SECRETARY of Finance David DLG Atalig said over $62 million in the third round of economic impact payments was distributed last week.
The CNMI government still has about $20 million left, he added, as he assured the local community that every taxpayer who is qualified for the payments will receive their stimulus one way or another.
“There is no running out of funds,” he said.
Should the CNMI government need to request additional funds, Atalig said the Internal Revenue Service is committed to providing those funds.
As for the CNMI’s EIP3 implementation plan and agreement with the IRS, the Commonwealth government is required to submit names, bank information, and payment amounts in its request to the IRS for an additional drawdown of funds.
“Normally, that process takes about a week to get those funds to us. At the moment we still have around $20 million in the bank for [EIP3],” Atalig said.
The CNMI Department of Finance released a batch of stimulus checks on Friday.
However, there are some issues with taxpayers’ accounts, including bank accounts being frozen or closed, Secretary Atalig noted.
Batches of EIP3 checks, he added, will be available for distribution on a weekly basis.
In the first batch of EIP3 payments distributed on April 12, more than 30,000 taxpayers received payments either through direct deposit or paper checks.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury approved $85 million for the CNMI’s Third Economic Impact Payment implementation plan.
The federal government had decided to do a blanket disbursement of the third round of stimulus payments for all U.S. territories, so although the CNMI had already submitted its implementation plan, it had to wait for the other territories to submit theirs as well, thus causing a delay in the distribution of the first batch of EIP3 payments.
The DOF-Division of Revenue and Taxation processed the first batch of stimulus payments based on the 2019 income tax returns.
Additional batches will then be issued based on the 2020 income tax returns that are submitted and processed by Aug. 15, 2021, 90 days after the filing deadline of May 17, 2021.
If a taxpayer does not receive his or her maximum third round payment in 2021, he or she may be eligible to claim the 2021 Recovery Rebate Credit when he or she files his or her 2021 income tax return in 2022.
For more general information on eligibility and calculation of the third stimulus payment, visit https://www.irs.gov/coronavirus/economic-impact-payments
David DLG Atalig
