{"id":376961,"date":"2022-10-03T06:00:10","date_gmt":"2022-10-02T20:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=376961"},"modified":"2022-10-03T06:00:10","modified_gmt":"2022-10-02T20:00:10","slug":"partial-govt-shutdown-avoided","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/partial-govt-shutdown-avoided\/","title":{"rendered":"Partial govt shutdown avoided"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Gov. Ralph DLG Torres receives claps and cheers as he signed into law last Friday a budget bill for the government\u2019s operations in Fiscal Year 2023. The signing of the budget law avoided a government partial shutdown. Also in the photo seated from left to right, are first lady Diann T. Torres, Sen. Victor B. Hocog (R-Tinian), Torres, Sen. Vinnie F. Sablan (R-Saipan), and Rep. Angel A. Demapan (R-Saipan). (FERDIE DE LA TORRE)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Commending the Senate for its swift action, while expressing utter disappointment in the House of Representatives majority leadership for failure to expeditiously pass a budget bill, Gov. Ralph DLG Torres on Saturday morning signed into law the $109.7-million budget bill for the CNMI government\u2019s operations for Fiscal Year 2023, averting a partial shutdown of government operations.<\/p>\n

\u201cSee you at work Monday,\u201d said Torres after he signed the budget legislation, House Bill 22-116, HD2, SS1, Conference Committee Substitute 1, into Public Law 22-22.<\/p>\n

He received cheers and claps from some members of the Legislature, Cabinet, and other government employees, who were present in the Office of the Governor\u2019s conference room.<\/p>\n

Torres said on behalf of the people of the CNMI, it is his great pleasure despite his disappointment with the House majority for passing this budget bill late, to have this legislation signed into law.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo all our government employees, I thank you for all\u00a0 the hard work and dedication. I apologize for any inconvenience\u00a0 and any worry that whether or not they go back to work Monday,\u201d the governor said.<\/p>\n

Among those present at the signing of the budget law were first lady Diann T. Torres, Senate President Jude U. Hofschneider (R-Tinian) who appeared virtually, Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee chair Sen. Victor B. Hocog (R-Rota), Sen. Vinnie F. Sablan (R-Saipan), House minority leader Rep. Angel A. Demapan (R-Saipan), and Finance Secretary David DLG Atalig.<\/p>\n

Combining the $109,782,265 million from the general fund and the $32,624,344 allocated to the CNMI from the American Rescue Plan Act, the CNMI government will have at its disposal a total of $142,406,609 million for government operations in the new fiscal year.<\/p>\n

The gross identified budgetary resources for Fiscal Year 2023 totaled $150,415,492 million. Minus debt servicing costs in the amount of $46,041,123, this leaves the government $104,374,369 million that\u2019s available for appropriation.<\/p>\n

Adding to that the $5,407,896 million budget for the Department of Public Lands, the grand total revenue available\u00a0 for appropriation is $109,782,265.<\/p>\n

Torres vetoed in its entirety several sections in the bill that he found to be unclear, ambiguous, or problematic either in their inconsistencies with existing provisions of Commonwealth or federal law or in their implementation\u2019s imposition of additional and unnecessary steps that would delay governmental efficiency.<\/p>\n

Before signing the bill into law, Torres mentioned that in reviewing the legislation he was assisted by deputy attorney general Lillian A. Tenorio, Finance Secretary Atalig, and the Office of Management and Budget staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday is a very important day. And as you know, I am mandated by the constitution to give the budget to the Legislature by April 1 and I have done that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The governor said the House passed their version of the budget on Aug. 27 and transmitted it to the Senate on Aug. 29.<\/p>\n

He said the Senate acted on it swiftly and expeditiously and passed it on Sept. 23.<\/p>\n

Torres said the House rejected the Senate version with the exception of five House minority members who voted in support of the Senate version.<\/p>\n

He said the Senate and the House had a conference committee on Thursday and came up with a joint budget.<\/p>\n

The Senate and the House unanimously approved the conference committee\u2019s final product and thereby passed the budget legislation Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n

Torres said they had the OMB, Secretary of Finance, his legal<\/p>\n

counsel, and staff, addressed thoroughly the bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we worked all the way past midnight,\u201d he said. Asked why Lt. Gov. Arnold I. Palacios and House Speaker Edmund S. Villagomez (Ind-Saipan) did not attend the signing of the budget bill, Torres said he didn\u2019t invite either one of them as there is no reason to invite someone that doesn\u2019t believe in the Leadership.<\/p>\n

Senate President Hofschneider thanked Torres and his team for acting swiftly on the disposition of the budget legislation, which he said is their primary responsibility as elected officials in the CNMI.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one in the Senate is thinking of a shutdown,\u201d said Hofschneider, adding that with that mindset and the collaborative effort with the leadership of the Senate led by Fiscal Affairs Committee chair Sen. Hocog, they went to a conference committee meeting with the House and got the final product.<\/p>\n

The president said he is thankful to Finance Secretary Atalig, who was able to articulate some of the questions that the bicameral conference committee asked primarily from the House with regard to the funding for Medicaid and retirees.<\/p>\n

Senate Floor Leader Sablan said it\u2019s a very exciting day and a comforting day for the people of the CNMI.<\/p>\n

Sablan, who served as the Senate conference committee\u2019s vice chair, said one of the House\u2019s approach to the budget bill was to use 80% of ARPA funds to fund the personnel of the CNMI in FY 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe saw that was not a wise move,\u201d Sablan pointed out.<\/p>\n

