The V.I. Legislature approved a heavily amended version of a Government House omnibus bill Thursday, deleting a series of appropriations to pay outstanding government bills and adding half a million dollars in new appropriations for senators’ pet projects.
The bill, proposed by Sen. Shawn-Michael Malone at Gov. John deJongh Jr.’s request, was described as a mix of technical amendments to provide more accurate descriptions of the scope of some of the work funded from the Tourism Advertising Revolving Fund, along with increased funding for several existing obligations.
As written, the bill would have increased funding from the Health Revolving Fund to the Department of Health – providing for the publication of delinquent taxpayers and adding funding for road repairs from the motor vehicle rental surcharge, among a wide array of adjustments to past appropriations.
It identified several million dollars in unanticipated funding, resulting from some large planned expenses not being as large as anticipated. The cost of ending emergency government salary reductions of 8 percent came in $4.5 million less than initially projected, and $6 million in funding for litigation over the closure of Hovensa was reduced to $4.9 million, freeing up another $1.1 million.
Malone said senators met behind closed doors Wednesday and worked out a series of amendments to the bill, introducing an amendment in the nature of a substitute, sponsored by 11 of the 15 senators.
That new version of the bill cut the Hovensa litigation funding to $1.5 million. Malone said Government House had told the senators it only needed $2.5 million of that $4.9 million, so they cut it to $1.5 million in the belief that Government House should not need it in light of the government’s agreement with Hovensa.
It also cuts $250,000 in funding for a new anti-gun violence program that proponents say has had a great deal of success reducing gun deaths in other jurisdictions and $600,000 in additional funding for system software for the government’s Enterprise Resource Planning internal financial accounting system. And it cut a cumulative half-million dollars or so from an array of consulting contracts, programs and printing purchases.
Senators also deleted $2 million in new funding for “critical vacancies,” and $400,000 in funding for a track at St. Croix Central High. And they cut roughly half a million dollars in funding for existing consultant contracts, printing expenses and the like.
Some of the cuts “will most likely” be looked at again in the Finance Committee and possibly reinstated in the next session, May 8, according to the Finance Committee chairman, Sen. Clifford Graham, who spoke after the hearing. He and Malone both said the Legislature is looking for revenues to help fill this year’s $40 million-plus budget deficit and some of today’s cuts would probably be applied to that.
Senators also added a $200,000 appropriation, proposed by Sen. Nereida “Nellie” Rivera-O’Reilly, to go toward the construction of a community center in Calquohoun on St. Croix; and a $300,000 appropriation, proposed by Sens. Alicia “Chucky” Hansen and Sammuel Sanes as a gift to the private social organization The American Legion for its Enrique Nieves Post 102, to go towards helping that veterans’ social fraternity build a private club for its private social activities.
Hansen said the $300,000 expense was not a new expense because it was “reprogrammed from projects on the shelf so it is not new money.” She added, “It is all about reprogramming so I don’t want to hear we have a deficit. It is not like that.”
Because money is fungible, a new expense, such as this new gift of public tax dollars to a private organization, remains a new expense, regardless of how it is categorized, however.
Later, Graham said the senators cut the gun violence program because they did not have much information on it when they marked up the bill and it “most likely” would be considered again at the next session in May.
The amendments and the bill as amended were approved unanimously.
