During yesterday’s House session, there was a lengthy deliberation on Senate Legislative Initiative 16-10 which seeks to amend Article 10 of the CNMI Constitution to require the reduction of government employment and authorize the government to issue a pension obligation bond.
But the vote was stalled after some lawmakers raised legal questions, prompting Speaker Arnold I. Palacios, R-Saipan, to defer action until tomorrow.
Rep. Diego T. Benavente, R-Saipan, said a legislative initiative should have only one subject.
House Floor Leader Joseph N. Camacho, R-Saipan, agreed.
“It’s asking two things. One is to reduce the government employment and borrow [money]. Here you are asking two different questions and you’re linking them together,” he said.
House legal counsel Joe Taijeron said although “a proposed amendment may not embrace the subject matter of more than one article of the Constitution…this is germane and within the umbrella of Article 10.”
Nevertheless, the speaker asked that the legislative initiative be thoroughly studied before the House votes on it.
Rep. Heinz S. Hofschneider, R-Saipan, who introduced a similar proposal, asked that his proposal be consolidated with the Senate version.
“It is important to take up this issue. I have sort of an ambivalent feeling because I authored this legislation to borrow roughly $200 million to pay for three administrations, 12 years and six Legislatures equally responsible for this situation,” Hofschneider said.
“Ambivalent in the sense that I see my kids getting into the workforce of the commonwealth as well as thousands of kids coming of age finding this $200 million to be part of their lives, working toward making payments, for the $200 million to be borrowed so that we can live up to the people who subscribed to be part of the retirement system,” he added.
The proposed $200 million pension obligation bond will be paid in 30 years.
Hofschneider said the bond is a very serious undertaking and the public should be educated why the cash-strapped government is doing it.
The Superior Court ruled recently that the CNMI government owed the Fund $231 million.
Vice Speaker Joseph P. Deleon Guerrero, R-Saipan, for his part, said the government workforce reduction and bond proposals should be separate, because people may fear for their jobs and reject the pension obligation bond proposal.
