Rota homestead bills rejected

A victory for the Office of Public Lands and a sorry loss for proponents of public land use for homestead projects in Rota.

Governor Pedro P. Tenorio yesterday returned to the Legislature two bills that would have provided homestead areas in the municipality. He argued that signing Senate Bills 12-100 and 12-101 would usurp the authority of the Office of Public Lands.

SB 12-100, dubbed as the “Rota Agricultural Homestead Amendment Act of 2001,” mandates the Board of Public Lands to designate, for homesteading purposes, public lands in Rota which are not required for government use nor reserved for other purpose by any other law.

In defending his disapproval of SB 12-100, Mr. Tenorio echoed his arguments on a similar bill, SB 12-60. “I emphasized the authority of the Board of Public Lands under Public Law 12-33, and urged the legislature to work with the Board to resolve the issues the bill is attempting to address.

The CNMI chief executive said the bill suffers from the same infirmities as SB 12-60, because it mandates that the Board designate public lands, which are not for homesteading purposes.

Mr. Tenorio said that if the bill was signed it would prevent BPL from exercising its authority to manage and dispose of land belonging to the Commonwealth.

The second law sent back to the Legislature was SB 12-101, or the “Rota Village Homestead Reservation Act of 2001.”

Mr. Tenorio noted that although he understood the wish of the bill’s author to appropriate specific public land on Rota for village homestead, he was also aware of BPL’s position regarding the distribution of public lands in the CNMI.

He said signing SB 12-101 would create chaos in the way the agency dispenses its functions. Mr. Tenorio said BPL, which included representatives from Rota and Tinian, is the statutory successor of the Marianas Public Lands Corporation.

And because of such, it inherits the mandate for PL 12-33. He further said, the Board is already required to make available some portion of public lands for village and agricultural homestead purposes.

“To avoid conflicting plans and use of public lands, the Board believes this bill is not necessary at this time,” the letter of Governor Tenorio to the Senate and House of Representatives noted.

SB 12-100 and 12-101 sought to provide much-needed homestead areas for agricultural and village use respectively to the inhabitants of the island-municipality of Rota.