The US Navy used Vieques between 1941 and 2003 to practice firing rockets, missiles and bombs.
Sharpton was arrested on May 1 for trespassing at a Navy firing range on Vieques.
The day after, the investigative panel was in Vieques to hear locals complain at the city hall.
But for decades Vieques's citizens have objected to the inconvenience, pollution and danger which the navy brings.
The latest report did, however, acknowledge that those living on Vieques had poorer health than elsewhere in Puerto Rico.
If Vieques will not allow it to practise, somewhere else will have to.
The Navy has already acknowledged its failure to implement a 1983 accord, which committed it to promoting Vieques' economic development.
CNN: Navy resumes use of disputed Puerto Rican bombing range
The government of Puerto Rico estimates that the cancer rate among Vieques's citizens is 27% higher than the Puerto Rican average.
Admiral Edney also warned about the decision effectively to halt the use of the live-fire training range on the island of Vieques near Puerto Rico.
Island of Vieques, a municipality of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Will Clinton Ignore the Military��s Advice on Vieques?
Sharpton had some high-profile partners in protesting Navy bombing on Vieques.
The best that can be said for the Bush administration's decision to stop military training on the island of Vieques is that it is a Solomonic one.
Puerto Rico's Vieques island is getting more built up every season, so do not wait another year if you like your beach finds DIY and your resorts small and rustic.
It would remove one of the greatest risks of living uncomfortably far from a cath lab, whether it's Vieques off the cost of Puerto Rico or a ranch in Wyoming.
Even in the absence of the ominous Vieques precedent, such demands were on the rise thanks to the reality that fewer and fewer Americans have any connection to the armed forces.
Unfortunately, sailors and Marines operating in and from the Atlantic Ocean - including some 3, 500 Hispanic-American personnel who are typically trained at Vieques each year - are not being properly prepared today.
Even though her boys are older, now ages 12, 14 and 15, Ms. Fischer, owner of Gallery Galleon, an art gallery in Vieques, Puerto Rico, has no plans to make her home more adult.
But Navy officials replied that Vieques -- which has hosted preparations for every U.S.-involved military conflict since World War II -- was the only place where its fleet could practice air, land and sea operations simultaneously.
CNN: Navy resumes use of disputed Puerto Rican bombing range
The conventional wisdom has it that all parts of the Puerto Rican body politic - and, for that matter, all Hispanic-Americans - oppose the resumption of the kind of realistic, combined-arms exercises that can be uniquely performed at Vieques.
With Gov. Rossello's belated support and that of other leading Puerto Rican politicians, they are poised to parlay their claim to speak for the people of Vieques into the sort of special interest political leverage that moves President Clinton to act.
They certainly apply in spades in Okinawa, the lynchpin of America's forward presence in East Asia and home to training areas every bit as essential to the readiness of U.S. forces in the Pacific as Vieques is to their Atlantic-based counterparts.
It is striking, though, that in tape-recorded interviews I conducted with some of these leading opponents of live-fire exercises on and near Vieques, they adamantly opposed the idea of putting the question of whether those operations should continue to a vote by that island's residents.
U.S. President Bill Clinton and Puerto Rican Gov. Pedro Rossello came to an agreement on January 31 allowing the Navy to resume its exercises with "dummy" bombs only, and giving the people of Vieques an opportunity to vote on whether the Navy should vacate by 2003.
CNN: Navy resumes use of disputed Puerto Rican bombing range
This view appears to be shared, moreover, by the radicals leading the campaign to close Vieques: According to Mr. Ortega, they adamantly oppose the idea of conducting a plebiscite of the Viequenses about the continued use of this unique facility by the Navy and Marine Corps.
Based upon extensive conversations last month with scores of officials, religious leaders, demonstrators, businessmen and others among the 9, 300 inhabitants of Vieques, I believe most Viequenses are actually prepared to accept continued, realistic military operations on their island - provided their legitimate concerns about safety, environmental responsibility and just compensation are addressed in good faith by the Pentagon.
President Clinton's hapless efforts to prevent Puerto Rican displeasure at the U.S. military's use of the vital Vieques live-fire training range from harming the campaigns being waged by his wife and Vice President Gore is giving rise to the worst of both worlds: Navy and Marine battle groups unprepared for combat operations and increasingly expensive bribes for unappeasable separatists.
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