transformation” with “exciting opportunities” that he said “will only be beneficial if we properly equip our next generation.”
Camacho and Lt. Gov. Mike W. Cruz officially began their term with a flag-raising ceremony at Adelup yesterday morning.
 “We raise these flags at the dawn of an era in our mission to change our people’s lives with purpose, with vision and with hard work. Our work starts today. As a community and as one people, this is the first day of our new season,” Camacho said.
“We are here in this place and in this time, armed with knowledge and experience and opportunity to shape a future of our own making,” he added.
Saying “history will be kind,” the governor said the future generations will look back and “know that this was a monumental time in the history of our people, that this administration made a difference in the lives of our people.”
Cruz, a colonel in the Guam Army National Guard, said the flag-raising ceremony symbolizes the start of something new and something worth fighting for.
He said the raising of the flags was symbolic of what the newly inaugurated administration will do over the next four years.
 “When I was in Iraq, there was a wall behind one of Saddam’s old palaces where his flag was painted,” Cruz recalled.
“I took a couple of our Chamorro soldiers and we held up a Guam flag right in front of it, not just to claim victory for America, but to claim victory for our people,” Cruz said.