Commonwealth Ports Authority board member Antonio Cabrera reads his prepared statement during a special board meeting on Friday in the Aircraft Rescue and Fire Fighting classroom at Fransisco C. Ada/Saipan International Airport.
COMMONWEALTH Ports Authority board member Antonio B. Cabrera is asking the CPA board’s acting chairman, Ramon A. Tebuteb, to require a probationary term of six months when hiring a new executive director.
Cabrera made this formal request following the CPA board’s decision on Friday to offer former CPA comptroller Derek T. Sasamoto the executive director’s position to be vacated by Christopher Tenorio, whose resignation takes effect on Oct. 20 and is already on leave.
In his letter on Monday, Cabrera told Tebuteb that he had a telephone conversation with the CPA board’s personnel committee chairman, Joseph Diaz, who agreed to provide Cabrera with a copy of the employment contract that the CPA board intends to present to Sasamoto.
Cabrera also said that Diaz assured him that the proposed employment contract had yet to be signed, but Cabrera would like to verify that.
He said Diaz also assured him that “no CPA action would be taken” on the proposed contract until Diaz first meets with Sasamoto to discuss various contractual terms, including compensation.
The CPA board will then convene and vote on whether to approve or reject the proposed contract.
Cabrera said he reminded Diaz of the “utmost fiduciary duties” owed to the CNMI general public by the CPA board members.
Cabrera also reiterated “our mutual recognition and concerns as to the exposure of liability as a board and in our individual capacities as board members for any actual or perceived abrogation or violation of those duties.”
He said these concerns “also give rise to my suggestion and urging, during the Oct. 6, 2023, Friday, CPA special meeting, that any proposed CPA contract, tendered to Mr. Sasamoto or to other candidates, for employment as CPA’s executive director, be subject to and include an express provision and express language establishing a probationary contractual/employment term of at least six months during which the contract may be immediately and unilaterally terminated by CPA’s board members with or without cause, and with CPA board members then permitted to select and hire a new or replacement executive director.”
Cabrera asked Tebuteb for a copy of the contract previously executed by CPA and its outgoing executive director, Christopher S. Tenorio.
