Torres: Priorities are deficit, employees, 100% pension for retirees

Gov. Ralph DLG Torres said on Friday with the $515 million allocated to the CNMI under the American Rescue Plan Act, some of the priorities are to take care of the government’s deficit, no more furloughed employees, pay retirees 100% of their pension benefits, and have a universal garbage collection and special projects for the three islands.

Speaking at a radio news briefing, Torres said on priorities for the discretionary funds under ARPA, they definitely want to address the deficit and make sure that funds being spent are done accordingly.

“We want to make sure that we are able to cover and pay as much as we can in our deficit,” he pointed out.

Torres disclosed that he recently met with House Speaker Edmund S. Villagomez (Ind-Saipan) and Senate President Jude U. Hofschneider (R-Tinian), and then also last Thursday with the Governor’s Economic Council advisers, to give a layout on the four categories that they need to spend the money.

“’We want to be sure that it falls within those categories and we’ll be sending our expenditure plan when it’s ready,” Torres said.

He said they are waiting for the guidelines from the U.S. Treasury as well.

The governor said first and foremost, they want to make sure that they have plans for the tourism market, work with the Marianas Visitors Authority, and also, through the Governor’s Economic Council Advisors.

He said they are also looking into universal garbage collection.

Torres said they want to continue to maintain payment of the 25% pension benefits to the retirees, making their pension 100%.

He assured that the employees are back at full hours and there will be no more furloughs.

The governor said with the ARPA funding, this will also give the municipalities the opportunity to get their priorities and work on that.

He said they send some infrastructure requests to the mayors.

“There’s a lot of moving factors into the expenditure plan,” Torres said.

He shared that they will be working with the mayors to work on special projects.

The governor said for example, they would like to give some funding to Rota to promote farming as they have excellent farming opportunities.

He said he talked with the Rota mayor regarding that project.

For Tinian, Torres said he spoke with the island’s mayor and leadership on embracing and expanding the cattle ranch.

For Saipan and the Northern Islands, the governor said, the focus is on fishing.

“So, in this way, they will give each island to showcase, you know, the love of our land and our waters. And I hope this will also give opportunity for the youth to have something within their islands—opportunity,” Torres said.

The governor said those are some of the projects that they’re looking at but that at the end of the day, they want to pay the deficit, protect government employees, and make sure that the retirees continue to get their 100% pension benefits.

“I can’t emphasize how critical our retirees for us to protect them. Even now, the whole last year, we had no tourism and yet, the administration was able to continue to give our retirees the 25% additional from the government, making their pension at 100%,” he added.