{"id":406590,"date":"2024-03-22T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-22T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=406590"},"modified":"-0001-11-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"-0001-11-29T14:00:00","slug":"Palacios-It-s-time-to-move-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/Palacios-It-s-time-to-move-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Palacios: It\u2019s time to move on"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n

Gov. Arnold I. Palacios delivers the opening remarks during the Governor\u2019s Economic Development Summit at the Saipan World Resort\u2019s Taga Hall yesterday.<\/p>\n

-FERDIE DE LA TORRE
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‘We invited all of you here to focus on how we can resolve and move forward and face the challenges and make the Commonwealth a better place to be.’<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gov. Arnold I. Palacios said yesterday it was easy for him and Lt. Gov. David M. Apatang to lament the situation of the CNMI when they first took office, but after one year of stabilizing the fiscal situation of the government and its public services, now is the time to move on.<\/p>\n

In his opening remarks during the Economic Development Summit at Saipan World Resort\u2019s Taga Hall, Palacios emphasized that he and Apatang did not invite the conference participants to dwell on the economic problems of the CNMI or to belabor and lay blame on past mistakes and administrations.<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead, we invited all of you here to focus on how we can resolve and move forward and face the challenges and make the Commonwealth a better place to be,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In other words, he said, they invited the participants to help turn economic diversity into an advantage and opportunity.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe may not always have the same thoughts [and] perspectives on how to approach and how to solve some of the problems we face, but we will listen,\u201d said Palacios.<\/p>\n

Organized by the Office of the Governor, the summit, \u201cChartering Our Future,\u201d was attended by policymakers, lawmakers, government agency heads, private sector leaders, nonprofit representatives, and community stakeholders.<\/p>\n

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Apatang said the summit is the setting for all participants to look at yesteryears to map out the Commonwealth\u2019s future economic development\u2014its growth beyond today.<\/p>\n

Apatang said Palacios emphasized the word \u201cteam\u201d in his remarks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we work as a team, with shared visions, wants, plans, goals, etc., as our single agenda, we will come out, I have no doubt, winners,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Apatang said the Commonwealth has all it needs to build its own small island economy and remain self-sustaining while building its strength to grow financially and economically.<\/p>\n

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Palacios said in his remarks that the CNMI is confronting one of its toughest economic challenges caused by many factors, including the continuing recovery from two super typhoons, the lingering impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the questionable use of millions of federal dollars originally intended to provide economic stability.<\/p>\n

In trying times like these, Palacios said, it\u2019s easy to succumb to doubt, and worse, to cling to the same failed economic policies that include, among others, the CNMI\u2019s overreliance on one sector of the economy.<\/p>\n

Palacios said it is during these moments that the CNMI\u2019s resilience, innovation, and island ingenuity shine the brightest.<\/p>\n

\n

‘When we work as a team, with shared visions, wants, plans, goals, etc., as our single agenda, we will come out, I have no doubt, winners.’<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

The governor underscored the need to put collective differences aside and work together as a team. He said economic recovery cannot be achieved by any one individual, by any one of the branches of government, by the private sector alone, or by a singular department or agency working in silos.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe must work together to provide a clear, realistic, and measurable path to economic growth through implementation of sustainable, long-term strategies,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Palacios said the summit will also focus on the critical infrastructure projects necessary not only to attract but also sustain investor interest and engagement.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour perspective will contribute significantly to understanding the infrastructural backbone required to support and accelerate our collective economic ambitions,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

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According to Celeste Boccieri-Werner, chief of strategic development\/project director of Matrix, which is the facilitator of the summit, one of the objectives is to create a shared understanding of the current state of the CNMI\u2019s opportunities and challenges facing the region.<\/p>\n

Other objectives are to develop a shared understanding of the CNMI\u2019s future economic development opportunities that will guide the region\u2019s development, identify an integrated list of specific projects to be completed to achieve economic development, and to identify a set of actions for economic development, Boccieri-Werner said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘We invited all of you here to focus on how we can resolve and move…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-406590","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\/406590","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=406590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406590\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}