May 29, 2003 – A day before the federal building on St. Thomas was to be named in his honor, former V.I. Delegate Ron de Lugo pondered the process that brought him — and the building — to this juncture.
"Our delegate introduced legislation and got it though the House, through the Senate," he said, referring to Donna M. Christensen, who now holds the seat in Congress that was his for so many years. She found support among "many, many of my friends whom I had the honor of serving with during my 20 years in the House of Representatives," he added.
"It passed the House and the Senate to President Bush. President Bush signed it into law, and that's how you get a federal building named after you," he said.
But as de Lugo reminisced about his 40 years of public service in elected office — first locally, then in Washington — he admitted the route had been much longer than that. When he first went to the nation's capital in 1969, his title was "representative to Congress." He had no congressional office, and his duties were more like those of a lobbyist than a lawmaker. Folks back home thought that once he went to Washington, they'd never see de Lugo again.
"Part of the plan was just to get me out of the territory, get me out of politics, eventually, because they figured, 'Out of sight, out of mind,' and 'You're not going to get home enough,'" he recounted.
"Well, I did get home. I came home on a regular basis. I served two terms as Washington representative; then I was able to get legislation passed by the House of Representatives giving a seat in the Congress to the people of the Virgin Islands. So I ran for that, and I was elected to it in 1972 and seated in January 1973," he said.
Re-elected regularly every two years, except in 1978 when he chose instead to run — unsuccessfully — for governor, de Lugo spent much of the next two decades winning friends and allies among Washington Democrats, of which he was one, and among Republicans, too. Eventually he parlayed his seniority and the goodwill of his colleagues into an appointment on the House Subcommittee on Interior and Insular Affairs.
"In that position I had tremendous power because we controlled the Congress," he said. "I was on very good terms with the Speaker and with the Majority Leader and key chairmen. I was in a unique position."
As a newcomer to Washington, de Lugo said, he understood well that he came to the position with no political clout. His goal was to get some. "I understood how to fight for it," he said. "I understood how to stand up and take on the Interior Department, for instance, or other federal agencies when it was necessary. I didn't go and take them on just to have a fight but I certainly took them on when I felt the interest of the territories was not being served."
Nine years after retiring from public life, he says the demands of the office of delegate remain challenging — which he adds is how it ought to be when politicians are working toward any worthwhile goal. His original objective as delegate, to wield power on behalf of the folks back home, is no different for the person in that position today, he said.
In fact, he said, Christensen, now in her fourth term as delegate, "has a serious handicap in that the Congress as it is constituted at the present time is not — nor is the administration, in my judgment — giving the kind of attention to the territories that we demanded back then and got because the situation was different. It is a different time. It's much tougher to do anything for the territories," he said.
For a list of his accomplishments as delegate, see "Federal building to be named for de Lugo"."

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May 29, 2003 – Another economic blow to the territory, and primarily to St. Croix, came about this week with word that U.S. Airways intends to pull almost all of its flights to that island and cut many to St. Thomas at summer's end.
The airline will end its "wrap service" to the territory on Sept. 5, a spokeswoman said, which means that daily flights from Philadelphia to St. Thomas and St. Croix will cease. U.S. Airways spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said planes currently fly six days a week from Pennsylvania to St. Thomas and on to St. Croix before returning to Philadelphia.
With the change, flights to St. Thomas from Philadelphia will be only on Saturday until Oct. 26, when the tourist season begins to resume, Kudwa said. She said the Saturday flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to St. Croix would continue, as will a daily round-trip flight from Charlotte to St. Thomas. "We will maintain those flights throughout the off-peak season and into the fall," she said.
The cause of the pullout is multifaceted, Kudwa said, pointing to economic problems being faced by other airlines as well. "We're not operating in a vacuum. There are lots of difficulties in the airline industry," she said, and the level of service USAir now provides is "no longer economically viable."
She said the cutback also can be attributed in part to "typical seasonal" schedule adjustments.
Some members of the local business community have pointed to the Port Authority's decision to raise airport landing and passenger fees by 25 percent last February as the impetus for an apparent airline exodus on St. Croix. In the wake of the VIPA fee hikes, American Eagle announced it was stopping commuter service between St. Thomas and St. Croix, and American Airlines announced it was discontinuing ground operations at both airports.
