By Mar-Vic Cagurangan
Variety News Staff

THE administration continues to reduce government staff and cut salaries as planned, the governor’s office said yesterday.
“In keeping with our commitment, we’re continuing the process of making reductions and we will know what other actions we need to take once Bill 74 reaches the governor’s desk,” a spokesman for the governor’s office said.
The governor’s office issued the statement in response to Sen. Rory Respicio, D-Agana Heights, who wrote a letter to Gov. Felix P. Camacho asking that his office be furnished with details on salary cuts.
Respicio said he wrote the letter to “find out if the governor is sticking to his plan.”
The governor’s office had yet to provide details on furloughs and the salary reduction process as of press time.
The Legislature, meanwhile, resumed deliberations yesterday on Bill 74, the administration’s revised budget plan, with health officials testifying on the impact of the governor’s proposed funding cuts.
Last month, the governor disclosed his plan to cut government costs by $49 million through the furlough of 2,222 employees no later than April 1 and to cut his and Cabinet officials’ pay by up to 20 percent.
Camacho has also ordered all the remaining unclassified employees in the line agencies under general funding to receive a 10 percent cut in pay. The pay cuts which, according to the administration, took effect immediately, were expected to realize $1 million in savings.
Respicio asked the governor to provide his office with a list of all the elected and unclassified individuals who have received these salary cuts and copies of the personnel actions for each.
At the same time, Respicio asked Vice Speaker Eddie Calvo, R-Maite, to share copies of the revenue tracking records submitted by the finance committee’s Office of Finance and Budget.
Respicio said he was surprised that the Office of Finance and Budget began conducting its own track revenues. “This is in contrast with past years when OFB merely adopted the Camacho administration’s highly questionable revenue projections without providing any checks and balances,” he told Calvo.
The Democratic senator also noted the discrepancies among the revenue tracking levels produced by different entities.
Calvo’s committee projected a revenue of $450 million, which is “significantly higher than the $434 million that the administration has identified in their current tacking and the $432 million that my office abacus has been tracking,” Respicio said.
“As discussions on revising the budget continue, I think it would be advantageous for all senators and for the administration, as well as your committee, to release copies of the OFB’s worksheets and revenue projections so that we can make comparisons and draw our individual conclusions,” Respicio stated in his letter to Calvo.