by Ken Quintanilla

Guam - At the beginning they said it would be a difficult task, one that probably wouldn't be popular with many, but after three months since first announcing plans to cut $43 million from the General Fund, the Spending Cuts Task Force has finally submitted its list of recommendations on how to move forward with putting the government back on track.

Most of the recommendations should sound familiar - back in April the Spending Cuts Task Force was formed and after weeks of meeting with different stakeholders including community members, recommendations have finally been submitted and are under review by Governor Eddie Calvo. According to chief of staff Frank Arriola, these recommendations shouldn't come as a surprise. "The recommended cuts are not going to extra ordinary or out of the ordinary, this will be things we've been talking about for some time now, so I don't think they'll come as a surprise to anyone frankly," he said.

Among the recommendations are an early retirement package for long standing government employees, cuts to certain benefits, auctioning vehicles and having its process improvement team look into ways to streamline the government. "There is a component we're mindful of which is the levels of service provision and that's important for us that our government continues to provide services, so we want to balance the cost component as well as the service provision component," he said.

Arriola adds that these recommendations are ultimately meant to avoid layoffs at all costs - something he says isn't necessarily out of the question just yet. "It really depends," he explained. "Once we look at that final analysis of these numbers, we'll determine if the layoffs will be appropriate or not."

The recommendations meanwhile won't be revealed to the public until July 25 and will be implemented in gradual phases. "We can't do it all at one time and I don't think it would be recommended and as the plan and process becomes more clear, we'll evaluate where that timeline of execution will is going to be."

For example, he says the early retirement plan would need about a three-to-six-month window for people to decide if they want to retire early. Ultimately, he says it was best to extend the deadline and discuss it with the community which he says proved advantageous and validated many concerns. "We got a lot of positive feedback and support from the community at large for the government to rightsize itself," Arriola said.

He adds as hard as it is to believe, the deficit if real. And it's something the Calvo Administration doesn't want to play politics with and the cuts are necessary in order to meet obligations especially that of paying tax refunds and for overdue vendor payments. After his review, the governor will present the report to the Guam Legislature by July 25 as some of the recommendations need legislative approval.