NMIRF asked to recover $127K from ex-CPA officials

The Public Auditor is asking the NMI Retirement Fund to recover more than $127,000 worth of retirement benefits improperly made to two former officials of the Commonwealth Ports Authority who were found to have inflated their leave and compensatory time credits to get higher pension.

Although a series of hearings conducted by CPA’s Personnel Affairs Committee insisted the 2,700 compensatory time claimed by the agency’s former security chief had a factual basis, OPA maintained these were excessive and warranted.

The Public Auditor has also suggested that the matter be referred to the Attorney General’s Office should the NMI Retirement Fund encounter problems in the recovery of the $126,730.06 in retirement benefits improperly paid to the two former CPA officials.

Public Auditor Leo LaMotte asked the Fund to discontinue payments to former CPA Security Chief Joseph A. Reyes, after investigations proved that he is not qualified to receive early retirement benefits.

The public auditor urged the Retirement Fund to properly calculate and adjust the pension benefits of all other members by disregarding overtime and compensatory time hours that were considered as additional credited service.

“OPA maintains that the 2,748 comptime hours claimed by the former security chief were excessive and unwarranted, and were made without proper documentation, justification and approval,” a final OPA report released yesterday said.

Citing CPA Board Resolution 01-94, Mr. LaMotte also said Mr. Reyes was not even among the list of ports authority officials who were granted the privilege to convert all of their remaining comptime hours to sick leave upon retirement.

“Therefore, the comptime claimed by the former security chief should not have been converted to sick leave and considered in the computation of retirement benefits,” said the public auditor.

Mr. LaMotte also called on the Fund to adjust the pension benefits payable to former CPA Executive Director Carlos A. Shoda which was actually $5,114 higher than what other government officials, who receive the same salary, would normally get.

Based on the CPA personnel manual, Mr. Shoda was paid $12, 114 in compensation benefits.
OPA also noted that the excess annual leave credits granted to Mr. Shoda increased his average annual salary and pension benefits by at least $222 monthly or $2,674 annually.

OPA asked Ports Authority Board Chairman Roman S. Palacios to officially request the Fund to adjust Mr. Shoda’s retirement pension based on the average annual salary and creditable years of service.

According to the OPA, the previous CPA administration allowed the conversion of the two officials’ unused compensatory time hours to sick leave for use as additional years of credited service in the computation of their retirement allotment.

The OPA report also said Mr. Reyes claimed excessive compensatory time of 1,800 hours to qualify for early retirement benefits which allowed him to receive the 30 percent early retirement bonus of $13,973.76, paid out of CPA funds.

This also paved the way for Mr. Reyes to receive monthly pension payments of $2,473.36 from the NMI Retirement Fund beginning January 1997.

The OPA report added that the previous CPA administration allowed its officials to earn annual leave of about 14 hours per pay period or 360 hours in a year which is excessive of the law-mandated eight-hour leave per pay period or 208 hours granted each year to officials and employees of the CNMI government.

The personnel regulations adopted by the ports authority were not in accordance with that of the Commonwealth-wide policies, resulting in irregularities in the granting of compensatory time to Mr. Shoda and Mr. Reyes.