Governor: Legislature has until today to get the ‘la crudita’ bill to his desk
By John McPhaul
jpmcphaul@gmail.com
Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia said Monday that the Legislative Assembly has until today to approve the moratorium on the tax on crude oil derivatives, known locally as “la crudita,” so that the term in which the Joint Underwriting Association can issue the dividend does not elapse.
“The information I have is that the House approved a revised version of the 45-day crudita elimination. [It was] Revised because we have to be sure that it complies with the requirements of the law and that it allows the Joint Underwriting Association to issue the dividend,” the governor said at a press conference. “So I think that the House has already achieved it, now this has passed to the Senate and I hope that tomorrow [Tuesday], when the Senate is in session, they will approve it.”
“It is important that they approve the revised version for me to deliver the signature tomorrow,” Pierluisi added. “Because the information I have is that by Wednesday the Joint Underwriting Association would have to issue the dividend. That must be handled very carefully, it cannot be done in a hurry, it must be done well and right now the House has already done it well, what is missing is for the Senate to attend to it and I will sign it as soon as it arrives.”
Regarding the Labor Reform bill, the governor said “we are reviewing it, to identify if what I had pointed out in the process was addressed.”
“You have to remember that at one point I vetoed a labor reform bill and made some comments and later when the matter also came up for public discussion, I again sent a communication to the legislative leadership making some comments,” Pierluisi said. “So what we are going to do is, first determine if these indications were addressed and if something additional was included, then evaluate it, because this was a fluid process and I really should not be establishing my position until we see that bill in detail.”
The governor’s statements were made at a press conference announcing the start of the Educational Summer program for public school students who faced academic problems in the past school year.