The Legislature and administration are now looking at a resource level of $156.7 million, a decrease of $1.7 million from the original revenue projection for the 2009 fiscal year.<\/p>\n
The new estimate factors in the $1.7 million income from the Marianas Public Land Trust, which has been earmarked for the payment of debts owed by the Commonwealth Utilities Corp.<\/p>\n
The updated revenue forecast is reflected in a resolution introduced in the House of Representatives last week. The resolution, once adopted, will set the government spending limit for the period between Oct. 1, 2008 and Sept. 30, 2009.<\/p>\n
Speaker Arnold I. Palacios yesterday said it is urgent to pass a new budget given the huge decline in government resources. \u201cWe need a spending plan that matches our resources, especially when resources are going down the way it is right now,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
No appropriation was passed for fiscal year 2008. The government is currently operating on the FY2007 budget level of $163 million, a figure largely believed to be more than the available resources.<\/p>\n
In April, the Fitial administration submitted its budget proposal for FY2009. The House Ways and Means Committee conducted initial review and held public hearings, but the process came to a temporary halt after the committee\u2019s chairman, Rep. Ray N. Yumul, left for military service.<\/p>\n
Rep. Victor Hocog, who also chairs the House Committee on Public Utilities, Transportation, and Communications, has been appointed to take over the Ways and Means Committee.<\/p>\n
Palacios said yesterday that the committee has resumed work on the budget, and is expected to introduce a bill soon. He said the Legislature is still hoping a budget will be passed before the fiscal year ends on Sept. 30.<\/p>\n
For her part, Sen. Maria Pangelinan, chairwoman of the Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee, said her committee is preparing a budget bill that can be used as a takeoff point for future talks with the Lower House.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Legislature and administration are now looking at a resource level of $156.7 million, a decrease of $1.7 million from the original revenue projection for the 2009 fiscal year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-125931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125931"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125931\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}