"I think we'll lose further flights," Frank Fox, St. Croix Chamber of Commerce president, said on Thursday. "What we've got here is proof positive that you can't raise taxes and raise taxes and raise taxes and get more money. The increase in landing fees means less money for the Port Authority, more flights lost and more passengers lost."
Fox added, though, that U.S. Airways' move probably is not based solely on the fee increases. "Everything is cumulative," he said, pointing to the entire airline industry's financial woes. But he added of the fees, "that is something we can control — how much it costs for someone to come and park a plane here."
He also said a lack of passenger demand for St. Croix is probably part of the reason for the bad news. Kudwa would not comment on that issue. "I'm not going to elaborate on that," she said. "It's proprietary information, and we don't break that out market by market." She also would not comment on how much money U.S. Airways stands to save by reducing its service in the territory.
The company has not made any announcement about its employees on St. Croix, she said, but personnel will continue to maintain service at the airport counter.
Chamber vice president and business owner Ed Buckley concurred that low passenger demand for St. Croix is a big problem, noting that fares to the territory are not prohibitively high compared to flights within the United States.
He said island hoteliers are reporting occupancy rates averaging 50 percent for last tourist season. "When the average in other parts of the Caribbean are 75 percent, I find it unbelievable," he said, "especially since we're a U.S. territory and this was during a wartime situation."
Buckley, who owns St. Croix Ultimate Bluewater Adventures, said much of his scuba-diving business promotions are in the northeastern United States, where there's easy access to U.S. Airways' flights. The cutback in service "is certainly going to hurt," he said.
Buckley served on the selection committee that hired a consultant to explore ways to increase airlift to the territory. The University of the Virgin Islands commissioned the $75,000 study, which was funded by an appropriation of the 24th Legislature. The consultant's draft proposal was unveiled on Thursday at UVI on St. Croix after having been presented Tuesday on the St. Thomas campus.
The plan provides a timeline for improving the airline situation in the territory, historical data about the industry and comments about the current state of the industry, Buckley said.
Meanwhile, a proposal on the drawing board that would put an airline hub on St. Croix is moving ahead again after being slowed by investor reluctance to commit funds during tax season and the war in Iraq, according to Bruce Morgan Casner, Sun Airways chair.
"We continue to be aggressively involved in putting a finance package together," Casner said. He said the increase in landing fees would not have "an appreciable effect on Sun Airways and its investors. It would simply be a part of our overhead."

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May 29, 2003 – Another economic blow to the territory, and primarily to St. Croix, came about this week with word that U.S. Airways intends to pull almost all of its flights to that island and cut many to St. Thomas at summer's end.
The airline will end its "wrap service" to the territory on Sept. 5, a spokeswoman said, which means that daily flights from Philadelphia to St. Thomas and St. Croix will cease. U.S. Airways spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said planes currently fly six days a week from Pennsylvania to St. Thomas and on to St. Croix before returning to Philadelphia.
With the change, flights to St. Thomas from Philadelphia will be only on Saturday until Oct. 26, when the tourist season begins to resume, Kudwa said. She said the Saturday flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to St. Croix would continue, as will a daily round-trip flight from Charlotte to St. Thomas. "We will maintain those flights throughout the off-peak season and into the fall," she said.
The cause of the pullout is multifaceted, Kudwa said, pointing to economic problems being faced by other airlines as well. "We're not operating in a vacuum. There are lots of difficulties in the airline industry," she said, and the level of service USAir now provides is "no longer economically viable."
She said the cutback also can be attributed in part to "typical seasonal" schedule adjustments.
Some members of the local business community have pointed to the Port Authority's decision to raise airport landing and passenger fees by 25 percent last February as the impetus for an apparent airline exodus on St. Croix. In the wake of the VIPA fee hikes, American Eagle announced it was stopping commuter service between St. Thomas and St. Croix, and American Airlines announced it was discontinuing ground operations at both airports.
"I think we'll lose further flights," Frank Fox, St. Croix Chamber of Commerce president, said on Thursday. "What we've got here is proof positive that you can't raise taxes and raise taxes and raise taxes and get more money. The increase in landing fees means less money for the Port Authority, more flights lost and more passengers lost."
