Release Of Tax Refunds In December Again In Doubt As O.M.B. Director Says Working Capital Loan Won’t Close Until January

ST. CROIX — Office of Management and Budget Director Nellon Bowry on Thursday told The Consortium that the working capital bond — some $147 million that the government has gone to the market for, most of which will be used to keep the government afloat — will not close until early January 2017.

“We’re going to price the working capital bond this month, and the closing will be early January,” Mr. Bowry told The Consortium at the Juan F. Luis Hospital on Thursday, while discussing funding sources to help the hospital meet its requirements for participation in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services program. Mr. Bowry serves as the chairman of the territorial hospital board.

Mr. Bowry’s comments place a monkey wrench in Governor Kenneth Mapp’s promise to deliver tax refunds by mid-December, because it was from the working capital bond he told this publication on December 1, that Dept. of Finance Commissioner Valdemier Collens would make refunds available to residents.

“I don’t know that we will pay all of it out,” Mr. Mapp told The Consortium during a candlelight vigil held at Fort Christianvaern as part of World AIDS Day activities on Dec. 1. “When we close on the working capital loan around December the 15, part of that money is going to be used for tax refunds.”

Asked whether that meant residents would see refund checks in their mailboxes before Christmas, the governor reiterated his statement.

“There will be. I’m telling you, there will be,” he said, referring to tax refunds this month. “I can’t tell you how much, but when we pull down the working capital loan, which will be closing around the 15-16 of December, the commissioner of Finance will release some funds.”

With the working capital loan not closing until early January, is there still a possibility that residents could see refunds in December?

“There’s another loan that we have, maybe we could drawdown from that,” Mr. Bowry said. “But the working capital loan, the plan is early January for the closing.”