ENVIRONMENTAL assessment has delayed the implementation of the Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery program, said Northern Marianas Housing Corporation Corporate Director Jesse S. Palacios.
“Under federal regulations, federally subsidized projects require environmental assessment,” Palacios added.
“We have to make an environmental assessment on the property,” he said. “Even if you have this…property, before we spend a single penny on that property, we have to assess the property first.”
“That’s why some realtors are a bit frustrated that we cannot act quickly. But our hands are tied because without environmental assessment, we cannot move,” he added.
Palacios said realtors “also gave us their price for a property, but we cannot just follow their price — we have to have the property apprised, and there are a lot of other steps that we have to take.”
In November 2020, the CNMI received $244 million for the CDBG-DR program to address unmet recovery following Typhoon Mangkhut and Super Typhoon Yutu.
NMHC has stated that a total of 391 loan packages have been approved, of which 341 are on Saipan, 32 on Tinian, and 18 on Rota.
For the program’s implementation, NMHC has allocated close to $150 million to housing, about $105 million to infrastructure, $8.6 million to economic development, and about $15 million to planning and administrative costs.
The first home to be built through the CDBG-DR program was in As Lito in March 2022.
“Currently we have a dozen in the process, but not yet completed,” Palacios said when asked about the status of approved applicants.
“Again, the delay is the environmental assessment. The permitting agency, for example, the Historical Preservation Office, they require a certified archaeologist to submit required documentation.”
But Palacios said NMHC is “hiring our own in-house archaeologist to speed up the process.”
Jesse Palacios
