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House asks feds’ help to solve power woes
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Posted on Jul 31 2008
The House of Representatives yesterday adopted a resolution formally asking the federal government to help solve the Commonwealth’s power crisis.
The resolution requests the U.S. Department of the Interior in consolidating and directing federal grants for the CNMI to the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. to the purpose of repairing the power plants. The document also asks the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to oversee the overhaul efforts.
The resolution, however, does not indicate how much federal capital improvement funds the lawmakers hope to funnel into CUC.
House Speaker Arnold I. Palacios and Senate President Pete P. Reyes, along with several other lawmakers, will bring the resolution when they travel to Washington, D.C. next week to meet with Interior Department and other federal officials. The CNMI’s power problem is one of the main items on the agenda.
Rep. Heinz Hofschneider, the chief sponsor of the resolution, said that rehabilitating the power plants would require significant funding. He added that the previous practice of funding CUC’s repair efforts little by little has proven futile. “We cannot continue with the piecemeal approach,” he said.
He added that the Army Corps of Engineers should be enlisted to supervise any future efforts to fix the power plants, given the past management and operational problems at CUC.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Public Auditor are now investigating a sole-source contract CUC inked with the Commonwealth Industrial Supply Co. Inc. CISCO was hired to fix six engines at Saipan’s Power Plant II, but failed to get the job done.
