POLICY NOTES

I have reviewed the available information on the airport construction projects, and discovered that the advertised cost of $1.2 billion is grossly overstated, as it does not include any tax revenues the USVI collects as the money is spent. This is a common mistake of stateside companies that work with US state and local governments, where, unlike the USVI they do not collect or retain Federal income taxes. During the 4 year construction process, as the $1.2 billion is spent,

I have proposed USVI tax refunds be paid in full on a timely basis as this money does not belong to the USVI. These are overpayments that are required, by law, to be immediately returned to the tax payer. Furthermore, to fund the overdue payments of tax refunds, I will arrange for the GERS (Gov Employee Retirement System) to purchase the delinquent property taxes owed to the USVI government. This provides immediate cash to the USVI general fund to pay all of the tax refunds,

An 11-Point Plan to Improve Public Safety

I had lunch a few weeks ago with the President of the STX hospital and the Hospital Board Chair from STX. ​ I asked what their plan was for our well documented medical issues. ​ They said they had no plan, but were in the process of contracting a consultant to come up with a plan! ​ They also said they recently asked for additional funding from the Senate and the Governor but were turned down. ​ The situation is desperate and will continue to deteriorate for the indefinite fu

Warren Mosler's response to the article: Fonseca, Plaskett seek emergency declaration for WAPA; Roach disagrees, Gittens wants audit results ​​ They don't have a full understanding of the WAPA problem which precludes a constructive solution. First, lowering the cost of power generation isn't going to reduce WAPA bills. It will only reduce the size of the USVI gov subsidy that covers WAPA's losses. The total cost of generation was reported to be .65/kw. WAPA charges only .43/k