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Atalig: Administration will share with the Legislature spending plan on ARPA funds
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Posted on May 26 2021
Finance Secretary David DLG Atalig said the Torres-Palacios administration wants to share with the Legislature its priorities and spending plan on the American Rescue Plan Act funding.
In response to inquiry about ARPA during a radio press briefing last Friday, Atalig said they received the $481,876,521 last May 17, and will soon be meeting with the Legislature.
“We want to work with the Legislature and share what our priorities are and what are some of the legislators’ concerns on how they want us to prioritize these funds. We need to work together to benefit our Commonwealth,” he said.
A House bill that seeks to give the Legislature appropriation powers over the ARPA money is currently with the Senate Committee on Fiscal Affairs.
Atalig said Friday they received the CNMI’s full allocation of the ARPA funds last May 17. He said the process of receiving the funds started before the funds were even available. He said his team worked extremely hard to get everything set up and prepared prior to that May 10 deadline for U.S. Treasury to put out guidelines.
“And so we had everything prepared, ready to go. So as soon as we received the guidelines, we submitted our request for [the drawdown of] our allocation,” he said.
Atalig said they were happy to receive a note that their request had been accepted, and that the Commonwealth will be expecting funds four days later. “And when we did that, we received it over the weekend and confirmed on Monday [May 17] by the Bank of Guam in our account. So we’re excited,” he said.
Atalig earlier told Saipan Tribune that the CNMI will get an estimated total of $507 million in ARPA funding—not $515 million as was previously estimated.
