SAIPAN Mayor Juan B. Tudela yesterday admitted he has relatives on his payroll, saying everyone in the government is doing it anyway.
Tudela said as mayor he can hire his own staff.
“I have relatives working for my office but that’s none of those (critics’) business. This office is a political office and nobody can stop me,” Tudela said in an interview.
Asked how many of his relatives are working for him, Tudela said: “Just a few.”
Well-placed sources said among these relatives are the mayor’s daughter and nephew-in-law.
Asked if he finds it appropriate to hire his relatives, Tudela said: “Most government officials hire their relatives. So what’s wrong with that? Do you mean that the (previous mayors) never hired their relatives?”
The Mayor’s Office has 61 employees that include heavy equipment mechanics, community workers and a “supply specialist.”
Records obtained from the Office of Personnel Management showed that all of the 61 employees were hired in January, or shortly after Tudela was sworn in.
According to OPM data, Tudela is paid $43,199 a year. His lowest paid employee, a maintenance worker, gets almost $12,000 a year.
Community workers and machine operators are paid between $14,000 and about $18,000 a year.
Like all other government agencies, the Mayor’s Office spends more on personnel than on programs.
For fiscal year 2001, $1.87 million of the office’s $2.1 million appropriation was for personnel. Under fiscal year 2002, the figure for personnel was increased to $1.91 million. According to OPM records, the Mayor’s Office is spending $1.25 million a year for its 62 personnel, including Tudela.
