VIEQUES, Puerto Rico (AP) - When U.S. Navy warships gather off the coast of Vieques for training, Isabel Perez watches them with pride and hangs an American flag from her balcony overlooking the sea.

The arrival of the ships is a ritual that has been part of life for decades on the small Puerto Rican island of 9,400 people.

"When the Navy boats come, it's all boats out there," she says, motioning to the turquoise sea. "I feel proud the Navy is on Vieques."

While Navy opponents press for an end to the military's use of the island's eastern tip as a bombing range, Perez and other supporters want the Navy to stay. Last week, four Vieques residents traveled to Washington to present pro-Navy petitions signed by 1,780 of the island's adults who want Vieques to secede from Puerto Rico and become a separate U.S. territory.

Luis Sanchez, a pro-Navy activist who led the lobbying trip, says the Navy has broad support on the island and that many people see secession from Puerto Rico as the best way to ensure financial backing from the U.S. government through a continued Navy presence.

Sanchez, a civilian security guard for the Navy, worries that without the bombing exercises, Vieques would lose precious jobs and federal funds.

About 200 Vieques residents work for the Navy in the area. Vieques' average unemployment last year was 12.3 percent, as compared to 10.1 percent on the main island of Puerto Rico.

"The future of this land depends on the Navy," Sanchez said. "The moment the Navy goes away, the federal funds go too."

Anti-Navy sentiment flared in Puerto Rico in 1999, when two off-target bombs killed a civilian guard on the bombing range. Protesters invaded the range, preventing exercises for a year until U.S. Marshals forcibly removed them last May.

Since then, the Navy has been using only inert ammunition and has scaled back the frequency of training, but it says live-fire exercises provide vital training for U.S. troops.

U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, a Republican from Oklahoma who advocates the use of live fire, welcomed the petitions presented by Sanchez.

"The people of Vieques should be provided with the opportunity for self-determination," he said. "I will bring it forward in the Congress."

Vieques residents are to decide in a referendum on Nov. 6 whether they want the Navy to leave in 2003 or to remain and pay $50 million to be used for economic development, housing and infrastructure.

While previous polls have suggested a majority of the people on Vieques want the Navy to leave, both sides claim they'll win the referendum.

Opponents of the exercises, including Puerto Rican Gov. Sila Calderon, have cited health concerns, but Sanchez - whose house overlooks Navy land - says he thinks there is no reason for concern. The Navy has vehemently denied that its activities cause any harm.

The Navy owns two-thirds of Vieques, and the bombing range is nearly 10 miles from the civilian sector.

Some relatives of security guard David Sanes, who died in the accident in 1999, say Sanes is unfairly being used by Navy opponents as a martyr.

"It was an accident," said Sanes' elder brother, Enrique Sanes Rodriguez, 59, who now works repairing fences for the Navy.

Angel Cruz Sanes - who also works as a security guard on Navy land - says his late cousin would never have wanted the Navy to leave.

"If he were alive, he would be 100 percent with us, because he liked his job, just like we do."