SEVERAL months ago, I found out that approximately $10 million of un-cashed income tax refund checks were sitting at the Department of Administration without any effort being made by either DOA or the Department of Revenue and Taxation to notify these taxpayers of their refund checks that have yet to be cashed.

This prompted me to write a letter (www.senbenp.com/Letter.pdf), dated Feb. 4, to the directors of both agencies requesting they work together to publish the names, tax year, and villages of each individual who is owed an income tax refund that has yet to be cashed – similar to how the Virgin Islands Bureau of Internal Revenue has posted online for returned income tax refund checks. I had originally asked the DRT director – on the record during a public hearing/meeting – if this would be possible, to which he replied there may be privacy of information concerns.

Only three short months after that letter was delivered, the tone has changed and DOA published the names, tax years, and villages of residents who are owed income tax refunds and have yet to claim their checks. It is important the public knows and understands that according to Guam law, if these checks remain unclaimed for a period of four years, such funds are then diverted to the government of Guam and recorded as revenues available for expenditures for other purposes.

Currently, the Guam Legislature is in session, determining the fate of these funds from unclaimed tax refund checks. It only makes sense that the funds from the unclaimed tax refund checks should be solely utilized for the continual payment of income tax refunds and for no other purposes. As chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, Public Debt, Legal Affairs, Retirement, Public Parks, Recreation, Historic Preservation, and Land, I have worked hard to hold the line on increasing operating expenditures until such time we are sure we have caught up with past due tax refunds we owe you, and we are putting away enough money every month to pay the current tax refunds. We have made great progress, but we are not yet quite there.

Now, the Legislature is considering appropriating these unclaimed income tax refunds and other checks for specific projects the agencies have asked the governor to fund, and which the governor has rejected, choosing instead to fund merit bonus payments. They include funding with your unclaimed refund dollars, $1.4 million for a project to effectively increase your property taxes without having to increase the property tax rate through revaluing property upward, and $700,000 for DOA to move from a facility the Guam Legislature has provided to them for decades free-of-charge to a building where they not only have to pay tens of thousands in rental costs, but where they also have to pay to upgrade its connectivity infrastructure with $700,000.

The Guam Legislature mandated cost savings in the amount of $14 million to be used solely for the payment of income tax refunds this fiscal year. Providing spending authority to the governor for projects he has decided not to fund not once but twice – first, by not including them in the original budget act and second, when he used more than $4 million to pay merit bonuses instead of paying for these projects – only undermines the intent of the Guam Legislature to prioritize income tax refund payments through cost savings.

I, however, will continue to prioritize the funds from unclaimed tax refund checks so they go back into the Income Tax Refund Reserve Fund for future use in paying income tax refunds. This is what I believe you, the taxpayers, would want the government to use this “windfall” for, instead of increasing government expenditures. That is why during the Legislative session this week, I will make sure this will be part of any discussion and action on any bill to take money from unclaimed tax refund checks for use on other un-budgeted projects and push for these funds to be put back in to the refund reserve fund to fulfill our promise to you that there is money for future income tax refund payments.

As I have done throughout my entire career, I will remain steadfast and provide a check and balance to protect your tax refund checks from being diverted to paying for other projects, and maintain the priority they are meant for – money for you and your families in a timely paid refund check.

Si Yu’us Ma’åse’.