Saipan Independent Rep. Stanley T. Torres will introduce House Bill 17-65, or the Fiscal Responsibility Reduction Act of 2010, on Friday when the Senate version of H.B. 17-45 is expected to be rejected by the House.
The Senate version eliminated the one-hour daily work reduction proposed by the original version and replaced it with three unpaid holidays and tax hikes on alcohol, cigarettes, among other things.
The first austerity bill, H.B. 17-22, which calls for a forced shutdown of government offices every other Friday and the nonpayment of legal holidays in fiscal year 2010, was earlier rejected by the House.
The chairman of the House Ways & Means Committee, Rep. Ramon Basa, Covenant-Saipan, sponsored both H.B. 17-22 and H.B. 17-45.
He said he was not going to reintroduce an austerity measure if the Senate rejected his bill.
Torres, who is aligned with the ruling Covenant Party, then sponsored the new austerity bill.
“In the darkness of the commonwealth’s present financial calamity where ever dwindling resources can no longer address our present needs, the Legislature finds that the CNMI government must immediately implement cost reductions, or else many government employees will definitely lose their jobs, including many parents of students of the Public School System,” according to the findings of H.B. 17-65.
“However, because reasonable access to essential government operations is still vital, this measure aims to minimize any adverse impact on the government’s ability to provide services by maintaining daily, but shortened government operations,” it added.
Torres said his bill proposes to reduce by 10 hours per pay period the work load of public sector employees which equate to a 12.5 percent reduction on their take home pay.
“The resulting 70-hour pay period shall be comprised of work days limited to seven paid working hours, from Monday through Friday. Provided that this cost-cutting measure is implemented, the Legislature shall permit all statutory paid holidays,” he said.
The measure covers both civil and excepted service employees, with no exemption.
Those who are receiving constitutionally protected salaries — the governor, the lt. governor, lawmakers, justices and judges — are “encouraged” to voluntarily waive 12.5 percent of their salaries.
The bill also seeks to prohibit new hiring and a travel ban on government employees except for the governor, the lt. governor, members of the Legislature, judicial proceeding-related travels and official travel paid by the federal government.
A sunset clause was inserted in the bill allowing the mandates of H.B. 17-65 to stay in effect for one additional pay period, if necessary, after expiring on Sept. 30, 2010, the end of fiscal year 2010.
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