The Northern Marianas Senate president says more data is needed to truly understand the military buildup’s impact to the local economy. NMI Senate President Edith Deleon Guerrero said she’s been asking for military build up data for the past two years.

"And why this is very important is because we have an infusion of capital from a particular industry, which is a military build up which is happening on Tinian. And what is happening inside the fence and outside the fence, we need to be able to quantify the capital infusion to the Marianas. Unfortunately, as we speak today, there is no collection of that particular information. It's just kind of like starting up to try to gather data from Tinian, trying to gather data from the seaport for what commodities are coming in," she said.

The senator spoke at the Saipan Chamber of Commerce this week. She referenced an Office of Local Defense Community Coorperation report showing the millions of dollars in contracts awarded for the military build up. However, she said, it’s not the full picture the CNMI needs.

"There's no report to quantify how much have we generated as a local government based on these build-up activities. And this is very critical if we are talking about deficit, you know, budget, the lack of funding to sustain programs, and employment of the public sector," she said.

 

She wants a clearer picture of what the CNMI economy gains from the build-up, including from the defense contracts.

"And so these are the concerns or I guess, conversations I would say that would take for the administration to carry on with the federal government to see where do we fit in in this particular category, and how can we, again, quantify what can we generate out of this entire activity? Because even for payroll expenses, withholdings, those are not very reported in the Commonwealth. They are reported where the company is domiciled," she said.