Meanwhile, DPL announced last week that it will conduct two public hearings regarding the proposed amendments to the commercial rules and regulations for Managaha.<\/p>\n
Both hearings will start at 5:30pm on Aug. 16 and 19 in the DPL conference room at the Joeten Dandan Commercial Building.<\/p>\n
According to Saipan Tribune<\/em> archives, marine operators have expressed that should DPL push forward with its amendments, many of them would have to close up shop as they won\u2019t be able to conduct business on Ma\u00f1agaha anymore.<\/p>\n However, DPL\u2019s David Sablan says that the current regulations provide that commercial competition on Ma\u00f1agaha Island will be eliminated and provide that the concessionaire has the exclusive right to operate all commercial concessions, and to conduct all tours of the island and from the island, but does not clearly define the scope of commercial activity and concessions included in this right.<\/p>\n \u201cRevising the regulations will clarify that this exclusive right to conduct or operate any tour or activity on the island or departing from the island includes but is not limited to underwater and surface water activities,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Ultimately, Sablan explains, the intent of this amendment is to further define the type of commercial activity the concessionaire and a limited number of sub-concessionaires may perform.<\/p>\n \u201cSection 145-30-101 of the Commercial Use of Ma\u00f1agaha Island Rules and Regulations already states that this includes the right to conduct all tours of and from the island, and to operate surface water sports, i.e., parasailing, banana boat ride, pedal boat, power boat lagoon cruises, windsurfing, canoe rentals, canoe tours, kayak tours; and underwater sports, i.e., SCUBA diving, SNUBA diving, snorkeling, BOB, and sea walker-type tours. The proposed amendment will clarify that picking up tourists from the island to conduct these activities is considered commercial activity and prohibited. The proposed amendment further clarifies that whether the commercial activity was a package deal that originated in Saipan to Ma\u00f1agaha Island, or departs from Ma\u00f1agaha to Saipan, this type of activity will be restricted,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n Furthermore, DPL said marine sport operators will be restricted from picking up a visitor from Ma\u00f1agaha Island for the purpose of any intended surface or underwater sport activity, unless the marine sport operator(s) has a valid sub-concessionaire agreement that was mutually agreed upon by DPL and the concessionaire.<\/p>\n \u201cThe existing regulations do not give the exclusive concessionaire the exclusive right to provide transportation to the island, and the proposed amendments would not change that. As a result, the proposed regulation would not prohibit local residents from hiring boats or using personal transportation and would not prohibit tour providers from arranging transportation between Saipan and Ma\u00f1agaha (as long as the transportation does not include a marine sport activity),\u201d said Sablan.<\/p>\n Angelo Atalig Camacho<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The CNMI House Standing Committee on Natural Resources has called for a public hearing to…<\/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-412249","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\/412249","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=412249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412249\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/images\/imgupload\/710b6bf646b8be55bb7852e029cfb4e0.jpg\")
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