Administration looking at options for La Fiesta

The Babauta administration is confident that it will manage to run the La Fiesta shopping complex without tapping into the CNMI government’s revenues and funds from the federal government.

The CNMI Executive Branch plans to pay its obligations involving La Fiesta and continue operating the mall using rental fees and other funding sources, Gov. Juan N. Babauta said yesterday as he and Northern Marianas College signed the final memorandum of agreement transferring the facility from NMC to the central government.

“The repayment plan for this is how we use the facility from hereon,” Babauta said.

He noted that there are potential tenants that can move into the facility. NMC, he added, is currently negotiating with a U.S.-based nursing company that may take one fourth of the facility. Further, the administration is looking into the possibility of having the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. move into La Fiesta and negotiating with CUC regarding the mall’s utility expenses.

“There are all kinds of possibilities. I’m not really concerned about the funding source for the maintenance of La Fiesta,” Babauta said.

The governor also apologized yesterday for the long period it took for the agreement to be signed. He explained that the Attorney General’s Office had to conduct a comprehensive legal review of the document before making it final.

For her part, NMC Board of Regents chair Kimberlyn King-Hinds thanked the governor for supporting the La Fiesta project.

“We wouldn’t have survived what we went through over the past year without that support,” King-Hinds said.

Earlier, King-Hinds said NMC will inform the Western Association of Schools and Colleges accrediting commission of the development immediately after the La Fiesta transfer becomes official.

The WASC accrediting commission is set to meet this month. Part of the agenda is NMC’s accreditation, which has been on warning status for a year now because of the financial problems caused by the La Fiesta purchase to the college.

Also present at yesterday’s signing ceremony were Lt. Gov. Diego T. Benavente, attorney general Pamela S. Brown, NMC president Tony Deleon Guerrero and other college officials, and representatives of La Fiesta’s original sellers—Hotel Nikko Saipan and Coco’s Lagoon Development Inc.