Fox added, though, that U.S. Airways' move probably is not based solely on the fee increases. "Everything is cumulative," he said, pointing to the entire airline industry's financial woes. But he added of the fees, "that is something we can control — how much it costs for someone to come and park a plane here."
He also said a lack of passenger demand for St. Croix is probably part of the reason for the bad news. Kudwa would not comment on that issue. "I'm not going to elaborate on that," she said. "It's proprietary information, and we don't break that out market by market." She also would not comment on how much money U.S. Airways stands to save by reducing its service in the territory.
The company has not made any announcement about its employees on St. Croix, she said, but personnel will continue to maintain service at the airport counter.
Chamber vice president and business owner Ed Buckley concurred that low passenger demand for St. Croix is a big problem, noting that fares to the territory are not prohibitively high compared to flights within the United States.
He said island hoteliers are reporting occupancy rates averaging 50 percent for last tourist season. "When the average in other parts of the Caribbean are 75 percent, I find it unbelievable," he said, "especially since we're a U.S. territory and this was during a wartime situation."
Buckley, who owns St. Croix Ultimate Bluewater Adventures, said much of his scuba-diving business promotions are in the northeastern United States, where there's easy access to U.S. Airways' flights. The cutback in service "is certainly going to hurt," he said.
Buckley served on the selection committee that hired a consultant to explore ways to increase airlift to the territory. The University of the Virgin Islands commissioned the $75,000 study, which was funded by an appropriation of the 24th Legislature. The consultant's draft proposal was unveiled on Thursday at UVI on St. Croix after having been presented Tuesday on the St. Thomas campus.
The plan provides a timeline for improving the airline situation in the territory, historical data about the industry and comments about the current state of the industry, Buckley said.
Meanwhile, a proposal on the drawing board that would put an airline hub on St. Croix is moving ahead again after being slowed by investor reluctance to commit funds during tax season and the war in Iraq, according to Bruce Morgan Casner, Sun Airways chair.
"We continue to be aggressively involved in putting a finance package together," Casner said. He said the increase in landing fees would not have "an appreciable effect on Sun Airways and its investors. It would simply be a part of our overhead."

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May 29, 2003 – Another economic blow to the territory, and primarily to St. Croix, came about this week with word that U.S. Airways intends to pull almost all of its flights to that island and cut many to St. Thomas at summer's end.
The airline will end its "wrap service" to the territory on Sept. 5, a spokeswoman said, which means that daily flights from Philadelphia to St. Thomas and St. Croix will cease. U.S. Airways spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said planes currently fly six days a week from Pennsylvania to St. Thomas and on to St. Croix before returning to Philadelphia.
With the change, flights to St. Thomas from Philadelphia will be only on Saturday until Oct. 26, when the tourist season begins to resume, Kudwa said. She said the Saturday flight from Charlotte, North Carolina, to St. Croix would continue, as will a daily round-trip flight from Charlotte to St. Thomas. "We will maintain those flights throughout the off-peak season and into the fall," she said.
The cause of the pullout is multifaceted, Kudwa said, pointing to economic problems being faced by other airlines as well. "We're not operating in a vacuum. There are lots of difficulties in the airline industry," she said, and the level of service USAir now provides is "no longer economically viable."
She said the cutback also can be attributed in part to "typical seasonal" schedule adjustments.
Some members of the local business community have pointed to the Port Authority's decision to raise airport landing and passenger fees by 25 percent last February as the impetus for an apparent airline exodus on St. Croix. In the wake of the VIPA fee hikes, American Eagle announced it was stopping commuter service between St. Thomas and St. Croix, and American Airlines announced it was discontinuing ground operations at both airports.
"I think we'll lose further flights," Frank Fox, St. Croix Chamber of Commerce president, said on Thursday. "What we've got here is proof positive that you can't raise taxes and raise taxes and raise taxes and get more money. The increase in landing fees means less money for the Port Authority, more flights lost and more passengers lost."
Fox added, though, that U.S. Airways' move probably is not based solely on the fee increases. "Everything is cumulative," he said, pointing to the entire airline industry's financial woes. But he added of the fees, "that is something we can control — how much it costs for someone to come and park a plane here."
