WASHINGTON — Key House lawmakers are weighing a measure that would give Japanese contractors the same access as American firms — in Hawai'i and elsewhere — to more than $2.5 billion in upcoming U.S. military construction projects on Guam.

It's part of a larger plan to move 8,000 Marines and their dependents from Okinawa, Japan, to Guam, starting in 2010.

The contracts are for new military housing on Guam, a U.S. territory that looks to enjoy an economic boon from the move.

But the new construction would require expertise, workers and materials from far and wide, generating jobs wherever the bids go.

Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawai'i, thinks the lion's share of those jobs should go to American companies.

"It's strange that there would be some sort of carve-out like this for the government of Japan," said Abercrombie, a senior member of the Armed Services Committee who is now running for governor. "This has been handled in offices and closed briefings."

Typically, military housing on American territory is built using a 20-year-old public-private arrangement. Private firms — usually American — finance and build the housing in exchange for long-term maintenance and rental contracts.

"It's been win-win virtually everywhere it's been tried," Abercrombie said.

But under an arrangement the House Armed Services Committee is expected to take up in the coming weeks as it debates defense spending, the Japanese would be equal players when the bidding starts for the Guam housing.

Japanese access to the housing contracts would come as part of a deal whereby the Japanese provide $6 billion in financing for the total cost of the Marine Corps move to Guam, now estimated at more than $10 billion and rising.

The driving forces behind the deal are not yet clear.

But the Japanese government has been under intense political pressure to get the Marines off Okinawa since 1995 when three U.S. servicemen raped a 12-year-old girl there, straining U.S.-Japanese relations. In all, the U.S. has about 50,000 military personnel in Japan.

ISLE FIRMS COULD LOSE OUT

In February, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signed a broad agreement with Japan for the move, but Congress must still work out some of the details.

So far, the housing part of the arrangement has not attracted much attention publicly so it's not yet clear how much opposition there is in the Armed Services Committee or elsewhere on Capitol Hill. And the incentives the Japanese have agreed to provide may take some of the sting out of opening up bidding on contracts.

Opening the projects to Japanese companies could mean less business available for some Hawai'i contractors that have done work on Guam military housing projects, such as Watts Constructors LLC. Another firm with longtime Hawai'i ties is dck pacific construction, which has a Guam affiliate involved in military construction projects.

Representatives of both companies did not respond to calls seeking comment.

Military construction projects in Guam, however, typically don't employ Hawai'i residents, even with the drastic industry slowdown in the state, because the wage base in Guam is too low to attract Hawai'i workers.

U.S. military officials have previously said that they wanted to use Guam workers and contractors wherever possible on the relocation project, but acknowledged that Guam's small labor force would probably require using outsiders for some of the work.

Loren Dealy, a spokeswoman for House Armed Services Chairman Ike Skelton, D-Mo., said it's still too early in the defense spending debate to talk about the housing contracts in any detail.

"The chairman doesn't discuss details of what might, or might not, be in (legislation) before it's marked up," she said.

Still, Skelton has raised concerns about the size, scope and cost of the move to Guam, as has the Marine Corps' top officer.

"At over $10 billion, it is an enormous project, and I am concerned that the thinking behind it is not yet sufficiently mature," Skelton said at a recent hearing. "We need to do this, but it needs to be done right."

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway recently told House appropriators that the move may not be complete by the 2014 deadline, raising the specter of further cost overruns. Originally estimated at $4 billion, the $10 billion cost has already more than doubled.

GUAM DELEGATE WEIGHS IN

A recent report from the Government Accountability Office concluded Guam's infrastructure — roads, ports, electrical grid and waste facilities — would be highly stressed by the influx of the Marines and their dependents.

The move could raise Guam's population of roughly 170,000 by as much as 10 percent.

All that got the attention of Delegate Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, who has said she has been reassured by top officials that the military buildup on Guam is on track.

"Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and numerous other policymakers have all pledged their commitment to the realignment of U.S. Marines from Okinawa to Guam," she said in a statement issued immediately after Conway's comments.