KOROR Palau — The Palau state of Irai and Pohnpei will both see new U.S. Embassies in the coming months.
“Here [in Palau] it’s on state government land in Pohnpei it’s on land owned by a private landowner ” Cliff Terry told the Journal. Terry is a Koror-based architect who has been retained by the U.S. State Department as owner’s representative on the projects.
“The driving force behind this is security ” he said.
The U.S. Embassy in Palau is presently in Nirmid close to the site of the former Nikko hotel.
Terry expects the one-story Embassy projects to be completed within about 18 months and put the cost “in the $5 million neighborhood.”
Other projects Terry is working on include the Yap State Museum building. “It’s a new archives storage building. The last typhoon blasted their existing building. They lost a lot of documents so they want to make a new building out of concrete.” The museum building will be underwritten by funds from the Peoples Republic of China.
Terry is retained to review plans and perform house inspections on behalf of the National Development Bank.
“It is a good public service because people end up getting houses that won’t fall apart.” He inspects about 20 houses a year. “I’ve done over 100 houses. I make sure the plans are good and the construction is good.”
One major project that Terry designed was the Bank of Hawaii branch building in Koror a $2 million project that opened in Oct. 2002. “I did the Chalan Kanoa branch in Saipan. Before that I did the branch near Micronesia Mall [in Guam]. I had designed that when I was still in Honolulu.”
Terry communicates on much of his project work via Internet. “I’m a virtual architect. I’m exploring now having my production work done by an architectural firm in Manila.” MBJ
