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Fitial OKs money for GTC; principal says it won’t work
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Posted on Feb 05 2009
Although Gov. Benigno R. Fitial has promised to use capitol improvement project money to repair the dilapidated buildings at GTC Elementary School, principal Charlotte Camacho said the money cannot be reallocated to the school.
Yesterday, Fitial told Camacho and representatives of the GTC Parents Teachers Association that he would give the school $536,500 from the $1.2 million Public School System CIP funding. GTC had originally just been given $66,000 of that $1.2 million.
“I just told them I’m going to give them $536,500,” Fitial said.
But Camacho said the $1.2 million has already been distributed among the schools.
“The $1.2 million already belongs to PSS and has already been allocated to other projects, so in essence really we don’t have the money,” Camacho said.
Fitial said he would reprogram the CIP funding after the Northern Marianas Housing Corp. decided to divert grant funding from the school to a Koblerville soccer field.
Camacho said she met with PSS officials and was told that the $1.2 million cannot be reprogrammed to GTC. Besides, she added, even if was possible she would not want to take funding from other schools.
“Unfortunately, I am not going to advance my school at the cost of others. We are a team here,” she said.
The $66,000 given to GTC is not enough for the necessary repairs, Camacho added.
Charles Reyes, press secretary for the Governor’s Office, said it appears PSS and the Board of Education are hindering GTC from obtaining the necessary repairs. The governor is willing to reprogram the money and the Department of the Interior should be fine with the reprogramming, he said.
“The question now is whether PSS will go along with it. It seems to me there might be a reluctance on the part of the Board,” Reyes said.
As long as the money has not been spent then it is still available, the press secretary said.
