TWENTY employees of the Rota Municipal Council have not been paid since Jan. 14, Council Vice Chairman Jeff Manglona told Variety yesterday.
These employees include administrative officers, technical coordinators and research coordinators.
Members of the Rota legislative delegation, the Rota Municipal Council and Rota Mayor Benjamin T. Manglona met with Attorney General Robert T. Torres, Personnel Director Juan I. Tenorio and officials from the Department of Finance and the Office of Management and Budget yesterday morning to discuss the salaries of the council employees.
During the closed door meeting, the group “agreed to address the situation,” according to Senate President Paul A. Manglona, R-Rota. and Rep. Danny O. Quitugua, the Republican chairman of the Rota legislative delegation.
Tenorio said his office was “trying to resolve” the issue.
The Senate president said the problem was the result of the conversion process of the exempted service job status into civil service positions.
“The question now is what happened to those converted municipal employees and to those who did not sign the conversion?” the Senate president said.
He said they would “revisit” Public Law 13-1, which attempted to address the problem.
He said they also wanted to know to what extent the Rota Municipal Council can hire its own employees.
“No matter how you look at it, the government is going to be liable, because the employees have been working for months and have not been paid,” the Senate president said.
Quitugua said they were “jointly working” with all the parties concerned to immediately address the issues.
