Simon Sanchez, standing right, speaks with the other Commonwealth Utilities Corp. board members during a meeting Friday. Seated, from left, Rufino Mafnas, Donald Browne, and Allen Perez.
ASKED about Guam and the CNMI’s utility situations, Commonwealth Utilities Corporation board member Simon Sanchez II said, “I see a lot of parallels here, lessons learned in Guam can be used here, and lessons learned in the CNMI can be used there.”
“I see a lot of common challenges where Guam was, where Guam has moved, and Guam still has plenty of challenges especially with the recent Typhoon Mawar, but I see solutions in Guam that can work here,” Sanchez added.
According to Sanchez, whose nomination to the CUC board was confirmed by the Senate in May, solar energy has potential in the CNMI.
He also said that the CNMI will “always need…a generator and so we have to think about getting the most efficient generator here and figure out how to pay for all of that. Ultimately the rate payers are both owners as well as customers [of] CUC. Sometimes the customers aren’t as happy to pay what they need to pay, but…as the owners of the utility [they] have also seen the price of degraded services when we don’t invest money wisely, and so we really have to strike that balance both as owners of this utility and as customers.”
Sanchez, a Palacios-Apatang appointee, attended his first CUC board meeting on Friday with CUC Chairwoman Janice Tenorio, and members Rufino Mafnas, Allen Perez, Donald Browne, and Frank Lee Borja.
“There’s a lot of work to be done,” Sanchez said. But “I like the [CUC] board — they seemed very committed. We just have to roll up our sleeves and get to work. It won’t happen overnight. Guam still has many challenges. [Its] Consolidated Commission on Utilities has been around 20 plus years, and there’s still plenty work to be done. But we can move in better directions, and I think we can improve the situation for power, water, and protecting our ocean from the waste we create,” he added.
Sanchez is in his sixth term as an elected member of CCU, a non-partisan body that oversees the operations of Guam Power Authority and Guam Waterworks Authority.
A former Guam senator, and a businessman, Sanchez has a B.A. in history from Stanford University, and a master’s degree in urban planning from Harvard.
Under CNMI law, one member of the CUC board should be from off-island with utility management experience.
“I’m honored to be given a chance by Governor Palacios, and I look forward to working with the other directors, trying to make things better,” Sanchez said. “I’ve known Governor Palacios since high school. He asked me to help, and that’s how we are built on all the islands — we try to help each other out. The CNMI helps Guam, Guam helps the CNMI. We are really brothers and sisters way out here. When one of us reaches out to the other, we help, and that is what we try to do…. I look forward in sharing information and continuing to support each other as we have done for centuries,” Sanchez added.
