Assistant Secretary of Interior for Insular Areas, Esther Kia’aina today approved $1.8 million in grant assistance for Fiscal Year 2016 to the Government of American Samoa from the Office of Insular Affairs’ (OIA) Technical Assistance Program (TAP) and the Maintenance Assistance Program (MAP).
Kiaaina says this year’s funding reflects the priorities and needs of the people of American Samoa including self-determination, climate change adaptation, addressing threats to public health, and workforce development both in areas of health and public works,”
Seven technical assistance grants for 2016 are:
- $300,000 for the American Samoa Constitutional and Political Status Review. The money will go to the Office of Samoan Affairs to establish the American Samoa Constitutional and Political Status Review Office. This Office will liaise, advise, and collaborate with the Legislature of American Samoa on amendments to the Constitution of American Samoa to explore possible political status with a full measure of self-governance and educating the community on these options.
- Nearly $400,000 will go to the Department of Marine and Wildlife Resources* to create a Climate Change Adaptation Strategy, to identify and prioritize immediate actions American Samoa needs to take to best adapt to climate change impacts. As part of this strategy, a climate change portal and database will be created and a territorial climate change summit will be held.
- $251,000 is allocated for the *Territorial Integrated Geospatial Framework. The funding goes to the Samoa Department of Commerce and the Environmental Protection Agency* to develop a centralized Geographical Information Service (GIS) server for all government agencies in the territory. This repository will hold geospatial information and serve as a tool to analyze and visualize data to predict the effects of climate change and to aid in adaptation planning.
- $222,500 is for the *Vulnerability Assessments of Urban Systems and Infrastructure.The money goes to the Department of Public Works *to identify key infrastructure, their functions and status in order to provide an overall picture of vulnerabilities to climate-related stress and induced events in the territory.
- $217,004 is awarded for the Improving Capacity to Respond to Emerging Mosquito-Borne Disease. The grant goes to the Department of Health* for equipment to remove and mitigate accumulated mosquito breeding sites in the community, such as tires, scrap vehicles and metals, and provide vector-borne disease prevention training to the community.
- $140,312 is for the Gastroenterology Procedures Training administered by the LBJ Tropical Medical Center. The grant will be used to improve the clinical capability of its staff. LBJ is to hire a gastroenterology team to consult on on-island training in necessary medical and surgical gastroenterology procedures, and send LBJ surgeons and technicians to the Straub Clinic and Hospital, a recognized training facility in Honolulu, where they can observe a high volume of these specialized procedures and techniques.
- $34,750 goes to the Certified Ophthalmic Assistants Training, another LBJ Hospital project to train and certify technicians as Certified Ophthalmic Assistants, to improve the efficiency and quality of practice at the LBJ Tropical Medical Center Eye Clinic, .
The two Maintenance Assistance Program grants are:
- $125,000 for the *Professional Training and Apprenticeship Program of the American Samoa Power Authority. Professional education and licensure will be provided for power system engineers, water/wastewater civil engineers, energy technology engineers, electricians and electronic technicians, and power linemen.
- $124,500 is awarded for the *Well Operator Professional Certification Training – to provide the necessary training to operate and maintain the drilling equipment and other new technologies required to develop American Samoa’s limited water resources.
