Help Rota help itself

The Rota East Harbor project is being explored due to the fact that the West Harbor is very much inadequate right now and into the future. The mayor of Rota and the Rota leadership want to jumpstart Rota’s economy by looking for a means to enable larger vessels to call port.

Even by following the previous master plan, the existing West Harbor will not accomplish that task without shelling out over $60 million, according to the latest master plan. Additionally, an engineer who was involved with the latest master plan agreed that the East Harbor as opposed to the West Harbor should be further explored.

If we look at a map of Rota from Google Earth and compare it with the neighboring islands of Guam, Tinian, and Saipan with respect to harbor location, one with common sense will conclude that the best location for a commercial port will be at the East Harbor. East Harbor is calm 95 percent of the year. The only time East Harbor experiences rough seas is when there is a typhoon or a storm approaching but then again that period is for not more that five days at a time. Try using Google Earth and see for yourself, then if your mind is clear enough then you should conclude that East Harbor is the best location.

The Rota community deserves a better port for its people. The Rota leadership is correct in exploring what is best for Rota. Those of you out there should not decide what is best for Rota. The people of Rota can do that. This is one way we can grow our economy and not be constantly reminded that we are not contributing enough to the CNMI’s coffers. We are trying to jumpstart our economy and we need a better port to do that. We are not asking for CIP funds to do this; we are working with alternative financing on this. Allow us to grow and contribute, stop choking us. Please take those hands off-our throat. I assure you we will contribute.

At present, there is a good amount of scrap metal right at the West Harbor waiting for a barge to haul it away to a recycling facility off-island. The problem, the barge cannot call port due to the size of the port and its entrance. We need a larger port now and for our future generation. Remember, many of our citizens are leaving. We need to grow our economy in order to create jobs and business opportunity for our citizens to stay and for those off-island to return. We need to work for each other, not against each other.
[B] Frank M. Atalig [/B] [I]Sinapalo 1 Rota[/I]