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Controversy with Pacair lease

by Nick Delgado

Guam - A lease signed by the previous administration with Pacair has the Guam International Airport Authority's board of directors taking a second look. It was during this week's airport board meeting Vice Speaker B.J. Cruz raised concerns about the Guam International Airport Authority's lease with Pacair. "I understand that there are tenants that are not airport related that are moving into those buildings," said Cruz.

"There's consideration to have those people move into the buildings."

It was in 2009 the ribbon was cut on the Guam Integrated Air Cargo Facility. Described as a public-private venture between GIAA and Pacair Properties, the new facility developed by Pacair was a $23 million investment in a state of the art integrated air cargo facility. As part of its lease, payment would be deferred for Pacair for five years, and the company is able to sublease its space.

Aside from the issue of deferred payments and concerns raised about Pacair charging rent to Guam Customs, a GovGuam agency, Cruz and GIAA board chairman Mike Ysrael are concerned Pacair is overstepping its authority in subleasing space to an entity that's not airport related.

He said, "He feels that its unfair that the airport and or through our tenant or directly is competing with the private sector. This actually also is my position that I've held when I first came into the airport. About a year ago it was being proposed that a portion of the land over by the police station be set aside and the airport hire a developer or contractor to build a tall a large commercial complex to rent to the GSA the federal GSA, which is the General Services Administration for use as ICE and eventually the FBI and a few other law enforcement agencies were thrown in. At the time that this proposal was coming to us I vehemently objected to it on the grounds that we should not be competing against the private sector. 3105 there are many people including myself as well as other private landowners who have property just like the airport that pay property taxes and they can compete and that the airport if this is not an airport related function then we should not do that."

The irony - Pacair evidently is planning to sublease its office space to GSA, which means several federal agencies could be making the move to Tiyan. And if Ysrael's statement about the GSA hold true, this would mean agencies, like ICE, currently renting out of Sirena Plaza and which is managed through his private real estate company Tanota Partners, could possibly be moving out as well.

He said, "Some in the airport feel that Pacair might have a provision in their lease agreement to sublease to the GSA without our permission or consent. I've reviewed the lease agreement, I think it's pretty clear its airport related uses only. And that if they want to amend the lease then they need to come back to the board and get approval and that has not been done. In fact no proposal has actually been submitted we at the board had not heard anything about it nor had our general manager who just came on board a couple months ago. He had not heard anything about Pacair either. So we have a little bit of confusion at the airport."

Confusion is an understatement. KUAM News spoke with the current executive manager of the airport Charles Ada who says he is aware of the lease and sublease issue and he along with their legal counsel are reviewing it. He adds there's also a misconception that airport property must be used for airport related functions. Case in point, many of you may have noticed a structure going up along Airport Road.

It's definitely not airport related, as Ada confirms that former airport management and board approved a lease for the construction of a restaurant.