Prez signs continuing resolution for 2020 budget

WINDOW ROCK

From the start, President Jonathan Nez was against a continuing resolution in regards to the Navajo Nation budget, but on Monday he signed it.

The Navajo Nation Council on Friday approved the continuing resolution for the Navajo Nation budget beginning Oct.1 and ending Dec. 31, essentially extending the present fiscal year for two months.

During the special session, Council deleted the adoption of the comprehensive budget for FY 2021 and replaced it with an emergency bill sponsored by Budget and Finance Vice Chairman Ray Smith, which adopted the continuing operations budget instead, allocating all departments a quarter of their current fiscal year funding for the remainder of the calendar year.

With the end of the 2020 fiscal year on Wednesday and FY 2021 beginning today, delegates believed a continuing resolution would buy them some time.

Council also waived provisions under Title 12 of the Navajo Nation Code, which require the adoption of a comprehensive 12-month budget.

The delayed action of the Council shortened the timeframe for Nez to consider the continuing resolution without causing a government shutdown and disruption to direct services for the Navajo people, according to Nez.

“A week ago, by letter, we urged the Council to complete the fiscal year 2021 budget as soon as possible so we could continue to provide services to the Nation,” stated Nez. “Now we are out of time. At this point, we cannot make a move without causing larger, more complex problems for the Nation.”

All Navajo government offices will receive a quarter of their FY 2020 general fund, indirect cost fund, proprietary fund, special revenue, and fiduciary fund allocations as of Sept. 30 for operations, according to the bill.

The Navajo Nation budget season was massively interrupted with the onslaught of COVID-19. Not only have budget hearings been shortened and done over the phone due to the government closure, but the tribe received a huge windfall of Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Recovery Act funding that absorbed the entire summer as the Council and president debated how to allocate it. They still have $176 million to spend from that fund.

“In here is an option to continue as is,” said Smith in presenting his legislation. “There will be no layoffs … using a quarter of the budget at 100% until the budget has been adopted by the Navajo Nation Council.”

In a previous Council session, Resource and Development Committee member Herman Daniels had moved to table the FY 2021 budget bill for 45 days. But it was brought back to Friday’s special session where it was deleted off the agenda and replaced with Smith’s emergency bill to adopt the continuing resolution.

Daniels said he had tabled to motion to approve the budget because he wanted Council to meet with divisions and departments to discuss carryover funding.

Nez had vetoed a similar continuing resolution bill in August and Council overrode that veto earlier this month. That resolution had provisions where all programs and chapters had to submit budget requests to the Office of Management and Budget by Sept. 1. This did not happen. The emergency resolution introduced Friday works around those provisions and allows OMB to implement the quarter funding instead.

“They were supposed to submit those budgets by Sept. 1,” said Dana Bobroff, chief legislative counsel. “Those budgets were not submitted by Sept. 1. Navajo Nation programs and chapters didn’t submit them. Its terms have been violated. It can’t be relied on. But the new continuing legislation waives provisions from the budget instruction manual.”

She further explained Smith’s emergency bill did not contain a provision that if chapters or programs did not submit their continuing resolution budgets then “OMB could.”

The lone dissenting vote against the continuing resolution was cast by Health, Education and Human Services Committee Vice Chair Carl Slater, who saw it as a cop-out.

“I think this action is really profound,” said Slater. “Deleting the comprehensive budget off of the agenda. What really needs to be considered is what new information has the Council been presented with to address the deficiency in the FY2021 budget?”

Slater said Council has to discontinue “bailing out” the executive branch, which he blamed for the deficient comprehensive budget.

“At a certain point we need to stand up for our citizens,” said Slater. “There’s such poor management across our Navajo Nation government because there’s no accountability. We are too afraid to take actions that have repercussions … that might create temporary discord but that would be in service to long-term durability and strong institutions.”

Slater continued, saying president’s office personnel were “laughing and harassing” his colleagues unmuted during previous meetings, as they failed to submit a budget on time and weren’t upfront on whether there would be layoffs.

“We have heard consistently how this president thinks that the Navajo Nation can run with a vastly reduced work force,” Slater said. “This was the back door to make this happen. The incompetence of management to not realize they will lose employees … people should lose their jobs for that. That is rank incompetence. We should be furious.”

Also seeing the need to approve a comprehensive budget, Nez had argued that in this time of pandemic, it only makes sense to adopt a budget so that the focus can be on getting direct services to the Navajo people.

If a continuing resolution is in place, it would mean Council will meet more with departments and divisions in order to get a budget developed. This would take the focus off of getting the CARES Act funding spent on time and that shouldn’t be the case, said Nez.

“You do have an opportunity to approve a comprehensive budget based on what the executive, judicial, legislative branch has put forward,” said Nez. “We did agree between branches. We are wanting to make sure of a comprehensive budget that we can all work with for 2021.”

The three branch chiefs recently had a meeting on the budget issue and Nez said they agreed it would be best for a comprehensive budget to be approved. However, lawmakers voted 19-1 in support of the emergency bill for a continuing resolution.

“A CR is failure of government – red,” said Slater as he voted against the resolution.

---