He also said a lack of passenger demand for St. Croix is probably part of the reason for the bad news. Kudwa would not comment on that issue. "I'm not going to elaborate on that," she said. "It's proprietary information, and we don't break that out market by market." She also would not comment on how much money U.S. Airways stands to save by reducing its service in the territory.
The company has not made any announcement about its employees on St. Croix, she said, but personnel will continue to maintain service at the airport counter.
Chamber vice president and business owner Ed Buckley concurred that low passenger demand for St. Croix is a big problem, noting that fares to the territory are not prohibitively high compared to flights within the United States.
He said island hoteliers are reporting occupancy rates averaging 50 percent for last tourist season. "When the average in other parts of the Caribbean are 75 percent, I find it unbelievable," he said, "especially since we're a U.S. territory and this was during a wartime situation."
Buckley, who owns St. Croix Ultimate Bluewater Adventures, said much of his scuba-diving business promotions are in the northeastern United States, where there's easy access to U.S. Airways' flights. The cutback in service "is certainly going to hurt," he said.
Buckley served on the selection committee that hired a consultant to explore ways to increase airlift to the territory. The University of the Virgin Islands commissioned the $75,000 study, which was funded by an appropriation of the 24th Legislature. The consultant's draft proposal was unveiled on Thursday at UVI on St. Croix after having been presented Tuesday on the St. Thomas campus.
The plan provides a timeline for improving the airline situation in the territory, historical data about the industry and comments about the current state of the industry, Buckley said.
Meanwhile, a proposal on the drawing board that would put an airline hub on St. Croix is moving ahead again after being slowed by investor reluctance to commit funds during tax season and the war in Iraq, according to Bruce Morgan Casner, Sun Airways chair.
"We continue to be aggressively involved in putting a finance package together," Casner said. He said the increase in landing fees would not have "an appreciable effect on Sun Airways and its investors. It would simply be a part of our overhead."

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May 29, 2003 – What may have been a day of anxiety for government employees on St. Croix who routinely receive their pay by direct deposit to their bank accounts had a happy ending — or will by Friday morning, according to Government House.
In a release issued Thursday, Finance Commissioner Bernice Turnbull stated that "due to a technical problem" the government's direct deposits for Thursday's pay day did not go through as usual on St. Croix.
Turnbull emphasized that "the delay in posting these direct deposits has been caused by a technical problem at the bank and nothing more."
"Both the Department of Finance and Banco Popular apologize for the inconvenience this delay has caused," Turnbull said. "The bank is doing its utmost to correct this problem and to make sure that it doesn't reoccur."
She said that employees who have direct deposit with Banco Popular should have had access to their payments by automated teller machine as of 5 p.m. Thursday. Employees who have direct deposit with FirstBank and Bank of Nova Scotia should have access by 8 a.m. Friday, she said.
The release stated that the government's direct deposit for the payday "was transmitted timely and received by the host bank, but due to a technical problem the file for direct deposit for employees on St. Croix was not transmitted."

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May 29, 2003 – A bill before the Senate Education and Youth Committee to eliminate the current six-year statute of limitations on recovery of college loans granted by the Board of Education was approved Thursday and reported out to the Rules Committee.
According to a Legislature release, school board member Terrence D. Joseph told the committee that 1,320 Virgin Islanders own nearly $2 million in college loans, some dating from 1970. But he said that more than $1.5 million is "uncollectable" because the loans, to 240 persons, were made prior to 1997 and the statue of limitations on collecting them has run out.
Another $416, 617.66 in loans made to 1,080 persons since 1997 is considered "collectable," Joseph said. But if the cut-off is not lifted this year, he said, the opportunity to collect as much as $74,306.56 of that amount from 49 persons will be lost.
Daniel said eliminating the statute of limitations would help in collecting the outstanding loans. However, the board's executive director, Evadney Hodge, acknowledged under questioning that the board has no one assigned to collect the money owed.
Sen. Carlton Dowe said additional time would not make any difference unless effort is made by the board to collect what's owed. Sen. Norman Jn Baptiste agreed, questioning the point of giving people more time not to pay.
If more old loans were repaid, more new loans could be made. Mavis Gilchrist, University of the Virgin Islands financial aid director, said UVI supports the bill as a means of enhancing the prospects for future students to obtain financial support for their college studies.
