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Camacho takes shots at DOE

by Mindy Aguon

Governor Felix Camacho weighed-in on the crisis at the Department of Education, saying the students of Guam and government agencies continue to suffer because of the DOE's financial problems and mismanagement.  "Yet another crisis and they have no one to blame but themselves...we're prohibited by law the legislature prohibits the Executive Branch of government of transferring or using any local funds for federal programs so we can't help," said the chief executive.

The governor added that if there's going to be a fix it's going to have to come from lawmakers who have to amend the budget law and identify the funds to cover DOE's shortfall.  Camacho added if the Legislature authorizes the money, other agencies or services will be impacted.

Camacho continued, "How can we afford this to continue to cover for their shortfalls and mistakes? I think they just have to make some hard decisions now and cut where they need to cut and besides that if the government was to use local funds to cover for their shortfall in federal programs how can they account for it?

"If they can't account for their monies on the federal end how can this local government expect that we'll get reimbursed from federal dollars.  It leaves us millions of dollars short on our end."