He said the governor, as the executive of the state, had to submit an ARPA spending plan to the U. S. Department of Treasury.<\/p>\n

Sablan said that plan was approved\u00a0 and it was then the ARPA monies were given to the CNMI and expended to satisfy the portions that were placed in the spending plan like ensuring that the CNMI invest money into broadband, healthcare, infrastructure, and a lot of other portions of the spending plan that was placed as a requirement.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we saw that if we were to take the House version and remove 80% and put it into paying the personnel of our government, it would have really affected the spending plan.<\/p>\n

And the unknown was could we really do that? How would we go back and report to the U.S. Department of Treasury that the plan was changed?\u201d Sablan said.<\/p>\n

He said they made it clear during the conference committee\u2019s meeting and that it was not a topic of negotiation for the Senate.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted to make sure that the ARPA stays as it is, which is working as the governor has been spending this money and not only spending the money, investing it,\u201d Sablan said.<\/p>\n

He said the CNMI has until Dec. 31, 2024 to extend all the ARPA monies to the departments.<\/p>\n

Sablan said with respect to outside sources such as the Compact Impact funds that came in, the House wanted to appropriate\u00a0 those funds.<\/p>\n

He said they made it clear that those funds can only be expended by a formula that is provided to the state.<\/p>\n

He said the House agreed to take the Senate\u2019s version and that\u2019s what is in the product today.<\/p>\n

Sablan said they compromised with the House on some parts of the budget bill to come up with a balanced budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re very happy that we were able to prevent a government shutdown. We all walked into the conference committee two days ago with one goal and that one goal was to ensure that the minute we walk out that door is to prevent a government shutdown and to provide comfort to our people,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sen. Hocog said the meat of the conference committee\u2019s disagreements or differences is the 20%-80% use of ARPA-local funding for personnel to return back to 80%-20%.<\/p>\n

Hocog said they placed two counsels from the House and the Senate to tell the conference committee whether or not the action of the House to appropriate ARPA funds is legal as their<\/p>\n

counsel of the Senate is telling them otherwise.<\/p>\n

He said during the counsels\u2019 exchange, they (Senate) took a letter from Attorney General Edward Manibusan advising or responding to House Ways and Means Committee chair Rep. Donald M. Manglona\u2019s (Ind-Rota) inquiryof whether or not the Legislature can appropriate ARPA.<\/p>\n

Hocog said it is very indicative in the AG\u2019s letter that the Legislature has a limit to appropriate and that limit extended\u00a0 that the legislature cannot appropriate ARPA funding.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey (House) adamantly refrained from answering yes or no at the first time that I told them that in order for us to move forward we need to dispose of the heart of this appropriation from the Senate version. Anything then after that followed our discussions and a compromise was received,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Hocog said they then tackled three major disagreements.<\/p>\n

When Hocog disclosed that the Senate version restored all full time employees deleted from the House version, this drew claps and cheers from many people in the conference room.<\/p>\n

He said the ARPA fund that was deleted by the House totals 2,103 FTEs and that the Senate reinstated that.<\/p>\n

Hocog said on the local funding, the House version deleted\u00a0 100 plus FTEs, and that the Senate restored that back.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything is restored by the Senate of what was deleted from the House,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Speaker Villagomez, in an interview shortly after the House passed the budget bill Friday afternoon, said the process can be painstaking and it can be long.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish we could have passed the budget sooner but again, things happened. And we worked through the challenges,\u201d said Villagomez as he extended his appreciation to the conference committee conferees from both the House and the Senate side.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a very amicable, diplomatic meeting. They got the big compromise out of the way and they were able to get something a product out by the 11th hour, enough for the House and the Senate to get it out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rep. Donald M. Manglona stated shortly before they voted to pass the budget bill Friday that what is included in the committee report is the letter from Finance Secretary Atalig, identifying the Community Disaster Loan as a funding source to address the Medicaid and retirees.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 80%-20% was never really the issue. It\u2019s not who gets 80% or what, whether it be through ARPA or general fund,\u201d Manglona said.<\/p>\n

He said the goal of the House Ways and Means Committee was to address the 25% benefits for the retirees and the Medicaid local matching fund.<\/p>\n

Manglona said without knowing what additional resources were available, it was a challenge of the committee to find those funds and in doing so, they identified the $20 million from the Medicaid reimbursement.<\/p>\n

He said, however, after hearing from Finance Secretary Atalig during his statement Thursday during the conference committee\u2019s meeting, those funds \u00a0 weren\u2019t available until the secretary had identified the $20 million from the CDL.<\/p>\n

Manglona said the committee previously mentioned that based on the fund status report that they received from the Finance secretary, only $36,000\u00a0 was available.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever if you look at the report, there was $20 million that was spent for COVID response. Because those were approved for reimbursement through the money that we\u2019ll be getting\u00a0 from FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency), we will then be given back from CDL and then those funds will be reserved and set aside for the Medicaid, retires, as well as to help provide additional funding to the judiciary and the Legislative Branch,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Manglona said all of this delay could have been avoided had they (committee) given proper reports or have the Finance secretary communicated all these additional resources that they\u2019re to receive.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe could have addressed all these issues early on,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Commending the Senate for its swift action, while expressing utter disappointment in the House of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":376962,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-376961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376961","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\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376961\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/376962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}