AGO blocks release of $1.2M as land payment
Attorney General Pamela Brown sued the Marianas Public Lands Authority at the Superior Court on Monday to prevent the drawdown of over $1.2 million in land compensation claims by two former wetland owners.
Brown contends that the MPLA unlawfully authorized the payments from the government’s land compensation fund, which faces depletion if the monies are disbursed.
“MPLA has exhausted the land compensation fund and, if the payments are made…many right-of-way properties will not be compensated at all,” said assistant attorney general James Livingstone on behalf of Brown.
Livingstone said over a hundred right-of-way claims have yet to be compensated for the government’s land taking.
In a civil action, Brown sued the MPLA and land payment beneficiaries Victoria S. Nicolas and Rosario DLG. Kumagai.
The MPLA authorized the payment of over $1.16 million to Nicolas on April 28, barely a week after Gov. Juan N. Babauta certified the government’s taking of her property in 1993 for the purpose of protecting wetlands and endangered species.
The MPLA also authorized the payment of some $159,408.19 to Kumagai on May 5, 2005. Then Gov. Lorenzo I. DeLeon Guerrero had certified the taking of Kumagai’s property for the same purpose on Nov. 16, 1993.
“Neither property was taken for the purpose of a right-of-way. Nor are the properties related in any way to needs for right-of-ways. Land Compensation Act funds cannot be used to compensate the landowners for properties taken unrelated to right-of-ways,” Livingstone said.
Livingstone explained that Public Law 13-17 originally prioritized the compensation of land-taking for right-of-way purposes. That law explicitly stated that wetland and other claims would be entertained only after right-of-way claims are settled.
P.L.14-29 amended part of that law and stated: “The MPLA shall compensate the acquisition of private lands for right of way purposes, including but not limited to public road construction, construction of ponding basins, wetland, and other claims involving private land acquisition.”
Livingstone said obligating land compensation funds as compensation for acquisitions of wetlands violates the Land Compensation Act and, thus, constitutes a breach of fiduciary duty on the part of the MPLA and its board members.
Asserting that MPLA’s actions authorizing the payments were void, Livingstone asked the Superior Court to prevent the drawdown of funds from the land compensation fund. Livingstone wants the court to declare that wetland properties that are not used for right-of-way purposes cannot be compensated using land compensation funds.
