An investigation is underway after office chairs with tags identifying the Guam Legislature were illegally dumped at a historical landmark recently. The incident prompting the Department of Parks & Recreation to speak-out about an ongoing littering problem in the island’s public parks and beaches, saying it’s a bad look for tourism.

"This is the chairs, if you want to look at it. We pulled off the tags there, you can see the tags of the legislature," explained Parks & Rec acting director Warren Pelletier, showing KUAM News photos of office chairs, that appear to belong to the Legislature, dumped at Fort Apugan, the historical landmark in Agana Heights.

Pelletier says his staff were cleaning up the park Monday morning when they found the furniture abandoned near the bathrooms and at the cannons. "When they went up there, they noticed office chairs there and all the tags said Guam Legislature," he said.

He says an incident report has been filed with Park Police and the Legislature has been notified. An investigation is now underway to track down who illegally dumped government property in a public park.

"The sergeant-at-arms said he’s going to research it and find out who disposed of the chairs either there or did they sign it over to another agency, mayors or some former senators’ office and see how it ended up there," Pelletier said.

Meanwhile, Pelletier says “it’s troublesome” that the chairs were abandoned at Fort Apugan. It’s the only surviving Spanish-era fort in Hagatna and also a popular tourist attraction.

"It was a shock for us to find that it was up there at Fort Apugan. It’s troublesome because that’s one of our more populated parks for tourism," he said,

He says illegal dumping also puts a strain on his agency's resources, which faces a manpower shortage like many agencies. "We’ve begged the legislature for help. Hopefully this time, they will see our challenges and help us. Our boat is filling up with water and we’re trying hard to bail out," he said.

Pelletier says Parks & Rec crews regularly find trash littered at Guam’s beaches. "See how they leave the trash? There’s another spot there. There’s another spot there," he demonstrated.

He showed us photos of piles of garbage left behind at leased pavilions, adding sometimes they’re stashed in barbecue pits and even in trees, saying, "Every Saturday and Sunday morning, it’s a serious mess out there and it shows our people disrespect our parks. It makes the government look bad and it makes our people look bad when trash is all over."

This as DPR continues to make repairs at parks across the island damaged by Super Typhoon Sinlaku. "We can only do so much. Our guys are overwhelmed with typhoon repairs and still have to go around to do the pickup, and to discover this where there’s no respect for our parks? That’s the frustrating part," he said.

In the meantime, Pelletier says the chairs were picked up by the Legislature and the investigation is ongoing.