House Speaker Eli Cabrera (R-Saipan) said yesterday that he will call for a House session to entertain a motion to reconsider Thursday\u2019s vote to override the governor\u2019s veto of House Bill 17-226, saying he will not stop until they have exhausted all options to allow non-retired members of the NMI Retirement Fund to withdraw up to 50 percent of their contributions.<\/p>\n
Cabrera, author of HB 17-226, said he hopes they will be able to get at least 14 votes to successfully override the veto.<\/p>\n
On Thursday, the \u201cyes\u201d votes totaled only 11, and six voted \u201cno,\u201d while three were absent.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope we can count on those who were not present the last time, and some of those who voted \u2018no.\u2019 I hope they reconsider their votes,\u201d Cabrera told Saipan Tribune.<\/p>\n
Those absent during Thursday\u2019s session were Reps. Teresita Santos (Ind-Rota), Janet Maratita (Ind-Saipan), and Ray Yumul (R-Saipan).<\/p>\n
Santos, according to Cabrera, supports an override, while Maratita is not expected to return on island until sometime end of June. Yumul, he said, voted against the compromise version of HB 17-226 and the speaker said there\u2019s no telling what his vote will be this time.<\/p>\n
The speaker said there might be others who could change his vote on the override from \u201cno\u201d to \u201cyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
HB 17-226 allows active members of the Fund\u2019s defined benefit plan to take back up to 50 percent of their employee contributions regardless of years of service and without penalty or the need for them to quit their job. The rest of their employee contributions will be rolled over to a defined contribution plan.<\/p>\n
Rep. Frank Dela Cruz (R-Saipan), one of the six who voted \u201cno\u201d to the override, separately said yesterday that he welcomes another session wherein a motion to reconsider could be brought up.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe House rules allow for that. But that can be debated,\u201d Dela Cruz said in an interview at his office.<\/p>\n
Dela Cruz said he thinks an override of the governor\u2019s veto will still not succeed the second time around. \u201cIt needs 14 votes. I don\u2019t think the outcome will be different,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
House Rules 10 Section 6, \u201cMotion to Reconsider,\u201d reads: \u201cWhen a main motion has been made once and carried in the affirmative or negative, it shall be in order for any member of the House to move to reconsider it on the same or succeeding day of the session during the appropriate order of business. The motion to reconsider is debatable. A simple majority shall be required for passage. When a motion for reconsideration has been defeated, a second motion for reconsideration of the same question shall not be in order.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lt. Gov. Eloy S. Inos, meanwhile, described as an \u201cexercise in futility\u201d the House\u2019s decision on Thursday to go on with the override without ensuring there\u2019s enough votes for it. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhy grandstand?\u201d he asked, adding that dozens of government employees had to show up at the House session, during government hours and on government resources, only to witness the override\u2019s defeat.<\/p>\n
Inos repeated his call for the Legislature to work with the administration on a \u201cbetter plan.\u201d He said active members will be able to get up to 100 percent of their contributions if the buyback into the Social Security system does not push through, but for now, he said, he calls on lawmakers to rally behind the Social Security plan. Inos said it is the government\u2019s responsibility to look after the welfare of its people, and make sure there\u2019s a safety net for them when they retire.<\/p>\n
Some 100 employees that filled the House lobby and chamber on Capital Hill on Thursday afternoon expressed disappointment over the defeat of the override.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
House Speaker Eli Cabrera (R-Saipan) said yesterday that he will call for a House session to entertain a motion to reconsider Thursday\u2019s vote to override the governor\u2019s veto of House Bill 17-226, saying he will not stop until they have exhausted all options to allow non-retired members of the NMI Retirement Fund to withdraw up to 50 percent of their contributions.<\/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-161710","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\/161710","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=161710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161710\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}