In September 1999, the school board reported some 1,700 delinquent student loans totaling $2,433,209. Testifying before the Senate Finance Committee then, Keith Richards, board chair at the time, said the board planned to take delinquent loan recipients to small claims court, update the list of delinquencies for publication, cross reference the list with government personnel records, and implement automatic payroll deductions to collect on loans where possible.
The issue of delinquent loans owed by prominent public officials was a topic of discussion two months ago at a school board meeting. The board on March 24 approved a request from Sen. Ronald Russell to obtain the delinquency list. The following day, Daniel said the list would be updated and checked for accuracy and then turned over to Russell "no later than April 21."
Russell, who prior to last November was the school board's legal counsel, chairs the Education and Youth Committee.
Funding an overriding concern
The main thrust of discussion on the other bill before the committee Thursday may become a familiar theme in legislative deliberations for the foreseeable future: not what can or should be done, but how to pay for it.
The committee took testimony on the proposal to institute a pilot after-school program for kindergarten through sixth grade in all of the public schools. In addition to raising financial concerns, according to the Legislature release, witnesses also said more study needs to go into the proposal before efforts are made to implement it.
Vickie Palmer, representing the federally funded V.I. PUSH after-school program, spoke in favor of the proposal but said it should be expanded to include the 7th and 8th grades. She also expressed concern that there isn't enough time to put the program into effect for the coming school year.
Tyrone Molyneaux, St. Croix teachers union president, said that before plans are mapped to introduce the program, an assessment of existing programs is needed to determine what needs "enhancing or eliminating."
Both Molyneaux and his St. Thomas-St. John counterpart, Vernelle De Lagarde, expressed concern that no funding had been identified for the program. De Lagarde suggested that if no funding can be found, more resources should be added to existing after-school programs.
Harry Daniel, Board of Education acting president, said "it is imperative that a funding source is identified." And Education Commissioner Noreen Michael expressed concern about any mandatory after-school program because local funding would be required.
The committee voted to hold the bill for further consideration.
Also at Thursday's committee meeting, Sen. Shawn-Michael Malone said he is having legislation drafted to toughen the penalties for school vandalism. His bill, according to a release from his office, would increase the minimum fine to $5,000 from the current $1,000 and the mandatory prison term to four years from the present two years.
Citing a "rash of break-ins that have been occurring in some of our public schools," Malone said his proposal also calls for posting the penalties "at the entrance of all the territory's public schools" and for the fines collected to "be deposited into the imprest fund of the school in which the vandalism occurred."
All committee members were present for Thursday's hearing — Sens. Baptiste, Roosevelt David, Louis Hill, Malone, Luther Renee, Raymond "Usie" Richards and Russell. Non-committee members present were Sens. Dowe and Celestino White.

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May 29, 2003 – The announcement came at "the 12th hour," to quote Gov. Charles W. Turnbull from another recent statement, but it came as no surprise: The governor will not be submitting his proposed Fiscal Year 2004 budget for the administrative branch to the Legislature by May 30 as required by law.
A Government House release issued Thursday afternoon said the budget would not be submitted by Friday and that it will be submitted only after the Legislature approves a plan to resolve the Fiscal Year 2003 "situation."
On April 24, the governor announced that the government was facing a deficit of $100 million for the current fiscal year, a figure revised soon thereafter to $115 million. Last week, members of his financial team testified before the Senate that the shortfall could reach $144 million as a result of a May 12 federal court order imposing a moratorium on the collection of property taxes.
Late on the night of May 13, the governor's package of six multi-part bills to address the financial crisis was delivered to the Legislature for consideration at a special session called for May 15. The bills call for borrowing another $235 million, spending much of it on projects that include $80 million for a new hotel that the government would build and own on St. Croix, and increasing existing taxes and adding new ones, most of them aimed at the business sector.
The revenue proposals include raising the gross receipts tax to 4.75 percent from the current 4 percent, adding a 2 percent surcharge to the 8 percent hotel room tax, and instituting an "environmental excise tax" based on the weight of items imported into the territory and a per-barrel tax on crude oil that one business executive calculated would cost Hovensa more than $32 million a year.
