Former land commissioner to seek permanent injunction on proposed Ypao land transfer

 By Mar-Vic Cagurangan

A former member of the CHamoru Land Trust Commission will seek judicial intervention to block the proposed transfer of Ypao property in Tamuning to the heirs of its former owner.

“This land was designated for the benefit of CHamoru beneficiaries and should not be alienated or transferred to a private party with no justifiable property rights,” David Herrera said in a letter to members of the 38th Guam Legislature.

The former land trust commissioner asked senators to hold off action on Bill 32-38, a measure pushed by Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero proposing to hand over the Tamuning property to the family of the late Francisco D. Perez, who sold the land to the government of Guam in 1952.

David Herrera

The property, also known as Oka Point, was the site of Guam’s old hospital from 1956 to 1978.

Herrera said the property—whose current assessed value is $635,934.33—was sold fee simple to GovGuam for $51,997 and transferred to the CLTC in 1992.

While remaining idle for decades, the property has emerged as the potential location for a new hospital.

The medical community and the legislature endorse the Tamuning site, but the governor insists on the Mangilao location.

Bill 32-38 was the governor’s apparent attempt to remove the Ypao option from the equation and cap off the debate over the location of a new hospital.

While he was a sitting commissioner, Herrera opposed the proposed land transfer, a move that cost him his job.

The governor fired him on Jan. 24, following his successful motion to seek the attorney general's legal opinion on the proposed land transfer.

In a Dec. 4 letter, Herrera notified the senators of his soon-to-be-filed motion for a permanent injunction with the Superior Court to prohibit the disposal of the parcel from the CLTC inventory.

“Public land must be declared as excess and deemed unnecessary before being transferred for a public, not private, purpose,” said Herrera, a CHamoru land rights advocate.

“The CLTC's trust inventory exists for the long-term benefit of over 60,000

beneficiaries, and any irreversible action must be taken with the utmost legal, ethical and cultural consideration,” he added.

Bill 32-38 noted that since the government of Guam has not made substantial use of the Ypao property in decades, it “should be restored to the family and heirs of Francisco D. Perez, who have a vested interest in the development and use of these lots.”

On June 23, 2015, Francis A. Perez, son of the late Francis D. Perez, made a claim of interest on the land.

Herrera, however, argued that “any claim of any rights by a private party is wholly unsupported by any documentation” and that removing the property from the trust inventory would breach the CHamoru Land Trust Act of 1975.

He pointed out that the claim invoked “a promise of construction equipment,” which he said was legally weak because it was made by the director of land management at the time, “who was not authorized to make that promise.”

Herrera also argued that the promised CLTC property did not belong to the government of Guam. “In short, it was an unauthorized promise because you cannot promise something that you do not own,” he argued.

“These are issues that must be addressed in a court of law. The Perez family knows that it cannot stand legal muster, hence they have repeatedly gone to the legislature, and now the governor, because it's politically expedient to her agenda.”

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