While we did not win in the past election, we remain dedicated to the future of our Commonwealth and seek new ways to serve. In the aftermath of Typhoon Soudelor, we are particularly interested in the lessons of that storm and rebuilding to be better than before. We need a redevelopment initiative that will make our villages more self-sufficient in power, water, and storm preparedness, response, and recovery. We can empower our people to be more self-reliant and able to achieve immediate and meaningful results through their own initiative locally.
Enormous thanks are due to all those persons, agencies, and governments that have pitched in and contributed relief to families whose homes were damaged or destroyed and lives disrupted and to restore critical infrastructure in a few months that otherwise would have taken six months to a year. Special praise and thanks, I think, is due the Guam Power Authority and the Governor and Government of Guam.
Never again should our people be so helpless in the face of natural disaster and nature's fury, especially since we can expect much more and even worse as a consequence of climate change brought on by excessive burning of fossil fuels. The CNMI needs to become a leader in self-sufficiency, distributed services, decentralization, and use of alternative technologies, particularly solar power generation, rainwater catchments, and localized water storage and distribution, integrated with comprehensive island-wide planning, coordination, and systems management.
