Compact of Free Association Host Communities Support Act

Bill: 117-hr-6819
Sponsor: full_name: Del. San Nicolas, Michael F. Q. [D-GU-At Large]
Introduced: 2022-02-22
Policy area: Immigration
Latest action: action_date: 2022-02-22
text: Referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.

Summaries:
action_date: 2022-02-22
action_desc: Introduced in House
text: <p><strong>Compact of Free Association Host Communities Support Act</strong></p> <p>This bill authorizes various financial waivers for certain U.S. jurisdictions (i.e., states, territories, or possessions) that host citizens of the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, or Palau as residents. (Under current law, citizens of these countries, known as the Freely Associated States, have the right to reside and work in the United States as nonimmigrants or habitual residents.)</p> <p>Specifically, this bill authorizes a federal agency to, for the purposes of a federal grant, waive any matching funds requirements for a jurisdiction that hosts citizens of the Freely Associated States as residents. </p> <p>Furthermore, the President may reduce, release, or waive amounts that such a hosting jurisdiction owes to a federal agency, at the request of the hosting jurisdiction. As a condition of receiving such a reduction, release, or waiver, a hosting jurisdiction must report to the Department of the Interior an accounting of the jurisdiction's unreimbursed economic impacts associated with receiving citizens of the Freely Associated States from 2004 through 2021. </p>

tv_txt: I 117th CONGRESS 2d Session H. R. 6819 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES February 22, 2022 Mr. San Nicolas (for himself, Mr. Case , and Mr. Kahele ) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Oversight and Reform A BILL To address the growing unreimbursed economic impact costs on communities that receive and host Compact migrants from the Freely Associated States, and for other purposes.

1. Short title This Act may be cited as the Compact of Free Association Host Communities Support Act . 2. Waiver of matching funds requirement A Federal department, agency, independent agency, office, or instrumentality may waive any requirement for local matching funds (including in-kind contributions) otherwise required to be provided by an affected jurisdiction for any Federal grant requiring matching funds. 3. Reconciliation of unreimbursed impact expenses (a) In general To address previously accrued and unreimbursed impact expenses, at the request of the Governor of an affected jurisdiction, the President may reduce, release, or waive all or part of amounts owed by the Government of an affected jurisdiction (or the government’s autonomous agencies or instrumentalities) to any department, agency, independent agency, office, or instrumentality of the United States. (b) Terms and conditions (1) Substantiation of impact costs Not later than 120 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Governor of each affected jurisdiction shall submit to the Secretary a report, prepared in consultation with an independent accounting firm, substantiating unreimbursed economic impacts to the affected jurisdiction of receiving compact migrants from 2004 through 2021. Upon request of the Secretary, the Governor of the affected jurisdiction shall submit to the Secretary copies of all documents upon which the report submitted by that Governor was based. (2) Congressional review and comment Any reduction, release, or waiver under this Act shall not take effect until 60 days after the President notifies Congress of the President’s intent to approve a request of the Governor of each affected jurisdiction. In exercising his authority under this section and in determining whether to give final approval to a request, the President shall take into consideration comments the President may receive after Congressional review. (c) Annual limit The President may reduce, release, or waive, under subsection (a), amounts totaling, in the aggregate, not more than $100,000,000 annually. 4. Sunset This authority of the Secretary under sections 2 and 3 shall terminate on that date that the Secretary certifies that all the unreimbursed economic impact costs to affected jurisdictions have been reconciled and repaid to those affected jurisdictions. 5. Definitions For the purposes of this Act, the following definitions apply: (1) Affected jurisdiction The term affected jurisdiction means any State, territory, or possession of the United States that receives and hosts a Compact migrant. (2) Compact migrant The term compact migrant means a person, or their children under the age of 18, admitted or resident pursuant to section 141 of the U.S.–RMI or U.S.–FSM Compact, or section 141 of the Palau Compact who, as of a date referenced in the most recently published enumeration is a resident of an affected jurisdiction. As used in this subsection, the term resident shall be a person who has a ‘residence,’ as that term is defined in section 101(a)(33) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. (3) Secretary The term Secretary means the Secretary of the Interior.