In a story Samoa News published Thursday, Feb 05, 2025, “Over $1 Million of $9 Million owed paid to ASG Employees Retirement Fund” a note was added to the bottom of the article in parentheses that referred to a statements made by Deputy Director of Treasury Levi Reese in a House committee on Monday, Feb. 3, 2025.

Reese said that there are issues with the high percentage now in effect for contributions to the Fund, mainly there is no revenue source identified. In response, Samoa News noted “that the ASG contribution of 14% is where the problem lies — having no revenue source. The 6% contribution from employees is a direct deduction from their gross salary and in this sense their revenue source is their ‘pay check’.”

The Samoa News editorial committee apologizes to our readers for not including the fact that the FY2025 budget laid out estimated revenue for estimated expenses that included the increases in the Retirement Fund contributions. Therefore, revenue sources were identified to cover the ASG share of retirement fund contributions for FY2025.

However, since the $9 Million of unpaid fund contributions is not identified by fiscal year — 2024 vs. 2025, it’s unknown if part of the unpaid amount should have been covered with FY2024 revenues.

And then there’s the problem with the FY2025 budget — where revenues are said to be overstated. The governor in his State of the Territory address said that there is currently a projected $55 million shortfall in local revenue for the current fiscal year.

And that’s without a complete forensic audit on the table yet.