GOVERNOR Ralph DLG Torres on Friday issued Executive Order No. 2021-13 to renew the Finance secretary’s authority to reprogram or transfer funds from any department, agency, office, board, commission, corporation, instrumentality or other entity of any branch of government to meet the Covid-19 threat.
The governor states that as of June 17, 2021, more than 177 million cases of Covid-19 had been reported worldwide resulting in more than 3.83 million deaths.
He said vaccines and treatments are available, but measures such as quarantine, isolation and containment “are still important in the fight against Covid-19. Action is necessary to protect the health and safety of the people of the CNMI.”
Because the pandemic has brought CNMI’s tourism industry to a standstill, it had depressed economic activity and drastically reduced tax revenue, which jeopardizes the government’s ability to meet the Covid-19 threat, the governor said.
Renewing the Finance secretary’s authority to access, reprogram or transfer funds, the executive order said, “is a reasonably necessary response” in order to ensure that the government is able to meet the Covid-19 threat.
Under the extended executive order, all powers, duties and responsibilities embodied in that executive order are “hereby renewed and shall thus continue for an additional 30 days.” This renewal takes effect immediately and will remain in effect for 30 days from the effective date of the executive order, which was on June 18, 2021.
All memoranda, directives, waivers of regulations, and other measures taken in accordance with original Executive Order 2020-05 shall remain in effect for 30 days from the date of the new executive order.
The governor issued the original EO 2020-05 on March 18, 2020.
When it was renewed in April 2021, Speaker Edmund Villagomez referred the executive order to the Ways and Means Committee and requested that its chairman, Rep. Donald Manglona, look into it “seriously.”
