Benavente mellow to idea of grant lobbyist

Lt. Gov. Diego T. Benavente has come out in support of the CNMI hiring individuals who can help the Commonwealth look for and tap additional federal grants, saying the CNMI has not fully maximized the use of all grants available to the territories.

“I am in support of that. I would agree that we have not maximized our opportunities in getting federal grants in all the different sources,” Benavente said in a recent interview.

As a matter of fact, Benavente said that, based on the information he has received, the Commonwealth is tapping a very minimal amount of the total federal grant funds that are available.

“We need a lot of help in that area, even if it means spending money to hire these people,” he said.

According to a Federal Grants Review that was undertaken by the Department of the Interior, federal expenditures per capita in the CNMI declined from $1,278 to $1,012 from 1993 to 2000.

The DOI study found that the territories—the CNMI, American Samoa, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands—received $581.5 million in federal grants in Fiscal Year 1999 and that an additional $51.3 million was actually available to the territories in that fiscal year.

The U.S. Virgin Islands got the largest chunk of this amount, at $203.16 million; followed by Guam, $196.88 million; and American Samoa, $116.04 million.

Of the possible $79.44 million in federal grants that were open to the Northern Marianas in 1999, Rep. William S. Torres had said that the CNMI government only managed to tap an estimated $65.45 million, leaving some $13.99 million in untapped funds.

The DOI Fiscal Planning Services Inc. estimates that at least $581.5 million in grant awards remained available but were untapped by all four territories.

Benavente said this only underscores the need for the Commonwealth to have somebody in the U.S. mainland who would make these untapped funds available for the CNMI.

This comes in the wake of a recent presentation made by former Office of the Interior Director Danny Aranza at the Office of the Governor, where he offered his services to the CNMI government in looking for and applying for all available federal grants. Administration sources said that Aranza’s retainer’s fee is $180,000 per annum.

“These might not be a real, true lobbying but this is a firm that we can hire to help us get more money from Washington D.C. If the figures are correct, even if we are to spend a couple of $100,000 on a project like this and manage to get $3 or $4 million in additional money every year, I’m sure no one would oppose something like that,” he said.

At the same time, Benavente said there is also a need to fix and enhance the Commonwealth government’s present reimbursement system and the general federal grants procedure.

Rep. Arnold I. Palacios, who has introduced a measure for the creation of an Office of Federal Assistance and Programs under the Office of the Governor, described Aranza’s presentation as a two-pronged proposal: to help the CNMI recover some of its unreimbursed grant funds and to look for available grants in behalf of the Commonwealth and make recommendations.

The unreimbursed funds arise from money that the CNMI spent out of its own pocket in anticipation of a grant release that has already been approved.