Senate fails to override Palacios’ veto of allotments for utility costs

With three senators absent, the Senate failed to override Gov. Arnold I. Palacios’ line-item veto of the allotments for the utility costs of Tinian, Rota, Saipan, and Northern Islands in the Fiscal Year 2024 Appropriations Act, or the budget law.

With five senators voting “yes” to a motion to override the governor’s veto and Sen. Corina L. Magofna (Ind-Saipan) voting “no,” the Senate failed to get the two-thirds vote needed to successfully pass the motion last Monday.

Absent at the special session were Sens. Celina R. Babauta (D-Saipan), Paul A. Manglona (Ind-Rota), and Donald M. Manglona (Ind-Rota).

Those who voted “yes” were Senate President Edith E. DeLeon Guerrero (D-Saipan), Sens. Karl Rosario King-Nabors (R-Tinian), Francisco Q. Cruz (R-Tinian), Jude U. Hofschneider (R-Tinian), and Dennis James C. Mendiola (R-Rota).

Before voting “yes,” DeLeon Guerrero noted that the fiscal year 2024 conference committee for both House of Representatives and Senate agreed that the utilities expenses will be shouldered by the central government.

“We must mean and hold what we say on these agreements. We are elected officials,” DeLeon Guerrero said.

She said they made that agreement and the product came out in their Conference Committee report dated Sept. 23, 2023. DeLeon Guerrero said there must be efforts initiated to identify possible funding for utilities, such as federal grants under allowable local administrative expenses or locations.

The budget legislation, House Bill 23- 66, HS1, SS 2, CC S1, became a law when Palacios signed it on Sept. 30, 2023.

Palacios disapproved a subsection on Section 601 as he emphasized that, although he has been given 100% reprogramming authority over the appropriation for the Executive Branch, the budget bill severely limits what he can chip off the skeleton appropriation to close the budget gap for all under-appropriated programs, including the underfunded utilities expenditure for the Executive Branch departments and agencies.