WITH only five days left in fiscal year 2023, the House of Representatives will pass at 10 a.m. today, Monday, Sept. 25, a new version of the fiscal year 2024 budget that includes a 10-hour cut per pay period for government employees.
The House and Senate agreed on a $163.4 million revenue projection of which $114.2 million is available for appropriation.
After a four-day deliberation that started on Sept. 19, a bicameral panel on Friday adopted a report recommending the passage of the conference committee’s substitute version of House Bill 23-66 or the FY 2024 Appropriation Act.
The conferees finally agreed on a provision pertaining to the government’s legal holidays. The Senate wants to “suspend” five of the holidays, but the House disagreed.
After a lengthy discussion, on Friday, the conferees led by Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee Chairman, Donald Manglona and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Ralph N. Yumul, agreed that instead of suspending legal holidays, they would propose a 10-hour instead of an eight-hour work-cut for government employees.
They also agreed to jointly push forward with tax-hike bills “because at this point, there is no other stream of revenue that can address the government’s revenue shortfall….”
These “revenue-generating” measures will include a tobacco tax increase, a sugar-sweetened beverage tax, a container tax, a betel nut tax, and a construction tax.
The conferees said passing most, if not all these tax measures will “address the shortfall in Medicaid and group health and life insurance [payments], and more importantly to prevent further reducing the work hours of our government employees.”
Government employees and retirees comprise the largest voting bloc in the CNMI.
According to the bicameral committee report, the conferees further agreed “that an additional two-hour reduction spread throughout the fiscal year will make adjusting to this additional cut easier on government employees.”
“Therefore, government employees will be paid on holidays because two additional hours will be added to the already existing eight-hour reduction for a combined total of 10 austerity hours per pay period,” the committee report said.
Tinian
As for Tinian, which was another contentious portion of the proposed FY 2024 budget, the conferees agreed to the Senate version that will allot $1.7 million for the Tinian Mayor’s Office but with the following provision:
“$531,277 shall be transferred from the Tinian Municipal Treasury to the Commonwealth government to partially fund the salaries of the 24 employees under the Tinian Mayor’s Office who are not fully funded in this Act, provided that the Tinian Municipal Treasury transfers each month the required two biweekly payments for the 24 employees. The Municipal Treasury shall provide a list of the 24 affected employees.”
The $531,277 is part of the more than $3 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds that then-Gov. Ralph DLG Torres wired to the Tinian Treasury last year.
The House conferees had some concerns with the Tinian budget provision, but “since the funds in question were outside sourced funds…the House conferees accepted the language. In addition, the Secretary of Finance informed the Senate conferees that transferring the funds to the general fund account would be the best approach solution,” the committee report said.
Medicaid
The conferees agreed to the Senate’s version that reduces Medicaid funds by $2.2 million while allowing the local Medicaid agency director to reallocate funds for any expenditure categories including, but not limited, to agency, reimbursement, and Medicaid enterprise systems.
FY 2023 ends on Sept. 30, 2023. Without a new balanced budget enacted into law on Oct. 1, 2023, there will be a partial government shutdown.
