Previous Story
The mystery of the missing $15K for Northern Islands summit
|
Posted on Jun 24 2011
House Speaker Eli Cabrera (R-Saipan) said Thursday that the leadership wants to know why a proposed $15,000 for the Northern Islands Development Summit that the Saipan and Northern Islands Legislative Delegation approved during its May 23 session was removed from the final copy transmitted to then acting governor Eloy S. Inos, who signed it into law on June 7.
Rep. Ray Yumul (R-Saipan), chairman of the delegation’s Ways and Means Committee and author of the bill, said it could be an oversight. But other members of the House leadership think it is intentional, and undermines the integrity of the local delegation’s legislative process.
Cabrera said the House leadership has been reviewing the videotape of the May 23 delegation session to see how a bill that ended up on the governor’s desk for signature was not the same bill the House leadership remembers it to be.
The speaker said it was clear that delegation members passed Vice Speaker Felicidad Ogumoro’s (Cov-Saipan) written floor amendment giving $15,000 for the Northern Islands Development Summit tentatively set for September. But the bill that was later transmitted to the governor did not include the $15,000.
Thus, the acting governor signed a bill into law appropriating some $3.454 million in revenue from poker license fees that did not have the $15,000 for the Northern Islands summit.
Yumul said there’s still time to appropriate funding for the summit, since it won’t be held until September.
“I would think that it’s only an oversight,” he said.
But Cabrera, in a separate interview, said while another local bill can be introduced to appropriate $15,000 for the event, it would be hard to identify the source of funding.
He also said that even if $15,000 is finally set aside for the summit, the House leadership would still want to know how the original proposal was deleted from the bill that became law.
The 21-member delegation will hold a session on Tuesday, but this may be rescheduled for Wednesday.
