THE failure of many landlords to present a business license is delaying the expenditure of funds for the Rental Assistance and Utility Relief Program and the Commonwealth Covid-19 Emergency Rental Assistance, according to a report of the Saipan and Northern Islands Legislative Delegation’s Judiciary and Governmental Operations Committee.
The committee report, which was adopted during the delegation session on Tuesday, stated that the CNMI government has until Dec. 31, 2021 to spend $10.4 million in federal funds for the Covid-19 emergency rental aid. However, the committee said, the expenditure ratio is less than 5%.
The committee, which is chaired by Sen. Edith Deleon Guerrero, said the emergency rental assistance office has reported that Saipan, Tinian and Rota have 1,430 applicants of whom 1,204 are deemed eligible.
The rental assistance office told the committee that besides “landlords not having a business license,” some of the program clients have also failed to submit the required documents. Moreover, some landlords believe that checks are supposed to be issued to tenants.
According to the committee, the rental assistance office “is trying to expend funds by August. However, with the alarming news of multiple businesses that are illegally operating without a license, the issue would be whether paying the funds to these businesses is allowable or will the unused funds have to be returned.”
The landlords illegally operating apartments are not reporting income that the Commonwealth could be collecting, the committee stated.
The committee is requesting the Office of Grants Management & State Clearinghouse for a list of landlords who do not have a business license “for further investigation and deliberation with [the Department of] Finance’s enforcement division and for [a] budgeting hearing.”
However, program administrator Epiphanio Cabrera informed the committee that he was advised by the Office of the Attorney General not to submit the requested list to the committee.
The AG’s office suggested that the committee get the list from the Division of Revenue and Taxation.
The committee, for its part, recommends that the federal grantor, the U.S. Treasury, be informed about the issue of landlords not having a business license, and if they can receive federal funds.
The committee also recommends drawing a contractual agreement with the landlords “to solidify them as a bona fide business dating back to March 2020 while requiring that the landlords pay for the business licenses for that year in addition to potentially unpaid business gross revenue tax that was not collected by the CNMI government.”