Nowhere in the bills were there any proposals to reduce government expenditures, save for changing the pay periods to twice monthly rather than every other week, which would mean two less instances of processing payments but would not affect the salaries government employees receive.
A top administration official told the senators that $5 million could be saved through natural attrition in the government work force of 2 percent a year for five years; enforcement of a hiring freeze; limitations on overtime, travel and the use of cellular phones; and restrictions on unauthorized use of government vehicles. Police officers got their marching orders on Monday to apprehend the drivers of any such vehicles found to be in use outside of authorized hours.
After 11 hours of deliberations on May 15, the Legislature voted unanimously to refer all of the bills to the Finance Committee for consideration on June 5. The hearing does not shape up to be a rubber-stamp affair; Sen. Adlah "Foncie" Donastorg, the committee chair, said on the Senate floor on May 15 that the administration officials were "stone crazy" if they thought he was going to sign off on the bills as proposed.
Reaction to the proposals was predictably negative from the business community. Joe Aubain, long-time executive director of the St. Thomas-St. John Chamber of Commerce, said: "I'm assuming this is one part of the package, and the cuts haven't come down yet."
Noel Loftus, president of the St. Croix Alive business organization and a former St. Croix Chamber of Commerce president, said: "There is no recovery plan. It is not balanced, not thought out, not responsible, and it won't work. If this passes, you will see more businesses close."
Delegate Donna M. Christensen was largely in agreement, expressing concern about "the Turnbull administration's tax-laden response" to the territory's fiscal crisis. "I am still waiting to hear the other side — how spending will be reduced," she said. "I know that the federal government, who I am sure will be called on for help, will be waiting also." In his letter to Senate President David Jones on Thursday concerning the FY 2004 budget, Turnbull wrote: "The executive branch departments and agencies have worked very hard to develop budgets within the confines of the limited resources available."
However, he added, "The budgets of all departments and agencies will be directly affected by the measures that are ultimately utilized" to resolve the projected massive funding shortfall by the end of the current fiscal year, on Sept. 30.
Turnbull said his administration is continuing its efforts to prepare "a realistic and meaningful budget."
The Senate Finance Committee not only is key to the immediate fate of the governor's proposals to address the burgeoning FY 2003 deficit but also has first say in the Legislature's manipulation of the administration's proposed FY 2004 budget.
On Sunday, the governor again called the Senate into special session, this time to act Tuesday on a bill ratifying the leasing of submerged lands in Long Bay and the granting of a Coastal Zone Management permit for development of those lands. In his transmittal letter to Jones on Sunday, he wrote: "If I understand the situation, if this development is to move forward and this investment is to be made for the people of the Virgin Islands, the time to act is now. This is the 12th hour and the cock is crowing."
On Tuesday, the Legislature approved both the lease and the permit.

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May 29, 2003 – Central High School and Education Complex recently held award ceremonies to honor winners in the Laws of Life essay contest.
The Peter Gruber Foundation, headquartered on St. Thomas, funds the contest through a grant presented by the Community Foundation of the Virgin Islands. An international character education program, Laws of Life was introduced in the territory two years ago as a pilot program at Charlotte Amalie High School and then expanded to Ivanna Eudora Kean High School. This was the first year that contests were held on St. Croix.
For the contest, students were asked to describe their personal ethical and moral standards and to explain how and why they chose those principles as their guideposts for life. The program was presented as a teaching unit in English classes.
The finished essays, coded to conceal the writers' names, were reviewed and ranked by a panel of 10 anonymous judges, each a respected member of the St. Croix community. They chose a first-place winner in each of the four grades in each high school.
The winners were:
Education Complex High School
9th grade – Joy Lawrence
10th grade – Desiree Golden
11th grade – Azmon Rougier
12th grade – Melissa Dickson
Central High School
9th grade – Jericha Harris
10th grade – Holly Rouger
11th grade – Julissa Copemann
12th grade – Swahili Willie
Each of winner received a check for $500. The presentations were made at Central on May 20 and at Complex on May 27.
Prizes were presented to CAHS and Kean students earlier in a ceremony on St. Thomas.
"Laws of Life" is the concept of investment manager and philanthropist Sir John Templeton. Since its inception in the 1980s, thousands of contests have been conducted in hundreds of cities, each tailored to the specific needs of the host community.
