{"id":39290,"date":"2014-06-19T04:01:47","date_gmt":"2014-06-18T18:01:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=39290"},"modified":"2014-06-19T04:01:47","modified_gmt":"2014-06-18T18:01:47","slug":"casino-law-repeal-blocked-house-calendar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/casino-law-repeal-blocked-house-calendar\/","title":{"rendered":"Casino law repeal blocked from House calendar"},"content":{"rendered":"

A controversial bill repealing and reenacting in its entirety the Saipan casino law, which is a subject of lawsuits and criticism, failed to muster enough votes to be placed on calendar yesterday afternoon. It was instead referred to the Ways and Means Committee for further review. But author House floor leader Ralph Demapan (Cov-Saipan) said this won\u2019t stop the Lottery Commission\u2014which meets again today\u2014from deciding whether to grant and to whom an exclusive license to develop a minimum $2-billion integrated casino resort on Saipan.<\/p>\n

\"Concerned<\/a>
Concerned citizen Leila Staffler shows a stack of the referendum petitions with over 3,000 signatures to repeal the Saipan casino and electronic gaming laws, during yesterday afternoon’s House session.\u00a0(Haidee V. Eugenio)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meanwhile, the House passed 12 bills and resolutions yesterday, including a resolution on a June 30 joint legislative session to receive Gov. Eloy S. Inos\u2019 State of the Commonwealth Address. But the House rejected the Senate\u2019s version to increase cigarette tax gradually, leading to a House-Senate panel to work on a \u201ccompromise\u201d version.<\/p>\n

Vice speaker Frank Dela Cruz (Ind-Saipan), Rep. Ralph Yumul (Ind-Saipan), Rep. Janet Maraita (Ind-Saipan), and other members pushed for the casino-law-repeal-and-reenact bill\u2019s referral to committee for review and to give the public a chance to comment on it, rather than have it placed on calendar.<\/p>\n

Demapan noted that the motion was only to place the bill on calendar\u2014but not for action yesterday.<\/p>\n

Still, some members said even if it was not meant to be acted on, its mere placement on calendar means it goes straight to members\u2019 voting without undergoing committee review.<\/p>\n

After a lengthy debate, the motion to place Demapan\u2019s HB 18-195 on the bill calendar yesterday was defeated at 2:16pm by a vote of 10-8, with one voting \u201cpresent\u201d and one excused absence.<\/p>\n

After the voting, the speaker allowed the public comment period to be re-opened, wherein concerned citizen Leila Staffler stood up \u201con behalf of the 3,000-plus voters\u201d who signed petitions to repeal the casino law.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe respectfully request that the referendum process is allowed to take its course\u2026Every voter in this stack wants to have a chance at voting on this issue in November,\u201d Staffler, showing lawmakers the referendum petition and signatures gathered so far.<\/p>\n

Staffler told lawmakers that if they repeal and reenact the casino law by way of passing HB 18-195, \u201cyou are robbing 3,000 people from all over every district their right to a referendum process.\u201d <\/p>\n

Sneaky approach<\/p>\n

Staffler said while the reason stated for HB 18-195 was to clarify ambiguities in the casino law and ratify the Lottery Commission good faith actions, the petitioners \u201cfear that the decision to repeal and reenact, as opposed to amend the casino bill, is a misguided attempt to nullify our referendum efforts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Staffler said they are targeting over 4,500 signatures, much more than the required number to placed them on the ballot.<\/p>\n

The referendum petitions were to repeal the original Saipan casino law or Public Law 18-38, the law that repeal it or PL 18-43, and the electronic gaming law or PL 18-30.<\/p>\n

Staffler said ultimately HB 18-95\u2019s proposed amendments are \u201ccosmetic.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf that\u2019s the case, then we humbly ask that we include a clause to protect the referendum from further cosmetic amendments\u2026\u201d she told lawmakers.<\/p>\n

Sean King of Park Strategies and consultant for Marianas Stars Entertainment Inc.\u2014one of the two casino applicants\u2014echoed Staffler\u2019s comments that the bill, in so many ways, \u201cis a cosmetic attempt to avoid the referendum without addressing the core issues that bother so many people.\u201d<\/p>\n

But King said it\u2019s not their place to say whether there will be casino gaming or whether there should be a referendum. He also welcomes further review of the \u201crepeal and reenact\u201d bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd again we\u2019re not saying there even should be casino gaming on Saipan but if there is, it should be done through a thorough, deliberative manner and why not two licenses? Means more money and more revenue for the people of the CNMI. Only if there is gaming. We\u2019re not saying there should be one way or another but if [there is], let\u2019s do it right, the more money, the better,\u201d said King, who was in the House gallery during yesterday afternoon\u2019s session.<\/p>\n

Also with King in the House gallery was former U.S. Interior deputy assistant secretary for insular affairs David Cohen, now also consultant for Marianas Stars.<\/p>\n

Marianas Stars suggests granting two casino licenses instead of one. The other casino applicant is Best Sunshine International Ltd.<\/p>\n

King said the push for two licenses instead of one shouldn\u2019t be taken as a sign that Marianas Stars is worried about not being granted a license. He said Marianas Stars has a \u201cgreat business plan\u201d and \u201cgreat corporate record.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything appears to be going well. We\u2019re not concerned but many times before there was a discussion of this being multi-license. On Tinian where we have the Dynasty there were five licenses issued. All of a sudden in [PL] 18-38\u2014which became 18-43 when it was passed\u2014all of a sudden\u2026one license. We\u2019re not saying it was but it gives an impression that perhaps it\u2019s designed for one person. I can tell you that wasn\u2019t us. So why not [have two licenses]? I know this is driven a lot by retirees\u2019 pension benefits so why not more money for the people of the CNMI?\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Saipan voters had twice rejected casino questions on the ballot. <\/p>\n

Another concerned citizen, Glen Hunter, wrote to lawmakers, asking them to \u201crepeal the Casino Act and place an initiative on this general election ballot\u201d because the \u201cpeople deserve to be heard.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis simple process could halt all current legal actions and allow the good people of the CNMI the power to determine if the Constitutional ban on casino gaming in Saipan should be lifted or retained,\u201d Hunter told lawmakers. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A controversial bill repealing and reenacting in its entirety the Saipan casino law, which is…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":39293,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[900,4],"tags":[256,26,65,67],"class_list":["post-39290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-local-news","tag-casino","tag-cnmi","tag-house","tag-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39290","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\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}