Five years and $26.7 million dollars after bulldozers unearthed an ancient Indian burial ground, Miami officials have decided to rebury the archaeological treasure.
The problem is bureaucrats can’t agree on what to do with the site.
The “Miami Circle,” as it’s called, is believed to have been constructed some 2,000 years ago by the now extinct Tequesta Indians. It was discovered in 1998 on a 2.2-acre plot of land on the southern bank of the Miami River during development for a high-rise building.
Upon its discovery, construction was halted and the state and Miami-Dade County chipped in $15 million and $11.7 million respectively to help buy the land to preserve what’s thought to be a sacred site.
Only select groups have been allowed to visit the Circle, as archaeologists said public viewing would cause too much damage.
And now it appears the public will be out of luck for possibly several more years, as the state and county can’t come to terms on how best to open the site up for public viewing. In the meantime, archaeologists warn the Circle is at risk of deteriorating.
The Miami Herald reports that at the request of state officials, archaeologists today will place bags of limestone gravel into the 26 carved basins that form the Circle, then cover the whole surface of the carving with a gravel, a tarpaulin and a layer of white sand.
“This is being done with the idea of not easily uncovering it for people to see,” prominent archaeologist Robert Carr, who helped uncover the 38-foot-wide stone carving, told the Herald. “It’s an acknowledgement that it could be a year or three years, we just don’t know how long, before the county and the state are ready to open it to the public.”
County and state officials are pointing fingers at each other over the setback. Both had offered their own solutions to the public-display dilemma.
In May 2002 Michael Spring, director of Miami-Dade County’s Department of Cultural Affairs, proposed erecting a 60-foot-tall thatched structure to shelter the Circle. It was estimated to cost $400,000 and take up to four months to build.
”Our objectives always have been to protect the Circle, remain respectful of the site and make it available to the public for limited tours,” Spring told the local paper.
The state had something else in mind and rejected the county’s proposal.
”We don’t want to take anything away from the aesthetic nature of the site, which is what a thatched roof would have done,” state archaeologist Brenda Swann explained to the Herald.
Swann said the site is being considered for incorporation into Biscayne National Park, and that dealing with federal officials and regulations takes time.
”We had the juice, the energy, to preserve it, which we’re all thankful for,” Carr said, “but it turns out to be much harder to manage it and open it to the public.”