Peter Gruber, president of St. Thomas-based Globalvest Management Co. and chair and sole funder of the foundation that bears his name, brought the contest to the territory.

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May 29, 2003 – A bill before the Senate Education and Youth Committee to eliminate the current six-year statute of limitations on recovery of college loans granted by the Board of Education was approved Thursday and reported out to the Rules Committee.
According to a Legislature release, school board member Terrence D. Joseph told the committee that 1,320 Virgin Islanders own nearly $2 million in college loans, some dating from 1970. But he said that more than $1.5 million is "uncollectable" because the loans, to 240 persons, were made prior to 1997 and the statue of limitations on collecting them has run out.
Another $416, 617.66 in loans made to 1,080 persons since 1997 is considered "collectable," Joseph said. But if the cut-off is not lifted this year, he said, the opportunity to collect as much as $74,306.56 of that amount from 49 persons will be lost.
Daniel said eliminating the statute of limitations would help in collecting the outstanding loans. However, the board's executive director, Evadney Hodge, acknowledged under questioning that the board has no one assigned to collect the money owed.
Sen. Carlton Dowe said additional time would not make any difference unless effort is made by the board to collect what's owed. Sen. Norman Jn Baptiste agreed, questioning the point of giving people more time not to pay.
If more old loans were repaid, more new loans could be made. Mavis Gilchrist, University of the Virgin Islands financial aid director, said UVI supports the bill as a means of enhancing the prospects for future students to obtain financial support for their college studies.
In September 1999, the school board reported some 1,700 delinquent student loans totaling $2,433,209. Testifying before the Senate Finance Committee then, Keith Richards, board chair at the time, said the board planned to take delinquent loan recipients to small claims court, update the list of delinquencies for publication, cross reference the list with government personnel records, and implement automatic payroll deductions to collect on loans where possible.
The issue of delinquent loans owed by prominent public officials was a topic of discussion two months ago at a school board meeting. The board on March 24 approved a request from Sen. Ronald Russell to obtain the delinquency list. The following day, Daniel said the list would be updated and checked for accuracy and then turned over to Russell "no later than April 21."
Russell, who prior to last November was the school board's legal counsel, chairs the Education and Youth Committee.
Funding an overriding concern
The main thrust of discussion on the other bill before the committee Thursday may become a familiar theme in legislative deliberations for the foreseeable future: not what can or should be done, but how to pay for it.
The committee took testimony on the proposal to institute a pilot after-school program for kindergarten through sixth grade in all of the public schools. In addition to raising financial concerns, according to the Legislature release, witnesses also said more study needs to go into the proposal before efforts are made to implement it.
Vickie Palmer, representing the federally funded V.I. PUSH after-school program, spoke in favor of the proposal but said it should be expanded to include the 7th and 8th grades. She also expressed concern that there isn't enough time to put the program into effect for the coming school year.
Tyrone Molyneaux, St. Croix teachers union president, said that before plans are mapped to introduce the program, an assessment of existing programs is needed to determine what needs "enhancing or eliminating."
Both Molyneaux and his St. Thomas-St. John counterpart, Vernelle De Lagarde, expressed concern that no funding had been identified for the program. De Lagarde suggested that if no funding can be found, more resources should be added to existing after-school programs.
Harry Daniel, Board of Education acting president, said "it is imperative that a funding source is identified." And Education Commissioner Noreen Michael expressed concern about any mandatory after-school program because local funding would be required.
The committee voted to hold the bill for further consideration.
Also at Thursday's committee meeting, Sen. Shawn-Michael Malone said he is having legislation drafted to toughen the penalties for school vandalism. His bill, according to a release from his office, would increase the minimum fine to $5,000 from the current $1,000 and the mandatory prison term to four years from the present two years.
Citing a "rash of break-ins that have been occurring in some of our public schools," Malone said his proposal also calls for posting the penalties "at the entrance of all the territory's public schools" and for the fines collected to "be deposited into the imprest fund of the school in which the vandalism occurred."
All committee members were present for Thursday's hearing — Sens. Baptiste, Roosevelt David, Louis Hill, Malone, Luther Renee, Raymond "Usie" Richards and Russell. Non-committee members present were Sens. Dowe and Celestino White.

