Sablan, Ind.-Saipan, said CRMO regulations require a siting permit for a major project impacting historical or archaeological sites and properties as well as designated conservation and pristine areas.
Sablan said the Marpi homestead project failed to secure a siting permit from CRMO.
“This CRMO determination of a major siting for the Marpi project should have triggered an extensive public review process, including public hearings, as required for all major siting permit applications, before any land clearing should have commenced,” she wrote to CRMO Director Dr. John Joyner.
The lawmaker said because the public’s input wasn’t considered before the project was started, there’s much confusion in the community about it.
“Unfortunately, and for reasons I do not yet understand, massive land clearing began at the Marpi project site nevertheless without a major siting permit and without a single formal public hearing, and continues to this day,” she said.
“Much public outcry and confusion have resulted, and many questions remain about the apparent breakdown in the local permitting process; the method of land clearing being utilized and its impacts on an areas of immense historical, cultural and biological value, the wisdom of the proposal to ultimately establish a homestead development in that area of Marpi; and the possible conflicts between an outdated public land use plan that has proven difficult to find, and the recently adopted Saipan Zoning Law of 2008,” she added.
The Marpi homestead project covers 62 hectares of public land that is home to four threatened animal species — the Mariana swiftlet, the Mariana fruit bat, the Nightingale reed-warbler and the Micronesia megapode.
The project will provide homes to about 500 families, but the Department of Public Lands earlier said there was no funding for the required homestead infrastructure.
