The Puerto Rico Planning Board and several municipal governments have struck a collaborative agreement to establish the Hazus project, a nationally applicable standardized methodology that contains models for estimating potential losses from earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes.
As part of its job-promotion efforts, Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro García-Padilla announced Thursday the launch of "Tweet My Jobs," a technology that facilitates the recruiting process for open job positions.
Certified Public Accountant Joey Christopher Cancel-Planas has been named the Economic Development Bank’s new president, taking office nearly six months into Gov. Alejandro García-Padilla’s term. His appointment was announced Monday by EDB Board Chairman Javier Ferrer, who is president of the Government Development Bank.
Government Development Bank President Javier Ferrer announced Monday the start of the 11th José M. Berrocal Finance and Economy Institute internship program, with the participation of 30 college students attending Puerto Rico and stateside universities.
Treasury Secretary Melba Acosta said Thursday that revenue collections so far this year — July 2012 through April 2013 — totaled $6.8 billion, or $321 million less than originally included in the general budget. The projection of a deficit through June 30, including certain transactions that will close before then, is $295 million, or 69 percent less than the original $965 million projected deficit, one of the components of the $2.2 billion structural deficit.
The Puerto Rico Financial Institutions and Insurance commissioners defended their respective budgets during a hearing before the Senate Finance Committee Monday, when they requested $15.2 million and $10.8 million, to run their respective agencies.
The Puerto Rico Treasury Department is currently working on a number of enforcement and automation initiatives to increase the island’s sales and use tax uptake from the current 68 percent while attacking the government’s fiscal shortfall, agency Secretary Melba Acosta told participants of the Puerto Rico Credit Conference Friday.
Gov. Alejandro García-Padilla, flanked by members of the current and previous administration, inaugurated Tuesday the second phase of the Bahía Urbana redevelopment project in Old San Juan, between Piers 7 and 8, at a cost of $40 million. The new facilities will create 100 direct and indirect jobs.
Puerto Rico individual and corporate taxpayers who have a sales and use tax (known as IVU for its initials in Spanish) debt with the Treasury Department will be able to pay without penalty through a tax amnesty good through June 30. The agency expects to collect $8 million through the initiative, Treasury officials said Monday.
Puerto Rico Treasury Department officials told lawmakers Friday that collections stemming from the proposed increase in the excise tax on cigarettes and tobacco should go in their entirety to the General Fund and not distributed for other purposes, as proposed by the three measures under consideration by the Legislature.
Government Development Bank President Javier Ferrer and Puerto Rico Treasury Secretary Melba Acosta- took off to New York Wednesday to meet with credit ratings agencies S&P, Fitch and Moody’s to continue informing on the administration’s efforts to stabilize the government's finances.
Grace Santana, who is pulling double-duty for the Gov. García-Padilla administration as head of the Puerto Rico Infrastructure Financing Authority as well as the Public-Private Partnerships Authority, is a firm believer that the private sector should take over the task of developing new infrastructure projects when the government can’t — but not take over existing facilities through long-term contracts.
Puerto Rico Statistics Institute Executive Director Mario Marazzi asked the Legislature to assign the agency a budget of a little more than $1.2 million for fiscal 2014, when it has set out to undertake 25 projects to expand and improve information databases.
Puerto Rico Government Development Bank President Javier Ferrer told lawmakers Tuesday that without the necessary measures, the institution he heads will not have the capacity to float petitions by public corporations by summer.
Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro García-Padilla presented Thursday a consolidated budget of $29 billion and an operating budget of $9.83 billion for fiscal 2014, representing a $750 million increase when compared to the current budget, which he said will be covered with new revenue.
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