Kilili, CNMI lawmakers want minimum wage hike in 2012

Delegate Gregorio Kilili Sablan (Ind-MP) said yesterday that the CNMI minimum wage should be increased by another 50 cents in 2012 as required by U.S. law, but he is open to supporting a delay in 2013 just like in 2011 if warranted.

At the same time, Sablan is hoping that his H.R. 670, which conveys three miles of submerged lands to the CNMI, will pass the U.S. House of Representatives on Monday.

Sablan’s position on the minimum wage increase is supported by some CNMI lawmakers interviewed yesterday, although some of those who testified at a hearing in Washington, D.C. on Friday, including Interior Assistant Secretary Tony Babauta, called for further postponement in the wage hike both in the CNMI and American Samoa.

“I am not going to do anything to change the increase for 2012. It will go up 50 cents an hour. What we’re looking at now is 2013 and 2014. That’s what the hearing [in Washington, D.C.] was for, as far as I’m concerned. The 2012 [increase] is already law,” Sablan told Saipan Tribune.

If not for a law that Obama signed in October 2010 postponing the minimum wage increase in September 2011, the CNMI’s minimum wage should have been $5.55 an hour by now. The same law says the minimum wage hike will resume in September 2012.

A 2007 federal law requires a yearly 50-cent increase in the CNMI’s and American Samoa’s minimum wage until it reaches the federal wage floor of $7.25 an hour.

Had the CNMI done what it was supposed to do within five years after it became a Commonwealth in 1978, it wouldn’t be catching up with Guam and the rest of the United States in terms of the minimum wage, said Rep. Joseph Palacios (R-Saipan) yesterday.

“With all due respect to previous lawmakers, they introduced bills or resolutions to suspend minimum wage increases. This issue of increasing the minimum wage has been going on for a long time. Now that a federal law requires it, we should now follow it because we didn’t do anything by ourselves since at least 1983,” Palacios said.

He said the CNMI government, as well as the private sector, had their faults.

“It’s just very unfortunate that the economy got worse. But if we don’t do it now, we will again be left behind. I just wish Kilili will ask the Obama administration for federal help to the CNMI just like other states,” he added.

Rep. Ray Yumul (R-Saipan) said it’s a “no-brainer” that the cost of living on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota is high compared to the rest of the United States so the CNMI needs to increase its minimum wage that will allow its population to earn a decent wage.

But at the same time, he said employers should expect better performance from their employees.

“We should not raise our minimum wage to reward laziness,” he said.

Yumul said if an employer can have only three hardworking employees, then that employer won’t have any difficulty paying higher minimum wages rather than hiring five employees, some of whom are not productive.

House floor leader George Camacho (Ind-Saipan) said he supports anything that will help people and households.

“However, there is a delicate balance between helping employees and hurting businesses,” he said. “If a business will continue to remain open with the increase in wages of its employees and not pass the added costs to the consumers, I am in favor of that.”

Rep. Fred Deleon Guerrero (Ind-Saipan) said his support of a wage increase in 2012 depends on the state of the economy.

“In general, minimum wage would follow economic growth as in the U.S. where ample time has been made for economic growth and the growth of their minimum wage,” he said.

Besides Interior’s Babauta, those who testified at the hearing of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans and Insular Areas to request further postponement of the minimum wage increase were businessman Jim Arenovski and American Samoa Gov. Togiola Tulafono.

The Fitial administration said it shares the concerns of the business community, but has yet to state whether it will push for further postponement in 2012 or not.

‘Submerged lands’

The CNMI delegate will be going back to Washington, D.C. on Sunday in time for the U.S. House session on Monday wherein his HR 670 will be up for action.

Sablan said he hopes his bill will pass the House just like the last time, until one of the senators blocked it and released it only when action was no longer possible.

Approval of the bill means the CNMI will be given control over submerged lands three miles out from its shores.