FY25 budget makes its way to Palacios’ desk

The House of Representatives, by majority vote, has passed House Bill 23-115 (essentially the House’s version of fiscal year 2025 budget) with Senate amendments and it now makes its way to Gov. Arnold I. Palacios.

With the beginning of fiscal year 2025 less than a month away, the Legislature has passed its version of the FY25 budget in the form of H.B. 23-115 House Draft 1, House Substitute 1, Senate Substitute 2.

During a House Regular Session yesterday, the House of Representatives voted 18-1 in favor of passing H. B. 23-115, HD1, HS1, SS2. Only Rep. Marissa Flores (Ind-Saipan) voted against the bill’s passage.

The bill is now on its way to Palacios’ desk for final approval.

Last Wednesday, the Senate passed their version of the fiscal year 2025 budget with a few floor amendments on top of the amendments passed by the Senate Fiscal Affairs committee.

Following an over three-hour Senate regular session last Sept. 18, the full Senate body passed their version of the fiscal 2025 budget; or H. B. 23-115, HD1, HS1, SS2.

After nearly an hour of discussion, the Senate unanimously voted to pass HB 23-115 HD1 HS1 SS2 past 4pm.

As part of their discussion, the Senate passed six floor amendments to include the addition of Section 609 to cap salary increases to service-contract employees as well as amendments pertaining to funds collected from the Department of Public Lands to be transferred to the Marianas Public Land Trust.

These amendments are on top of the amendments proposed by the Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee last Friday.

A week before the Senate body passed H. B. 23-115, HD1, HS1, SS2, the Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee met to discuss the bill.

The committee voted in favor of passing the House Bill with amendments to include two additional amendments specifically to reporting requirements.

According to Fiscal Affairs Committee chair Sen. Donald M. Manglona (Ind-Rota), the proposed amendments to the House bill are to add additional sections requiring the Department of Finance to report any additional revenue collected that is not detailed in the FY25 budget if it exceeds $200,000; and to include language that penalizes government departments who don’t comply with budget reporting requirements.

“[The proposed amendments include] adding a section D that mentions that the secretary of Finance shall report any additional revenue in excess of $200,000 that have been received that are not identified by this act. As for the penalties for failure to report, it is proposed by the committee that we include similar language to was indicated in Section 713 by taking the same language and applying to 712 in terms of the violations of that section,” said Manglona.

The committee unanimously voted in favor of passing the amendments.