A top federal official overseeing insular affairs lauded the CNMI\u2019s resiliency after Typhoon Soudelor, growing emotional at a press conference yesterday over the help given to the elderly during the recovery efforts.<\/p>\n
Esther Kia\u2019aina, U.S. Department of the Interior Assistant Secretary for Insular Areas, said she is committed to leveraging all federal resources with the objective to help the CNMI government.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy primary objective was to come and show support to the CNMI government and the people of the Northern Marianas [after] one of the most devastating natural disaster it has faced in modern history,\u201d she said of her trip.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have every intent on strategizing to determine what remaining fiscal 2015 funds, including for Capital Improvement Projects, might be able to be reprogrammed to meet the immediate needs of the Northern Marianas as well as to contemplate the use of fiscal [2016 and 2017] funds to that end,\u201d Kia\u2019aina told reporters.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Kia\u2019aina met with the Public School System, Northern Marianas College, and Commonwealth Utilities Corp.\u2014three of the hardest hit public agencies hit by the storm.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went to the Aging Center as well, which was for those individuals who needed critical care\u201d or have health care needs that needed electricity \u201cbefore they moved back to homes,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were two families that were left. I heard praise from the federal agencies on all fronts. They have been completely amazed by the professionalism, cooperation, and dedication of the CNMI government as well as the resiliency of the people of the Northern Marianas. I need to tell you that was pretty touching to me,\u201d Kia\u2019aina said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat was more touching was they said that,\u201d she continued, growing emotional, with tears visibly forming in her eyes. \u201cThat the quality of care that was given to the people of Aging Center, they were shocked. And I am thinking that if the government and the people rally to do the debris removal and cleanup and then still care about yours seniors and those families in greatest need\u2014that is a testament to the people of the Northern Marianas and the government and that needs to be applauded.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know full well of the impacts of typhoons. I was raised in Guam. I was there during 1976 when Super Typhoon Pamela hit. I was horrified, I thought the whole house was going to blow up and be sucked into a tornado-like environment.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I\u2019ve heard from almost everybody that I\u2019ve talked to here. That for a short period of time\u2014apart from being stunned because they weren\u2019t expecting the winds\u2014being stunned by the devastation and being afraid for their lives. That story is not being told enough.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am amazed at coming here and seeing the cleanliness of the island. I see the collaboration\u201d and the resiliency of the people.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a model case study of what should occur if something so devastating happens. \u2026I have confidence that in our long term hazardous mitigation plans the people of the Northern Marianas will be stronger when something of this magnitude hits again,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A top federal official overseeing insular affairs lauded the CNMI\u2019s resiliency after Typhoon Soudelor, growing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900],"tags":[2966,26,4998,67],"class_list":["post-212019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","tag-aging-center","tag-cnmi","tag-insular-areas","tag-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212019","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\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212019\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}