TINIAN senators say they appreciate House Committee on Ways and Means Chairman Stanley T. Torres’ statement that the commonwealth should help jump-start the island’s economy.
Sens. David M. Cing, D-Tinian, and Jose M. Dela Cruz, D-Tinian, said that they were delighted to hear a Saipan lawmaker fully supporting Tinian.
“(It) was very comforting to the people of Tinian to know that…a Saipan representative who, incidentally is also the chairman of the House Committee on Ways and Means, express a desire to see more…progress…on Tinian and Aguiguan,” Cing said yesterday.
Dela Cruz, in an interview Friday, observed that the Saipan-dominated House “is now more sympathetic to the needs of (the smaller) islands.”
“Hearing Chairman Torres say that Tinian needs a bigger budget is a most welcome statement. You can rarely hear that in the past. The House is now more sensitive to our needs. So I see light at the end of the tunnel even after the recent fiasco in the Senate. I believe in the leadership of the House and I hope this will be the start of a genuine cooperation among the three islands,” said Dela Cruz.
Cing said Tinian’s success can only be achieved if the CNMI government will work “closely with Tinian’s leadership in finding new sources of funding and proper allocation.”
Torres, R-Saipan, earlier said that the CNMI government has an obligation to help Tinian with increased financial assistance especially with the island’s significant role in establishing the Covenant with the United States and its leasing of two-thirds of its land to the federal government.
Several years ago, Torres asked the federal court to rule that the current composition of the CNMI Senate violated the one-man one-vote principle. Based on the islands’ populations, Rota and Tinian should “share” one Senate seat, while Saipan should have eight, he said.
