Fitial: Delay start of classes

Gov. Benigno R. Fitial has asked Public School System Board of Education chair Lucy Blanco-Maratita to delay the start of classes for at least two weeks due to the island’s power crisis.

Classes in public schools are currently set to begin Sept. 8.

“Because the imported Aggreko generators will not be fully operational until mid-September, [the Commonwealth Utilities Corp.] will not be in a position to provide reliable utility services for the traditional opening of our public schools after the summer break,” Fitial wrote in a letter to Blanco-Maratita yesterday.

The PSS board should delay the start of school for at least two weeks, or until CUC can provide reliable utility services, he wrote.

“I regret that the CUC power plants are in such a state of disrepair after years of neglect, but I am confident we will be able to finally resolve our power crisis with the arrival of temporary generators from Aggreko International,” Fitial said in the letter.

Blanco-Maratita said yesterday she would have to meet with PSS Commissioner Rita Sablan before she could comment, although, she added, officials must remember a system-wide delay will mean schools on Rota and Tinian will also be affected.

Members of the Strategic Economic Development Council also share the governor’s concerns, Fitial wrote.

On Tuesday, Council members drafted a resolution to Fitial urging the start of school to be pushed back to Sept. 16, or until public schools on Saipan can operate uninterrupted or experience outages for no more than two hours during school hours. PSS is required to send students home if a power outage lasts more than two hours.

The resolution and letter are meant to bring the power crisis to the board’s attention, said Charles Reyes Jr., press secretary for the Governor’s Office.

“We feel, realistically, we will not be able to provide reliable power,” he said. “Basically, we’re asking the Board of Education and seeking their support. We don’t want to have a situation where students attend school and a significant power outage occurs.”

Details, such as how this would affect holiday breaks and the end of the school year, would be left to the board to decide, Reyes said.

“We’re not going to tell them how to run their affairs,” he said.

The Aggreko generators are currently being shipped in four parts, and are expected to be operational in mid-September. The first shipment should arrive this weekend.

Reyes said he believes the board will have enough time to make all of the necessary changes before the start of the year.

“We think everything will go according to plan,” he said.

Officials are also confident there will be no delay in the starting of the Aggreko generators in September, Reyes said.

“Once we get everything connected and online, we should have substantial relief, if not total relief from these power outages,” he added.

As of Aug. 18, there were 29.6 megawatts of available CUC power. The capacity for CUC generators is 116.2 megawatts, according to CUC’s status report.