GOVERNOR Ralph DLG Torres reiterated his opposition to the nomination of the Mariana Trench National Marine Sanctuary during a virtual meeting on Thursday.
Also opposed were John Gourley, vice chair of the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, and Glenna S. Palacios, CNMI Bureau of Military Affairs special assistant.
They were among those whose comments were heard by the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration which is conducting a five-year review of the nomination of the Mariana Trench National Marine Sanctuary.
Torres, in his comments, encouraged more dialogue between the federal agency and the local community.
“I wrote a letter in 2016 in support of the monument with the understanding that I would be brought to a table to see what is the proposal, how it came about, so that we could have a good public outreach to let them understand why this is important, why a specific location is being requested, and so forth. To this date, I was never invited. It was just an announcement on April 12 for a hearing, and the last deadline for this five-year review was on February 22,” the governor said.
“I am totally in opposition to continuing to put the [Marianas Trench National Marine] Sanctuary into the five-year list. I would also like that not only is it retracted, but to do an outreach to the community…. The lack of understanding here brings so much resentment in the community.”
Governor Torres said the CNMI had been promised “economic growth” by the Pew Charitable Trusts when the Mariana Trench monument was first proposed in 2008.
“And here we are again; we’re back to square one. The proposed sanctuary is a good 300 to 350 miles from Rota and Saipan. Barely anybody goes out there to destroy that area. So, if we’re talking about employment to monitor this, again, there will be [more] empty promises. As we’ve seen [with] the monument, no promises have been kept. Not one. So, again, I would like, for the record, that this CNMI or the marine monument will be withdrawn from the five-year inventory,” he said.
Gourley said the Mariana archipelago is comprised of Guam and the CNMI with a total population of 230,000 people.
“The initial go-around when [the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries or] ONMS actually accepted the sanctuary proposal only included feedback from the CNMI, which is only about 25% of the affected communities in the Marianas. Guam was not really included. I am amazed that ONMS actually approved the nomination based on a very serious underestimation of the public outreach for the proposed sanctuary. Should the sanctuary be re-upped for another five-year list, quite honestly, I can see a question coming to ONMS on justifying how this passed muster with ONMS, because the people were not coordinated with [on] Guam,” Gourley said.
He said about 50% of the proposed sanctuary boundaries includes the Guam exclusive economic zone, or EEZ.
“This is a very serious problem with the process,” he said.
Moreover, Gourley said the support in the CNMI for the initial nomination package has completely fallen apart.
“From what I can gather in letters, the governor does not support it. Apparently, there are problems with the Rota mayor, Tinian mayor, Northern Islands mayor, and other people that are not supporting the monument. There’s a lot of criticism out in the public about lack of coordination. Nobody knows what’s going on. In my feeling, in my belief, management consideration number seven has not been satisfied. This is new information, the sanctuary should not be relisted on the inventory list, and we should give the monument a chance to move forward,” Gourley said.
CNMI Bureau of Military Affairs Special Assistant Glenna S. Palacios also expressed her opposition to the proposed sanctuary.
She said that the NOAA forum should be held in the CNMI instead of just a virtual meeting.
“A proposal [of this] magnitude… really does have an impact on our community, on the entire CNMI. There needs to be some meaningful engagement with members of our community, and I would like to also submit the desire for this proposal to be removed from the inventory,” Palacios added.
Supporters
Retired manager of natural and cultural resources at the National Park Service, Michael Gawel, supported keeping the proposed sanctuary in the inventory.
“I personally would like to promote the continuation of the listing for a marine sanctuary. There are some new items that would reflect on such a decision… I see that there are extremely high increases in demands for and restrictions on availability of rare-earth [elements] that are needed for expanding global technology applications and large-scale industries. This has created pressure on deep-sea mining on these resources,” he said.
Gawel said plans are underway for mining near the Ryukyu chain, which is a continuation of the Marianas chain, and this, he added, will greatly impact and permanently destroy many unique resources.
This needs to be prevented by designating the area as a national marine sanctuary, he added.
“Having worked with the National Park Service in Guam and the Marianas, the parks are under a legal agreement with the federal Fish and Wildlife Service, which has responsibilities in the monument outreach. In the last three years, they’ve committed a building space at American Memorial Park in Garapan, Saipan, for a visitor center for the Marianas Trench National Marine Monument. The monument is co-managed by Fish and Wildlife and NOAA. This visitor center would be used for the sanctuary, if the sanctuary nomination proceeds into the designation process,” he said.
“We’re finding out more and more of the special characters and values as more research is being done, especially by NOAA, in the existing marine sanctuary area, so there’s much more information and much more to be found in the next few years, I think, on the value and sensitivity of the resources there.”
Friends of the Mariana Trench or FOMT Senior Project Coordinator Joleen Salas, a native of the CNMI, said, “Like many of us, my parents raised me to be proud of being from Saipan and to be proud to be Chamorro. Like many of us, I grew to be protective of our lands and our waters and did not understand why we couldn’t leave our land and our waters alone…. I commend and thank our brothers and sisters who have committed their lives to protecting our lands, waters, and culture.”
She added, “I want to express to my brothers and sisters that the 2017 proposed sanctuary nomination by the [FOMT], the 2017 addendum to the nomination, and the [FOMT] public comment is not meant to threaten our lands, waters, and culture. Rather, it provides the foundation to discuss the possibility of elevating our responsibilities to be caretakers of everything that makes us proud to be from the Marianas. I invite you to review the 11 criteria that have been detailed in our public comment.”
To submit electronic comments, visit www.regulations.gov.
The docket number is NOAA-NOS-2022-0005. Click the “Comment Now” icon, complete the required fields, and enter or attach your documents for submission.
