TINIAN – Commonwealth Public Utilities Commissioner James Mendiola has released a video defending his vote to lift the Fuel Adjustment Charge cap, taking his case directly to social media as ratepayers across the Commonwealth react to a near-doubling of the surcharge tied to global fuel prices.
The CPUC voted 3-1 on May 16 to raise the FAC from 24.5 cents to 44.489 cents per kilowatt-hour, effective May 15. The increase reflects April’s global ultra-low sulfur diesel prices, which more than doubled from March. Mendiola was among the three commissioners who voted yes.
Speaking in the video, Mendiola said he was not speaking on behalf of CPUC but as an individual community member responding to comments he had been reading on Facebook.
“I’m reading a lot of these comments on Facebook and I understand completely,” Mendiola said. “There’s a lot of frustration, a lot of negativity, a little bit of violence in the comments, a lot of FUs. And I just wanted a chance to explain myself.”
Mendiola, whose background is in economic and financial consulting, walked through the analysis behind his vote. He said the FAC was designed in 2014, and earlier under the Levelized Energy Adjustment Clause, to float with the market because roughly 85 to 90 percent of the charge tracks fuel prices.
“My decision to vote yes on removing the 24.5 cent cap was not me just licking my finger and pointing up in the air and seeing which direction the wind’s going,” he said. “I want to make sure you understand that I did it with diligence. I looked at the numbers. I looked at the economic analysis, general facts and figures, and really came to that decision under a heavy heart. But I felt like it was a decision that needs to be made.”
Mendiola pointed to the ongoing Iran war as the driver of the fuel shock. “Every single barrel of oil, every single gas price for the last few months has built in risk premium because of the uncertainty of the region we’re talking about,” he said. He said the FAC mechanism was set by a 1985 agreement that requires the Commonwealth Utilities Corporation to recover every cost. “The cost of the fuel has to go somewhere, and it goes to CUC, and CUC has to recover that fuel cost,” he said.
Mendiola compared the CNMI situation to Guam, which faced the same fuel shock but did not pass the full increase to ratepayers. “Guam Power has reserves in place so that it can absorb some of that,” he said. “Why does the CNMI not have reserves? Well, that’s the crux of the situation. We’re talking about years and years and years of financial management which have kind of dwindled any kind of reserve capacity that the CUC has.”
He laid out what he called a “perfect storm” of three converging pressures: the post-Super Typhoon Sinlaku recovery costs, the fuel-price shock, and a decline in the Commonwealth’s primary industry. Mendiola cited tourism figures showing the CNMI received about 43,000 visitors in October 2018, compared to 10,000 in October 2025.
“I went back and looked at all of these activities because that’s what I do,” he said. “I look at quantitative numbers, and I said, holy mackerel, what are we going to do? Because honestly, the situation has gone down to the point where we’re saying we’re thinking about the survival of CUC.”
Mendiola framed the vote as a choice between giving CUC the tools to survive a two- to three-month window and risking the utility’s collapse. “If CUC goes down, it’s a very difficult road for it to come back,” he said. “At least we can survive in CUC. We have the choice to regulate. Do we turn on the light? Turn off the light. Without CUC, there’s no choice.”
He acknowledged the public anger and said ratepayers were entitled to it. “You wanna get angry, that’s fine. You’re entitled to your opinion,” Mendiola said. “Maybe not so much where you’re threatening me harm or telling me to F you, but I get told to go F myself constantly.”
Mendiola said he was open to direct conversation with constituents. “I’m bicycling and walking around Tinian. I’m driving around Tinian. You catch me at the right time. Hey, let’s sit down and talk,” he said.
The video closed with a call for cooperation. “Marianas strong, CNMI strong shouldn’t be just words. Let’s cooperate, let’s dig deep. We’ve done it before.”