Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the many individuals and organizations that contributed their time, knowledge, and effort to aid us in our research. Firstly, we would like to thank our workshop facilitator Eduardo Bhatia for his invaluable instruction and guidance throughout the process of producing this report. We also thank the staff at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs for their support.

Our work is particularly indebted to local civil society leaders, activists, experts, and elected officials in Puerto Rico, who graciously and enthusiastically supported our research endeavor. We are particularly grateful to the Center for a New Economy for their sustained engagement with our project and for allowing us to present a preview of our report in their 2021 Growth Policy Summit. The authors would like to thank the following individuals for their contributions:

Pedro Pierluisi, Governor of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico José Luis Dalmau, President of the PR Senate Rafael Hernández, Speaker of the PR House of Representatives Omar Marrero, Executive Director of the PR Fiscal Agency and Financial Advisory Authority Francisco Parés Alicea, Secretary of the PR Treasury Juan Carlos Blanco Urrutia, Director of the PR Office of Management and Budget Zulma Rovira-Pérez, COR3 Luis M. Collazo Rodríguez, Administrator of the PR Public Employee Retirement System Julia Nazario Fuentes, Mayor of the Municipality of Loiza Natalie Jaresko, Executive Director of the Financial Oversight and Management Board Antonio Weiss, former Counselor to the Secretary of the U.S. Treasury Kent Hiteshew, former Director of U.S. Treasury’s Office of State and Local Finance Rosanna Torres, HUD Senior Advisor for Puerto Rico Sergio Marxuach & Deepak Lamba-Nieves, Center for a New Economy Cecille Blondet, Daniel Santamaría & María Mercedes Rodríguez Rivera, Espacios Abiertos Rolando Emmanuelli, Bufete Emmanuelli, C.S.P. Rafael Arrillaga-Romany, RAR Consulting Group, LLC Javier Rua-Jovet, JRJ Consultants and Legal Advisors Jorge Irizarry, Executive Director of Bonistas del Patio José Coleman & Emiliano Trigo, former officials at the PR Government Development Bank Javier Balmaceda, Senior Policy Analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities Ricardo Cortés, Public Affairs Director at Discover Puerto Rico John Bozek, Research and Stratregy Director at Invest Puerto Rico

Members of the workshop team meeting with Puerto Rico Governor Pedro Pierluisi. From left to right: Professor Eduardo Bhatia, Ryan Price, Nethaniah Josma, Juan Pablo Alvarez Enriquez, Joshua Seawell, Gov. Pedro Pierluisi, Francis Torres, Joscelyn Garcia, Andre Zollinger, Jia Jun Lee, Guillermo A. Herrera.

Published January 2022

Cover Photo by Stephanie Klepacki on Unsplash