“We’re determined to pass the budget and we’ve requested the [Office of Management and Budget] to give us the latest information about our finances. The easy part is where to spend it. Finding revenues is another issue” said Rep. Ramon S. Basa, Covenant-Saipan, in an interview with the Variety.
Basa is a graduate of economics from the University of Oregon and has a master’s in business administration.
One of the 13 freshmen lawmakers in the House, Basa said he’s still studying the figures given by the Fitial administration and holding talks with the heads of different government agencies to familiarize himself with their budget needs.
He said Speaker Froilan C. Tenorio, Covenant-Saipan, is bent on passing a budget to comply with the mandates of the CNMI Constitution that requires a yearly appropriation for the government, or it shuts down.
In a report to the Legislature, Gov. Benigno R. Fitial said the government incurred a deficit of $16,868,797 in FY 2009.
Of the figure, the governor said $346,554 was due to less revenue collections and the rest of the more than $16 million deficit were due to excess expenditures.
The excess expenditures included $8.5 million in personnel cost; $5.1 million in all others or operations cost; and $2.9 million in utilities.
The governor said the government could have balanced its budget for FY 2009 if austerity holidays were implemented every week. This means public offices should have been shut down every Friday to reduce government pay by 16 hours every payroll.
Because of the tough times, the administration said it is willing to settle for an eight-hour work reduction per payroll or austerity Friday every other week which is the equivalent of a 10 percent pay cut.
