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Congressman Faleomavaega announced today that he is providing an update regarding minimum wage to outline efforts that have been underway since the GAO released its report in June of 2011.
“Since that time, my office has been working closely with the Committee on Education and the Workforce, which has jurisdiction for minimum wage issues in the House,” Faleomavaega said. “I have also been working closely with the Natural Resources’ Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans and Insular Affairs which has jurisdiction for matters relating to the territories, including American Samoa.”
“In June, I requested a hearing of Chairman Fleming who was kind enough to hold the hearing on September 23, 2011. As a follow-up to that hearing, my office has been working with both the Committee on Education and the Workforce and the Committee on Natural Resources to find short term and long-term solutions to the problem of automatic increases and in determining which agency should be responsible for determining future increases.”
“Over the course of the past several months, my office has also been working with Senator Bingaman’s office. Senator Bingaman is the Chairman of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, and in the Senate, this Committee has jurisdiction for the territories, while the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) has jurisdiction over minimum wage. The HELP Committee has been in discussions with the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, and no objections were raised. The same is true of the House Committee on Natural Resources which has also been in discussions with the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.”
“Our discussions in the House and Senate have been positive and, in principle, all parties support our request for wage delays given the importance of this issue to American Samoa’s economy which is a single-industry economy almost entirely dependent on the U.S. tuna fishing and processing industries. Congress also knows that American Samoa has not fully recovered from having been struck by a powerful tsunami in 2009, and from the closure of the Chicken of the Sea facility which shut down its operations one day afterwards and outsourced more than 2,000 jobs to Thailand.”
“But even with this understanding, there are sensitivities surrounding the issue of minimum wage and I have been very cautious about releasing press updates and making radio announcements because I do not want to see American Samoa dragged into another national debate like occurred last time. However, yesterday, Senator Bingaman was kind enough to introduce S. 2009, the Insular Areas Act, which includes a provision to delay wages in American Samoa until 2015. Today, it passed the Senate by Unanimous Consent (UC) so I felt the time was right to announce this good news.”
“I want to thank Senator Bingaman and his counterpart, Ranking Member Murkowski, for their support, as well as Senator Harkin and Ranking Member Enzi of the Senate HELP Committee. I also want to extend my personal thanks to Chairman Kline, Chairman Hastings, Chairman Fleming and Ranking Member George Miller, Ranking Member Markey and Committee staff for the hard work they have put into making this happen. Finally, I want to thank Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for allowing this bill to be brought to the Senate Floor by UC, and Senator Daniel Inouye for always being a help.”
“As S. 2009 now moves to the House for consideration, we’ll have to watch and wait because two other issues – the monitoring of Runit Island and clarifying the temporary assignment of judges to courts of the Freely Associated States – have been included in S. 2009. Consequently, it remains to be seen whether or not the House will agree to pass S. 2009 given these other provisions, but I will continue to keep our people updated as this matter progresses,” Faleomavaega concluded.
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