SECRETARY of Finance David DLG Atalig said the administration will submit a revised fiscal year 2022 government budget proposal to the Legislature by July 1, 2021.
He said they are looking at current revenues and analyzing the impact of the over $480 million American Rescue Plan Act funds that have already been remitted to the CNMI.
“We are going to submit the revised budget based on reporting what we’re doing with the ARPA [funding] and how it’s subsidizing the government’s operations,” he said.
In April, Gov. Ralph DLG Torres submitted a proposed budget that identifies $144 million in projected revenues of which over $98 million was left for appropriation after deducting debt-service payments and the government’s obligations to the NMI Settlement Fund.
The overall revenue collections in the second quarter of fiscal year 2021 was roughly $21.5 million, nearly 3% more than the projected amount of approximately $21 million.
Atalig said the Northern Marianas Territorial Income Tax collections amounted to nearly $9.5 million, which he attributed to taxes received from PUA and Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation funds.
Wage and salary tax collections amounted to more than $4.4 million, which is more than a quarter less than the projected amount of over $6 million.
Corporate income tax collections came out to roughly $287,000 which is way less than the projected amount of approximately $613,000.
Business Gross Revenue Tax collections totaled more than $10.8 million, or about 20% less than the projected amount.
As for the excise tax collections, they totaled $6,079,375 or 27.36% less than the projected budget.
Atalig said actual expenditures had exceeded the appropriated budget mainly because of the Department of Public Safety’s response to the Covid-19 emergency.
DPS ended up spending $2.8 million, which is more than twice its $1.2 million funding allotment for the second quarter.
As for the 25% retiree pension benefits, which amount to $2.8 million in the second quarter, Atalig said they will be covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Community Disaster Loan for the rest of FY 2011.
The Government Health and Life Insurance employer and retiree share totaled $2.3 million, which exceeded the appropriated amount by 170%.
With funding from the American Rescue Plan Act, the CNMI government can recall furloughed employees and restore the government employees’ 80-hour work schedule, Atalig said.
Effective this July, moreover, qualified families are expected to start receiving advanced child tax credit payments.
Gov. Ralph DLG Torres said he will exercise his authority over the payments so that qualifying families can receive $300 a month per child for children ages 0-5 and $250 a month per child for children ages 6-17 as early as this summer and until the end of the year.
“We are exercising our authority to go ahead and process advanced child tax credit monthly payments starting in July,” the governor said, adding that they are working hard on getting all the processes in place.
The governor said his administration will also share with lawmakers priorities and spending plan for the ARPA funds.
“We want to work with the Legislature and share what our priorities are and hear what some of the legislators’ concerns are on how they want us to prioritize these funds. We need to work together to benefit our Commonwealth,” he said.
Secretary Atalig said the CNMI received its full allocation of the ARPA funds on May 17.
He said the process of receiving the funds started before they were even available, adding that his team worked extremely hard to get everything set up and prepared prior to the May 10 deadline for the U.S. Treasury guidelines.
“We had everything prepared, and we were ready to go as soon as we received the guidelines,” he added.
David DLG Atalig
