STaRPO: An anatomy of a decline

In the spate of break-ins that has happened on Saipan in the last 12 months, with the prominent ones like the Capitol Hill Post Office, public schools, and the CUC supply depot, other unfortunate victims seem to have taken a “bear-and-grin” it attitude.

The Saipan, Tinian, and Rota Parent Organization’s parent-teacher center at Chalan Kanoa, formerly a Head Start facility, hit twice this past week by taunting burglars, the ninth time since summer of 2005, has grave security considerations to make that may just determine its survival.

Auspiciously launched in 2002 with the ribbon cutting done no less than Bishop Tomas A. Camacho, PSS Commissioner Rita Inos, then Lt. Gov. Diego Benavente, then PSS SPED Coordinator Ann Quick, and STaRPO president, now Workmen’s Compensation commissioner, Frank Cabrera. Dignitaries who graced the Open House included Herman Guerrero, then BoE Chair, Rep. Oscar Babauta and Dave Rosario of the Mayor’s Office. The offices of the last two have faithfully facilitated the care and maintenance of the facility’s external grounds.

Not unlike many former Head Start facilities on island, the Chalan Kanoa facility was in serious disrepair. Ann Quick brought in resource from SPED and combined it with STaRPO’s own material and volunteer assets, and the facility quickly evolved into a possible creative collaboration between teachers and parents of children with developmental disabilities. STaRPO, through its own Parents Association for Children with Autism was experienced in information campaigns, referral expertise and advocacy strategies and tactics. It added cerebral palsy and Down syndrome to its arena of concern.

Made up of volunteer parents, STaRPO managed to stay dynamically afloat with its programs and operations for a year. The first snag came when Ann Quick was diagnosed with a rapidly debilitating disease that required her immediate repatriation to the U.S. mainland. Loosely organized, STaRPO had at its helm the troika of Frank Cabrera, then president of the SVES PTA and a strong proponent of the SVES Autism Center, which later moved to WSR, Josephine Fejeran of Disabilities Studies Center at NMC, and this writer, former Saipan Methodist Pastor and volunteer executive director.

The intense infighting within the Developmental Disabilities, evident in the affairs of the DD Council, seeped into the STaRPO organizational operations as well, and soon, the element of distrust corroded interpersonal relationships within STaRPO members and among DD colleagues. Interests represented by factions within the DD Council, VocRehab, SPED, and other related agencies, generated unnecessary and unwelcome intrusions on STaRPO’s operations. It did not help that a substantial funding commitment by an off-island outreach network never made it to STaRPO’s accounts, weighing heavily on out-of-pocket expenditures by the group’s officers and leaders.

After the third year of operation, a hiatus was reached. The facility was cared for, with landscaping providing the appearance of order and well-being, while what used to be frequent weekend family activities waned. When a severe typhoon revealed serious roof contradictions, a couple temporarily moved in to effect repairs. Ironically, as a facility for those with special abilities, the building needed to upgrade its non-disability compliance in the kitchen and the restrooms. Unfortunately, a misunderstanding with a PSS administrative officer resulted in a report to the police that a public facility had unauthorized occupancy. The volunteer couple immediately vacated the premises.

It was not too long that the first vandalism occurred. Unidentified young people, according to the neighbors, started hanging out again in the driveway, smashing outside lights and damaging the water pumps and screen windows. After repairs were made, the first break-in happened. A group of six teenie-boppers were seen coming in and out of the facility during unseemly hours of the night. The youth trashed the place, writing graffiti on the wall, consuming food items and carting off electrical appliances including the children’s VCR and TV. Also taken were assortment of hand tools, office supplies, children’s games and toys, donated clothes and valuables slated for the group’s fundraising garage sale and personal properties like an unused newly acquired bicycle for mobility within the flat plain from San Antonio to Lower Base.

Volunteers from Saipan’s Immanuel United Methodist Church helped repair windows and doors, paint over the wall and other defacements, and cleaned up the facility after each break-in. A two-month stretch without intrusion gave hope enough to have the damaged air-conditioners and other electricals repaired and the doors and windows secured. The day after New Year, burglars broke in, carting off musical instruments that had recently been brought to the Center. Again, series of repairs and securing the place were made.

On the second incident, a police officer was informed, and subsequently, police patrols made routine surveillance of the premises. Then, Mt. Carmel Diocese and the School were burglarized. “If the sacrosanct can be violated,” it was said, “what chance do we have?”

Last Monday, vandals “totaled” the place. Books and educational supplies and computer diskettes, video tapes and markers were carted out littering the grounds. Bookshelves not secured to the walls were toppled, and papers from the filing cabinets and working files were strewn all over the place. At a time when a parent group with members of STaRPO started meeting again, most recently, at the Town and Country restaurant, raising the possibility of regular use of the facility once more by a support group, the burglars and vandals insist on leaving their marks. As if to make their taunting point, after Monday when once more, repairs were made, the night crawlers pried the window screens again and left the doors unlocked and wide open, as if to say, “Come and catch us [me]!”

“From the ashes shall the phoenix rise,” is a lesson from a venerable ancient tradition. STaRPO members will now have to decide whether to abandon the facility and relocate, or engage a broader system of checks and counter measures to assure that its assets and properties will not continue to be abused and violated.