From left, Rota Mayor Aubry Hocog, Northern Islands Mayor Val Taisacan, Tinian Mayor Edwin Aldan and Saipan Mayor Ramon “RB” Camacho at the Sunny Side Café on Thursday morning.
SAIPAN Mayor Ramon “RB” Camacho on Thursday said starting at 8 a.m. on Sept. 23, Saturday, at his office, and tentatively at the Sabalu market, he will launch a signature drive for a petition urging Gov. Arnold I. Palacios to remove DPL Secretary Teresita A. Santos from her position.
He is asking members of the public to support the signature drive “because we cannot continue…with this [kind] of problem [that prevents us from obtaining] public benefits from our very own land here in the CNMI.”
Also on Thursday at Sunny Side Café in Garapan, Camacho met with Tinian Mayor Edwin Aldan, Rota Mayor Aubry Hocog, and Northern Islands Mayor Val Taisacan to discuss their concerns regarding DPL and its secretary.
Camacho said he initiated the meeting because the other mayors are also affected by the public benefit issue.
According to Camacho’s petition, the DPL secretary should be removed for “1) Gross ignorance of official duties; 2) Gross carelessness in the discharge of those duties; 3) Unfitness or inability to promptly and properly discharge her official duties because of personal vendetta against certain citizens; 4) intentional and corrupt failure, refusal, neglect to perform duties imposed on the DPL secretary by law; 5) Failure to carry on her duties as DPL secretary and steward of CNMI public lands for the benefit of persons of Northern Marianas Descent; 6) Her recent public position of staunchly advocating for outside business interests over public land resources, which is widely reported in the media, is contrary and substantially detrimental to the best interest of NMDs and a direct betrayal of the official charge of her office.”
Variety was unable to get a comment from the DPL secretary.
According Camacho, Santos was “recently cited by the media, saying that I was asking about property in As Perdido because there’s a grant opportunity…. I know DPL has a surveyor, but she wants me to hire a surveyor. The government is suffering. Where would I get the [money] for a surveyor?”
Camacho added, “She also made a statement that she’s offering the municipality of Saipan [an opportunity] to build a building in Obyan. Look at that. She is giving the people of Saipan [land] to build a municipality office in Obyan.”
“The Isley field in Koblerville, if you go up there — is DPL doing anything about illegal dumping? It’s an eyesore,” Camacho said.
The Marianas Visitors Authority, he added, “is killing themselves promoting us as a destination, and yet we are not doing anything. I think…her removal is warranted because she cannot think outside the box. I understand she is from Rota, I’m not putting Rota people down, but she has to see these things. She is claiming that I’m getting a lot of property, I am not. She gave me a three-year temporary [permit] to clear that area for heavy equipment certification, for the municipality and other government agencies, [so] we can use that property for beginner drivers to practice there instead of [doing it] on the road, but she doesn’t care.”
Definitely
For his part, Tinian Mayor Edwin Aldan said: There are definitely some issues that we need to bring attention to the DPL secretary.”
He said each island “has its own particular issue with DPL, also in communicating with the municipality. That one major issue that we have [is] how do we move forward with public lands. There was a master plan, years back. We need to sit down and look at those designated public lands for commercial purposes. We need to engage in dialogue. I hear Mayor Camacho’s concerns, and I think he has a big concern…. We are a unified [group of] mayors of the CNMI…and you guys see us, we are very active mayors. I hear his concerns [and] we do have issues with DPL,” Aldan reiterated.
Land claims
For Northern Islands Mayor Val Taisacan, his issue with DPL is its failure to address land claims that have been pending since 2000.
“We have 80 homestead lots that have been divided in the Northern Islands. But up to this day, I have not seen anything moving yet. I do support [Camacho’s] petition, not only for us mayors, but also for the people,” he added.
As for Rota Mayor Aubry Hocog, there should be a “balance’ when prioritizing public lands for commercial lease.
“We have land to build facilities, and we find the funding to do that so we would like for DPL to support it. I know the governor is on board to support our initiatives and our plans to really build and expand in Rota. We want to address…deficiencies, and this is something we would like to put on the table and…see how we can rectify this to move Rota forward. For Rota we want to push many, many things, and we need DPL to do that, so we need to somewhat find a compromise to move these things along,” Hocog said.
“For Rota, I have my own experience, with regards to DPL Secretary Santos in securing some public lands for a site. We have [Community Development Block Grant] funding to build a public facility, but we got denied. This public land was going to be saved for a commercial lease…. Governor Palacios…was able to help us and secure funding and I just want to make sure that in things like this we should be more unified because it’s really to help the people. We are not using the public land for our benefit — it’s to promote expansion and build on our island so we can generate and expand our local capacity to stir our local economy,” Hocog said.
Mayor Aldan added, “We push grants, we avail ourselves of grants for the municipality and these grants are conditional…. If you don’t have the conveyance of that property then it would not go through…. The process to get conveyance is very tedious. At the same time there are restrictions for the grants, which you have to use within a certain time period…so if we don’t roll out or we don’t avail ourselves of the grant, the municipality loses out. Most of these projects are pure 100% public use.”
