Kilili to serve on four committees

WASHINGTON, D.C.— House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has announced additional committee assignments for members of the Democratic caucus in the 117th Congress, with Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan (Ind-MP) serving on both the Agriculture and Veterans Affairs committees, in addition to his seats on the Natural Resources and Education and Labor committees.

“I thank the Speaker for giving me the rather unusual ability to sit on four House committees,” Sablan said. “I explained to her that without representation in the Senate and without a vote for President the people of the Marianas have only one person in the federal government to look out for their interests. So, I have to cover as many bases as I can.”

Ordinarily, members of the House are limited to a maximum of two committee assignments. In the previous Congress, however, Sablan sought and was granted a waiver to serve on three committees. After last November’s election, he asked the speaker for permission to serve on a fourth committee and she announced Friday she had agreed to his request.

Sablan will still be limited to serving on a maximum of four subcommittees, one in each committee. And, he said, he will seek to remain vice chair of the House Natural Resources Committee with responsibility for insular affairs and chair of the Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education Subcommittee of the Education and Labor Committee.

“I want my committee assignments to line up with the issue areas that are most important to constituents in the Marianas,” Sablan explained. “In December’s relief appropriation we were successful at getting the governor all the money he asked for the Marianas Nutritional Assistance Program to carry us through fiscal year 2021. But my longstanding goal is to have the Marianas in the national Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP. That way we never have to beg for extra money when there is an economic crisis; it comes automatically. Being on the Agriculture Committee can help me reach this goal.”

Sablan has also used the position of chair for Insular Affairs effectively. In the last Congress he called a hearing on Medicaid in the territories, which led to a ten-fold increase in funding. The Marianas went from an annual $6.7 million in 2019 to $62.3 million this year.

“Getting state-like treatment in Medicaid—for the Marianas and the U.S. territories—remains my goal,” Sablan said. “As vice chair I can make that case.

“I am also very concerned with the lack of progress on renewal of the compacts of free association between the United States and the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia. As a Micronesian myself, I want to be sure that our fellow islanders are treated with respect by the U.S.; and I also want to ensure that the strategic arrangement that keeps our part of the world peaceful is maintained.”

Front and center

Sablan will be front and center on the nationwide push to reopen schools, if he retains the chairmanship of the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education, when the leadership selections are made in February. “It has proven very helpful to be in leadership when decisions were made on coronavirus relief and other school funding,” Sablan said.

Last week the Marianas was awarded $77.7 million for its public schools and Northern Marianas College, bringing total education relief funding since last March to $108.9 million.

Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan

Membership on the Veterans Affairs Committee also paid dividends in the last Congress. Last month, his legislation, which began in the committee, increasing grants for maintenance of veteran’s cemeteries, became law. Sablan was also able work legislation through the committee to allow veterans and family members to use their GI Bill educational benefits to cover the cost of preparatory courses for license and certification exams. And he got his Military Spouse Career Education Act enacted to help wives and husbands of service members finish their college degrees more quickly and get the training needed to re-license in their professions, when they must move to a new location under military orders.

“The committee also gives me a bully pulpit to draw attention to how Marianas veterans are underserved,” Sablan said. “I am especially looking forward to the new Biden administration’s response to the assessment of placing full-time permanent VBA, Vet Center, and VHA staff in the Marianas and other underserviced areas, which I required in report language last year.”

Sablan would like to see the committee meet with veterans in the Marianas, when travel is possible again, he said. “Chairman Mark Takano’s delegation had to cut its trip short in 2019 because of a typhoon. But I think he would like to try again.” (PR)