House panel ‘moves around’ $253.79 in proposed budget

House Ways and Means Committee chairman Tony Sablan (Ind-Saipan) told reporters yesterday afternoon that the panel decided to move around $253,788 in the proposed fiscal year 2015 budget, which means some agencies got more while some got less than Gov. Eloy S. Inos’ proposal. The latest number is lower than the panel’s earlier projection of between $300,000 and $400,000 that can be cut from and added to agencies’ budgets.

Sablan’s committee has been working on the 2015 budget bill, although they have been sidetracked by a host of issues that included the casino lawsuit, sessions and the State of the Commonwealth Address, less than three months before the start of FY 2015 on Oct. 1.

He said the committee decided not to add to the governor’s proposed budget for the Public School System but instead retained a $1 million appropriation for the ROTC program that is supposed to be funded 50 percent by local government and 50 percent by the federal government. Sablan said right now the $1 million is budgeted under 2015, so once the federal government reimburses the CNMI $500,000, PSS will have the flexibility to use that money for its programs and services.

“When feds money comes in, PSS will have $500,000 that it can use for its other needs,” Sablan said.

The $253,788 that the Ways and Means Committee moved around came from the following offices and agencies: $40,000 from the governor’s office’s “professional services” fund; a total of $16,000 from the lieutenant governor’s office; $54,500 from the Office of Indigenous Affairs; $54,500 from the Carolinian Affairs Office; $60,467 from Finance’s Revenue and Taxation Division; and $16,515 from the Civil Service Commission.

Sablan said the money were redistributed to the following agencies and offices: $35,000 to the Judiciary; $50,000 to the Law Revision Commission; $18,000 to the Legislature for inaugural costs; $15,860 to hire a cook at the Tinian Aging Center; $30,000 for the Medical Referral Office’s purchase of a service van; $10,000 for the Land Registration’s photo copying needs; and $19,000-plus for the Parole Office.

Any leftover funds will go towards hiring a medical referral assistant in Honolulu, among other things. A budget bill could be pre-filed next week.