THE new chairman of the Marianas Public Land Trust on Wednesday said the new board will follow MPLT’s fiduciary process when making decisions.
In an interview during a break from the board meeting, MPLT Chairman Phillip Mendiola-Long said they will follow the standard fiduciary practice: analyze, formalize, implement and monitor.
As fiduciaries of the local people’s land resources, the MPLT board members must produce returns that “the NMI indigenous people will be thankful for,” he added.
MPLT is responsible for managing the net revenues from the lease proceeds of CNMI public lands.
As of Sept. 2022, MPLT’s total investments amounted to $101.9 million. These are the funds under the care of investment managers and diversified local investments which included loans to the CNMI government ($10.7 million), the Northern Marianas Housing Corp. ($2.3 million), Tinian Shipping ($1.3 million) and the Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. ($525,707).
Mendiola-Long said once they complete an analysis of MPLT’s current portfolio, including its diversified local investment, “there probably will be significant changes.”
Once they get the fiduciary steps out of the way, then they can come up with a decision, he added.
“If you make a decision in haste without going through the analytical fiduciary process, that is what would get you in trouble,” he said. “So, we will make sure that we can tell the public that these trustees will follow the fiduciary process, that we will do the steps of analyzing, formalizing, implementing and monitoring,” Mendiola-Long said.
Marianas Public Land Trust Chairman Phillip Mendiola-Long left, speaks to Raymond James & Associates representative Jason Miyashita, right, as MPLT Vice Chair Dr. Rita A. Sablan, second right, board member Vianney Hocog third right, and Financial Officer Vinney Hocog third left, listen during a meeting on Wednesday last week on Capital Hill.
