{"id":1526,"date":"2012-02-01T03:33:36","date_gmt":"2012-02-01T03:33:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newspaper.ctsi-logistics.com\/?p=1526"},"modified":"2012-02-01T03:33:36","modified_gmt":"2012-02-01T03:33:36","slug":"jan-6-start-date-for-reapportionment-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/jan-6-start-date-for-reapportionment-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Jan. 6: Start date for reapportionment plan"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>By Haidee V. Eugenio<br \/>\nReporter<\/div>\n<p>While Gov. Benigno R. Fitial and lawmakers now agree to a Jan. 6 start of the 120-day timeline for coming up with a reapportionment\/redistricting plan instead of Aug. 24, they still want to wait for the attorney general&#8217;s opinion on the matter.<\/p>\n<p>During Friday&#8217;s closed-door meeting between the governor and lawmakers, the governor indicated that he has no problem identifying Jan. 6 as the start of the 120-day period for the Legislature to come up with its plan, said press secretary Angel Demapan yesterday.<\/p>\n<p>But Demapan said should the attorney general&#8217;s opinion conclude that the 120-day period started on Aug. 24-which would mean the Legislature lost its chance to come up with a reapportionment\/redistricting plan-the Fitial administration would listen to lawmakers&#8217; concerns and recommendations.<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Joseph Palacios (R-Saipan), author of a pending initiative seeking to reduce the number of Saipan lawmakers in the House from 18 to nine, said yesterday he&#8217;s looking forward to the AG&#8217;s opinion, expected to be issued this week.<\/p>\n<p>If both the Legislature and the governor fail to come up with their reapportionment\/ redistricting plan as required by the Constitution after release of census results every 10 years, then any register voter could petition the court to do so.<\/p>\n<p>Some House members cautioned their colleagues and the governor against jumping to conclusion that a 22.7-percent decrease in Saipan&#8217;s population is the only basis for cutting the number of House members.<\/p>\n<p>Palacios&#8217;s initiative is now under review by the Committee on Judiciary and Governmental Operations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Haidee V. Eugenio Reporter While Gov. Benigno R. Fitial and lawmakers now agree to&#8230;<\/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-1526","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\/1526","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=1526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1526\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}