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HomeNewsArchivesMINORITY HAS ITS OWN AGENDA FOR SPECIAL SESSION

MINORITY HAS ITS OWN AGENDA FOR SPECIAL SESSION

June 27, 2001 – The Legislature's minority senators announced Wednesday that they plan to offer a number of their own initiatives at the special session Gov. Charles W. Turnbull has called for Thursday.
All of their measures address "quality of life" or "business-related" issues, Sen. David Jones, minority leader, said in a release issued from Sen. Emmett Hansen II's office.
Items to be proposed by the minority, the release said, would:
– Authorize the governor to fund and implement an increase of up to 5 percent in retired government workers' annuities.
– Raise the minimum salary for government workers to $15,000 a year. At minimum wage, currently $5.15 per hour in the Virgin Islands, a full-time employee receives $10,712 annually.
– Appropriate $1 million from interest earned on matching funds, for the Police Department Bureau of Motor Vehicles and other purposes.
– Appropriate $750,000 from the General Fund to the Tourism Department, to fund a St. Croix jazz festival. St. Croix in 1993 and 1994 was the scene of a Jazz and Caribbean Music and Art Festival that received government funding.
– Appropriate $500,000 to the Government Development Bank, to fund a micro-credit loan program. This is a pet project of Sen. Roosevelt David, a member of the minority bloc. His plan is to make low-interest loans of $25,000 to $150,000, with less red tape than commercial banks require, to qualified individuals who want to start small businesses but lack capital and collateral.
"Through these initiatives," the release stated, "it is hoped that the economy will be stimulated, primarily by providing loans to entrepreneurs, bringing tourists to St. Croix … and fully funding a cost-of-living increase to a portion of our retirees." Providing funds to the police and "raising the lower end of the government pay scale," it said, "will also benefit the community at large."
The minority bloc issued its list of initiatives Wednesday as an addendum to Turnbull's $40 million-plus shopping list for the special session, released by Government House late Tuesday. For details on the governor's proposed supplemental appropriations, see the story titled Tobacco funds in danger; special session called.
The minority consists of six senators — Jones, Hansen, David, Lorraine Berry, Douglas Canton Jr., and Vargrave Richards. The seventh non-majority lawmaker, Adlah "Foncie" Donastorg, is unaligned.

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