Flashback July 18, 2000-2002

[B]July 18, 2000

Gov’t debts to Fund balloon to $43 million[/B]

Hopes by the NMI Retirement Fund to recover over $43 million owed by the government in unpaid contributions and other debts continue to dim as the House Ways and Means Committee has yet to commit on how to meet the mounting financial obligations. Committee chair Rep. Antonio M. Camacho said a decision will have to come at the end of a series of budget hearings being conducted by lawmakers on the FY 2001 spending proposal from the governor.

[B]USDA agrees to guarantee home loans[/B]

Good news for local families who want to have a home of their own. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development office has agreed to guarantee home loans availed by low- or moderate-income families living on Saipan through the local branch of Bank of Hawaii. Steven R. Chapman, acting state director of the federal agency for Hawaii and the Western Pacific Region, broke the good news to Rep. William S. Torres who visited the office in Hilo last month in an effort to bring the program to the CNMI.

[B]Domestic terminals witness growth in passenger traffic[/B]

Overall passenger traffic in three domestic air transport terminals in the Northern Marianas edged up 12 percent during the period covering October 1999 to May 2000, according to a report obtained from the Commonwealth Ports Authority. Ironically, aircraft landing on Saipan, Tinian and Rota air transport facilities fell 22 percent to 17,570 in the first eight months of Fiscal Year 2000 from 17,592 in the same period last year.

[B]July 18, 2001

NAP fears budget shortfall[/B]

Projected funding deficit for FY 2001 threatens the monthly allotment of over 150 food stamp recipients due to the reported increase in the total number of program participants. The Division of Nutrition Assistance Program disclosed that the number of eligible food stamp recipients has been increasing by an average of one percent each month.

[B]CUC races with time for better treatment facility[/B]

The Commonwealth Utilities Corporation is running against time to meet the deadline set for the construction of a better wastewater treatment facility. The US Environmental Protection Agency requires the utilities company to upgrade the Agingan facility within four years after it was allowed to operate the treatment plant through an administrative order dated November 1, 1999.

[B]Gov’t saves $48M from austerity program[/B]

Put on the defensive by alleged negative perception toward the Tenorio administration’s austerity program, the Public Information and Protocol Office issued a statement yesterday, claiming that the program actually saved the government $48 million in operating expenses without laying off workers or reducing hours of services. The statement, prepared by Bob Shreck of the Department of Finance, stressed that a simple glance at the revenue and expense figures would show that the government had no choice in the matter.

[B]July 18, 2002

Consumers to suffer from new taxes[/B]

The House of Representatives assured the passage this Friday of three new tax bills but businessmen warned that, besides adding to the cost of doing business, the additional burden would be shouldered mostly by consumers. This was the overall sentiment of businessmen toward the planned passage of three new tax bills, on whose fate the $213 million Fiscal Year 2003 budget hinges.

[B]Saipan’s PCBs enter Nevada[/B]

Several tons of concentrated PCBs passed through Nevada’s Customs officers Monday (Tuesday, local time) and were on their way to a regulated landfill in Beatty town at the Silver State. Thus said John Trela, the Environmental Chemical Corporation’s project manager at the PCB treatment site in Tanapag. The ECC is the contractor of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the treatment of over 20,000 tons of soil that were stockpiled in Tanapag.