KUAM.com-KUAM News: On Air. Online. On Demand.Housing project not sitting well with GHURA

by Mindy Aguon

Guam - The Micronesia Self-Help non-profit organization is working to complete constructing Sagan Bonita in Mangilao. More than 50 energy-efficient, affordable homes are to be built in the central village, giving the island's working class an opportunity to make home ownership a dream come true.  

The project has hit a few snags along the way, most recently with the Guam Housing and Urban Renewal Authority executive director expressing disappointment with the project thus far. Marcel Camacho doesn't think too highly of the Sagan Bonita project, which has been underway for more than a year and today he expressed his criticisms leaving the developer defending the project and its reputation.

"I don't see this as a community, I see this as a subdivision of homes," Camacho expressed. "It's unfortunate that I didn't have a say in trying to develop it for the future to ensure we don't have blighted areas." GHURA's executive director wasn't happy when he recently visited Sagan Bonita. The agency provided $3.8 million in federal funding to assist in the construction of 56 affordable homes to make The Guamanian Dream a reality for families who couldn't otherwise afford the fair market value price to buy their own home.

"What I was looking for was playground areas where people can recreate. The community center where the children can come after school and jump on the computer or get on the Internet is do their homework. After school programs, programs for the parents," he continued.  "Unfortunately, I don't see it in here." KUAM News asked if technically the developer wouldn't be required to have that," to which he replied, "Yes, that's correct. But knowing that $15 million from federal money was put into this development I would've thought that they would have planned it much better."

But according to Micronesian Self Help's Carlos Camacho, GHURA only provided $3.8 million and the $12 million from the USDA was a result of individual homeowners applying for the homes. Additionally, he says building a community center would have only drove the cost of the homes up defeating the whole purpose of providing the homes well below fair market value.

"I know you saw him pointing at me, why isn't there a community center? Well, I just wanted to clear for the record that when you're going for home ownership and you're going for a targeted audience their buying power is only 'X' amount of dollars. If I put a community center, and I wish I could, I have to pass that cost back to each homeowner," he noted.

Camacho was taken aback this morning when he was called to the subdivision and briefly met with the GHURA director, who expressed his disappointment with the project visibly disgusted and fully believing that the subdivision isn't living up to its name with some areas that are overgrown and the lack of recreational facilities. "I think it's unwarranted and this is why I wanted the opportunity to rebut his statements," he said.

Carlos Camacho stated, "For defining it as 'a blighted community', I think these families deserve a lot more better than that."

"I'm just hoping the contractor, the developer and GHURA can go back and rethink this and see how we can make this a livable community," noted Marcel Camacho.

But it's evident that the 30 families who have already moved in to their new homes believe the subdivision is livable and they are proud to be homeowners. "This was a partnership with GHURA and the partnership strictly spells out our roles and responsibilities on both parties and wherever the hiccup was will show that the hiccup was on the government side of the equation," Carlos Camacho said.

The non-profit organization had intended to complete the subdivision last August, but ran into some roadblocks.  The contractor that was hired through GHURA has fixed a problem with the sewer infrastructure and has ensured that it is working at full capacity for the entire subdivision.  Carlos Camacho meanwhile adds that the construction of the remaining 13 homes should begin in the coming months and the entire subdivision should be completed before the end of the year. 

Micronesian Self-Help meanwhile fully intends to bid for future affordable housing projects as it supports the governor's vision for 3,000 affordable homes. Camacho is hopeful that the GHURA executive director's concerns over Sagan Bonita won't mar the organization's future efforts and hopes that future concerns can be addressed at a sit down meeting rather than in front of the media.

The organization is still waiting on the government to act on its requests for two bus stops and the installation of streetlights at the Mangilao subdivision.