Tinian Chief of Staff Alan Perez told the Senate Fiscal Affairs Committee on Aug. 18 that the Tinian Mayor’s Office needs additional operational funding and expanded authority to respond to infrastructure and service demands driven by military and development activity.

Perez said the mayor’s office employs 131 full‑time staff and manages library services, a youth center, dog control, ID services, parks and tourist sites, building repairs, municipal scholarships, the slaughterhouse and municipal treasury plus emergency preparedness and grant management. “Without the support staff of the mayor’s office, Tinian’s local government would face serious operational disruption,” Perez said.

The request is part of a broader appeal for resources to mitigate what Perez described as growing infrastructure impacts tied to the Department of Defense presence. He told senators the municipality expects to “capture about 10 to 11,000,000 at the end of the fiscal year alone” from taxes related to the military build‑up but has seen little added budgetary support to address resulting wear and new demands. Perez urged the Legislature to permit assessment of the developer’s tax on DoD‑related projects, saying the municipality has repeatedly requested DPW and the Secretary of Finance to institute assessment and that the Attorney General told them “there are no legal obstacles” to doing so.

Perez also asked that the FY26 budget not suspend hotel‑occupancy allocations to municipalities. He noted that Public Law 2017 requires municipalities to receive at least $300,000 annually from hotel funds but said the FY26 law should guarantee at least $175,000 per municipality. He said Tinian received $153,000 from Dec. 23 to June 25, which he characterized as insufficient to sustain tourism promotion, annual festivals and contracts that support the local economy.

Other requests included removing suspensions on revolving funds (examples cited: e‑gaming and developer’s tax funds), granting mayors authority to reprogram 100% of lapses for emergency use, and fully funding overtime for law enforcement (Department of Public Safety) and fire/EMS to avoid operational gaps. On reprogramming authority Perez told the committee he and the mayors would use flexibility to cover shortfalls within municipal operations if granted broad reprogramming powers.

Senators pressed for clarification about how CIP/“702” allocations would be used for law enforcement overtime and whether funds were available for the current fiscal year; Perez said some CIP allocations are expected to be available and that the municipality hopes to use them for overtime and back pay if released. He also repeated the municipality’s request that the developer’s tax be assessed on federal contractors related to DoD projects so that revenues flow to mitigate infrastructure impacts.

The committee did not take formal action on the requests at the hearing. Agency staff and committee members asked for follow‑up fiscal detail and for written documentation of outstanding requests to DPW and finance so the Legislature can evaluate options during budget markup.

Perez closed by reiterating the mayor’s office role as a link between residents and higher levels of government and urging prompt legislative support and clarified authority so municipal services are not disrupted.