Chamber outlines hopes for immigration regs

The Saipan Chamber of Commerce is hopeful that regulations will address local business concerns about the federalization of immigration in the Commonwealth.

“Although we are disappointed that Senate Bill 2739 has passed the United States Senate in its current form, we look forward to having a seat at the table and participating in the formulation of regulations pertaining to the bill to ensure that our questions and concerns are addressed and to hopefully clarify ambiguous portions of the legislation,” said Chamber president Jim Arenovski.

On top of the Chamber’s agenda is to ensure the regulations offer potential investors and existing businesses “a greater sense of stability, and knowledge of what the future will hold, than the bill does,” said Arenovski.

According to Arenovski, the Chamber will seek to ensure that local businesses have access to qualified workers into the future. This concern comes in light of the immigration bill’s stated intent of reducing the nonresident worker pool.

The Chamber also hopes the regulations will enable the CNMI to maintain a visitor industry. Tourism is the only remaining large-scale industry supporting the community.

The concern is that a federalized system will pose uncertainty to the China and Russian tourist markets. Under federal control, tourists from these countries will be required to apply at U.S. embassies.

Arenovski said the embassies would place great limits on those would choose to travel here. The limits include a much higher pricing and the required travel to get to a U.S. embassy.”These factors alone may be enough to severely damage the 10 percent of the NMI tourism market these countries represent,” he added.

The U.S. Senate, by a vote of 91-4, passed the bill. The measure now heads to the U.S. House of Representatives, where it has bipartisan support. The House is expected to concur shortly. Once the bill clears the House, it will be sent to the president for his signature, and will then become law.

In addition to federalizing CNMI immigration, the bill would also give the Commonwealth a delegate with limited voting powers to the U.S. House.

The CNMI provisions contained in S. 2739 are identical to the House version, H.R. 3079, which passed by the House in December 2007.