Ex-Speaker defends travel expenses

Their travel expenditures have gone up as members of the Legislature made several trips to Washington D.C. to attend oversight hearings conducted by the U.S. Congress as well as to meet with lawmakers and their staff.

This was the response of Rep. Diego T. Benavente to a report from the Department of Finance citing a 56 percent increase in travel expenditures by the legislative branch last year compared to its 1997 spending despite the austerity measures implemented by the government.

About $704,578 in taxpayers’ dollars were spent by members of the 11th Legislature in FY 99 for their off-island trips, up 56 percent from $454,988 two years prior to that. In contrast, the executive branch cut its travel expenditures by 73 percent, from $2.84 million to $1.47 million during the same period.

“We had a lot of reasons to travel to D.C. last year,” said Mr. Benavente who was the House Speaker during the said period. “There were hearings a couple of times and there were several meetings. There certainly has to be an increase there.”

Members of the 11th Legislature flew to the U.S. capital at least four times over the past two years as part of CNMI’s official delegation to two hearings conducted by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in March 1998 and September 1999.

They also attended a separate hearing by the House Resources Committee in September 1999. All these hearings tackled federal takeover proposal pending in Congress.

Legislative leaders also went there for a series of meetings with U.S. lawmakers and their key staff, including the trips made in July 1998 to hold talks with House Resources Committee Chair Don Young (R-Alaska) and in February 1999 as part of their lobbying efforts against federalization of the island’s labor and immigration.

Although Gov. Pedro P. Tenorio and key administration officials joined most of these trips, Mr. Benavente attributed the huge reduction in travel expenses in the executive branch to the belt-tightening efforts that were not observed during the time of former Gov. Froilan C. Tenorio.

“It’s easily justified in the administration side because during the previous administration, there were travels being done left and right unnecessarily,” he told reporters in an interview yesterday after the joint legislative session.

“It’s very easy to reduce the travel expenses in the administration,” Mr. Benavente explained. “The increase in the travel expenses of the Legislature really showed how many had to go to Washington D.C. for hearings and meetings.”

When asked about people’s perception on lawmakers’ spending public funds on their trips while budgets of critical agencies suffer cuts, the representative said the media should set the record straight to justify the costs incurred by the CNMI.

“There were some travels that were unnecessary but certainly for the most part… All I can say is that we needed to travel to D.C. We couldn’t just say ‘Never mind, there’s no money.’,” added Mr. Benavente.