Previous Story
Arctic Circle loan proposal on hold
|
Posted on Apr 28 2012
By Moneth Deposa
Reporter
Reporter
The Marianas Public Land Trust board of directors decided to hold off making any decision on the loan proposal of Arctic Circle Air due to lack of representatives from Saipan.
MPLT board chair Pedro Deleon Guerrero said until new trustees representing Saipan are appointed and confirmed, no action will be rendered on the company’s request for financial assistance.
There are only three trustees currently serving the MPLT board after the Senate rejected the reappointments of Gregoria Omar and Alvaro Santos.
Onboard are trustees Peter Q. Cruz from Tinian, Melchor Mendiola from Rota, and Deleon Guerrero from Saipan. Due to conflict of interest, the former recused himself from participating in the Arctic Circle Air proposal because his brother is among the company’s officials.
The chairman disclosed that both trustees from Rota and Tinian have agreed to defer taking any action on the issue during a meeting they held in Tinian last month.
Deleon Guerrero disclosed Thursday that to date, the board has also yet to receive some important documentations requested from the company that will aid the trustees in their review of the loan proposal.
Deleon Guerrero said that according to the trustees, Arctic Circle Air has not been producing what has been required of them in a timely manner.
“And even up to this time, they still have not received other important documents,” he said during a break at Thursday’s meeting.
According to the chairman, MPLT earlier approved $500,000 loan to the company which was rejected by Arctic Circle Air. It later approached the board of trustees requesting MPLT to invest $235,000 to the business.
Deleon Guerrero said the “investment request” was turned down by the board and which converted the $235,000 as a loan proposal from the company. This issue is now at the board’s table which review was put on hold.
Arctic Circle Air, which will be doing business as Marianas Harvest, will package the produce from local farmers so that farmers will just have to provide the goods that will be packed, labeled and sold in Guam. The cargo airline aims to revive the CNMI’s agriculture industry, which was supposed to start last month.
