by Sabrina Salas Matanane

Guam - Governor Eddie Calvo's Communication Director Troy Torres reacts to the amended version of Bill 268 which passed by majority vote minutes after 8 o'clock Saturday evening. A public hearing was held on the original version Friday afternoon and was supposed to continue on Monday but instead Senators added the new version to session agenda today.

The new version prohibits raises for the Governor, Lt. Governor, Legislature, Public Auditor, Attorney General and Judges in the Superior Court of Guam. Mayors will get a raise but not the amount allocated in the Governor's pay plan. The new bill also requires the Governor to submit a detailed cost breakdown by agency for the implementation of the hay pay raises.

Torres issued the following statement:

"The Governor and Lieutenant Governor don't care what the Senators do to play with their salaries. They aren't even taking a pay raise to begin with. But they believe it is wrong for the legislature to deny, without any HR experience, the salary adjustments to the mayors and vice mayors, the public auditor, the attorney General, and the cabinet. These positions are severely underpaid. The governor and lieutenant governor are calling on senators to follow their own policy of denying recommended salary increases to the mayors by denying the salary increase they are already taking. If they do not give back their pay raises, they will spend the rest of their term as hypocrites. There is an irony in this entire situation. The senators gave themselves a pay raise when the government had a $332 million deficit and owed taxpayers an average of $7000 each in refunds. And now that the deficit is gone and tax refunds are on time, they have a problem giving a raise to the mayors and the professionals in the cabinet, along with the public auditor and the attorney General. Shame on them."

All the Democrat senators voted yes on the bill, while all the republicans who were present voted no. Senators Aline Yamashita and Brant McCreadie were excused.

You can read the new bill here: http://202.128.4.46/Committee_Reports_32nd/Bill%20No.%20268-32%20(COR)%20ComReport.pdf