THE Senate on Thursday passed Sen. Victor B. Hocog’s Senate Bill 22-09, which proposes to remove the Commonwealth Casino Commission’s regulatory power over the hotel and other non-gaming operations of Imperial Pacific International.
The measure was placed on bill calendar for action immediately after Hocog introduced it. Minority bloc Sens. Paul A. Manglona Edith Deleon Guerrero strongly opposed the motion to rush the bill’s passage, saying it requires proper deliberation in a committee, and comments from the public.
By a vote of 6 to 2 with one abstention, S.B. 22-09 passed the Senate on first and final reading.
Manglona and Deleon Guerrero voted no, while Sen. Teresita Santos abstained.
The bill, which IPI supports, now goes to the House of Representatives.
According to S.B. 22-09, it will “clarify that the Commonwealth Casino Commission shall regulate the gaming facilities and activities of the exclusive casino license not the hotel facilities and other non-gaming activities of the exclusive casino license.”
It added that the commission shall “not regulate the areas of a resort complex or other facility exclusively devoted to other activities, such as hotel, a golf course, etc., in which no game is conducted or played and no wagering occurs.”
In his Feb. 9 letter to Senate President Jude U. Hofschneider and Speaker Edmund Villagomez, IPI Chief Executive Officer Ray N. Yumul said, “IPI respectfully asks the Legislature to pass legislation to allow it to separate the casino from the hotel.”
A former senator and chief of staff of Hocog, Yumul said such legislation if enacted into law, “will allow IPI to focus on gaming and for the CCC to focus on regulating.”
“There are agencies in place that are more apt in monitoring and regulating the non-gaming facilities of IPI,” Yumul added. “IPI believes that a more realistic timeline for completion of the hotel is necessary and is in the best interests of the CNMI and IPI so as not to place undue pressure on the company to hastily complete the hotel while attempting to recover from the severe economic downturn.”
Yumul said if the bill is passed and becomes law, IPI would be in a better position to seek additional investors that can help complete the hotel construction.
Yumul also told the lawmakers that IPI will not be able to meet the Feb. 28 deadline for the completion of the IPI hotel tower in Garapan.
He is also asking the legislators’ assistance in amending the casino license agreement to extend the construction deadline to Feb. 28, 2026.
‘IPI should pay workers’
On Facebook, House Gaming Committee Chairman Edwin Propst posted the following statement:
“We are being told that IPI is willing to pay $6 million toward the $15 million it owes in its monopoly licensing fee if we legislators support a bill that will sever or separate the casino from its hotel room obligations.”
Propst said IPI “is in no position to be pulling strings again and calling the shots.”
“Those days are over,” he added. “None of us in the Leadership can be bought, bribed, or bullied.”
“The truth of the matter is, if IPI has $6 million to spare, it should use that to pay its workers what they are owed, pay its vendors, and STOP trying to buy up all the real estate on our island. How much property have they bought thus far? Did they come here to build a casino or to buy up property? Where are their priorities?”
He said the Turkish workers who left the CNMI “with a tiny fraction of what they were owed got another kick in the gut from IPI.”
“As the Turkish workers were about to depart Saipan on a four-day trip back to Turkey,” Propst said, “they were given $250 in cash for travel money if, and only if, they would sign a document relinquishing IPI from all future financial obligations, and that included the money they are owed. How despicable and dirty.”
Propst said, “IPI knows full well [that the workers] were under duress and desperate for travel money. IPI knows they can barely speak English, let alone read a legal document, without a translator or attorney present. This, in essence, was extortion. Either you sign this document or you don’t get $250 of travel money. Was IPI obligated to give them $250? Perhaps not. But it would have been a kind gesture from a company that treated these and other workers like cattle.”
Propst said, “As Chairman of Gaming, I have informed [Commonwealth Casino Commission] Chairman Andrew Yeom and the United States Department of Labor about this document, and will be calling for another committee meeting to discuss this and other pressing matters. I also want to get to the truth about IPI, even if we have to move to executive session. What is IPI’s cash flow right now? Can it finish their Initial Gaming Facility? Whatever happened to [the Development Plan Advisory Committee or] DPAC? Where is the report from DPAC, and can we see that report? Many questions that will all be answered soon. And no, I am not anti-IPI or anti-casino. I am anti-corruption. Know the difference.”