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May 29, 2003 – The announcement came at "the 12th hour," to quote Gov. Charles W. Turnbull from another recent statement, but it came as no surprise: The governor will not be submitting his proposed Fiscal Year 2004 budget for the administrative branch to the Legislature by May 30 as required by law.
A Government House release issued Thursday afternoon said the budget would not be submitted by Friday and that it will be submitted only after the Legislature approves a plan to resolve the Fiscal Year 2003 "situation."
On April 24, the governor announced that the government was facing a deficit of $100 million for the current fiscal year, a figure revised soon thereafter to $115 million. Last week, members of his financial team testified before the Senate that the shortfall could reach $144 million as a result of a May 12 federal court order imposing a moratorium on the collection of property taxes.
Late on the night of May 13, the governor's package of six multi-part bills to address the financial crisis was delivered to the Legislature for consideration at a special session called for May 15. The bills call for borrowing another $235 million, spending much of it on projects that include $80 million for a new hotel that the government would build and own on St. Croix, and increasing existing taxes and adding new ones, most of them aimed at the business sector.
The revenue proposals include raising the gross receipts tax to 4.75 percent from the current 4 percent, adding a 2 percent surcharge to the 8 percent hotel room tax, and instituting an "environmental excise tax" based on the weight of items imported into the territory and a per-barrel tax on crude oil that one business executive calculated would cost Hovensa more than $32 million a year.
Nowhere in the bills were there any proposals to reduce government expenditures, save for changing the pay periods to twice monthly rather than every other week, which would mean two less instances of processing payments but would not affect the salaries government employees receive.
A top administration official told the senators that $5 million could be saved through natural attrition in the government work force of 2 percent a year for five years; enforcement of a hiring freeze; limitations on overtime, travel and the use of cellular phones; and restrictions on unauthorized use of government vehicles. Police officers got their marching orders on Monday to apprehend the drivers of any such vehicles found to be in use outside of authorized hours.
After 11 hours of deliberations on May 15, the Legislature voted unanimously to refer all of the bills to the Finance Committee for consideration on June 5. The hearing does not shape up to be a rubber-stamp affair; Sen. Adlah "Foncie" Donastorg, the committee chair, said on the Senate floor on May 15 that the administration officials were "stone crazy" if they thought he was going to sign off on the bills as proposed.
Reaction to the proposals was predictably negative from the business community. Joe Aubain, long-time executive director of the St. Thomas-St. John Chamber of Commerce, said: "I'm assuming this is one part of the package, and the cuts haven't come down yet."
Noel Loftus, president of the St. Croix Alive business organization and a former St. Croix Chamber of Commerce president, said: "There is no recovery plan. It is not balanced, not thought out, not responsible, and it won't work. If this passes, you will see more businesses close."
Delegate Donna M. Christensen was largely in agreement, expressing concern about "the Turnbull administration's tax-laden response" to the territory's fiscal crisis. "I am still waiting to hear the other side — how spending will be reduced," she said. "I know that the federal government, who I am sure will be called on for help, will be waiting also." In his letter to Senate President David Jones on Thursday concerning the FY 2004 budget, Turnbull wrote: "The executive branch departments and agencies have worked very hard to develop budgets within the confines of the limited resources available."
However, he added, "The budgets of all departments and agencies will be directly affected by the measures that are ultimately utilized" to resolve the projected massive funding shortfall by the end of the current fiscal year, on Sept. 30.
Turnbull said his administration is continuing its efforts to prepare "a realistic and meaningful budget."
The Senate Finance Committee not only is key to the immediate fate of the governor's proposals to address the burgeoning FY 2003 deficit but also has first say in the Legislature's manipulation of the administration's proposed FY 2004 budget.
On Sunday, the governor again called the Senate into special session, this time to act Tuesday on a bill ratifying the leasing of submerged lands in Long Bay and the granting of a Coastal Zone Management permit for development of those lands. In his transmittal letter to Jones on Sunday, he wrote: "If I understand the situation, if this development is to move forward and this investment is to be made for the people of the Virgin Islands, the time to act is now. This is the 12th hour and the cock is crowing."
On Tuesday, the Legislature approved both the lease and the permit.

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