MikeLigalig.com

By the Bohol Chronicle

Tagbilaran City Vice Mayor Jose Antonio Veloso demanded transparency behind the request of the city mayor for a P40.7 million supplemental budget.

Veloso who presided last Friday's session of the city lawmakers, was surprised to receive the request minus the particulars on where specifically the money be used.

City Kagawad Oscar Glovasa, chairman of the committee on appropriations who requested the matter to be considered as "special order of the day" presented the signed request of the city mayor for a supplemental budget amounting to P40,728,306.

During the session, Veloso reminded his colleagues on the city mayor's call for "transparency" which he repeatedly wrote when he notified the vice mayor of his supposed 27-day leave which he shortened to seven days last month.

Veloso said it has been agreed that request for budgetary allotments should not be hurriedly approved by the body but should instead exhaust time to scrutinize all budgetary measures in the spirit of transparency.

The vice mayor, as presiding officer,  said it would be prudent to have the matter referred to the committee on appropriations for further discussions especially that he noticed the absence of specifics on the outlined request.

The cover letter signed by the city mayor stated that the P40,728,306 was intended for the "maintenance of our city roads and barangay roads, the revamp/ expansion of city street lights and other necessary expenditures."

The vice mayor said the budget request was "so generalized that if we approve the request without further scrutiny and discussion, it was like giving the mayor a blank check for him to decide where and how to spend the money."

He cited as an example the request for P1.9 million for "calamity fund" when the city did not experience any calamity.

"We were also shocked for a budget request of P13 million for city street lights while the budget request for road repair was only P10 million," he stressed.

The vice mayor deplored the "sense of priority considering how deplorable our roads are and yet the budget request for street lights was more than what was requested to repair damaged roads in almost all parts of the city.

Veloso said he was particular on the  fund request for road repair as there was  no program of work attached which reminded him of the continued refusal of the office of the city engineer to provide the program of work of the P19 million one-kilometer concreting of Gallares street.

"We are extra careful in approving fund releases for road projects after the sad experience on the Gallares concreting where our request for a program of work was ignored until this time," the vice mayor stressed.

In fact, City Kagawad Zenaido Rama earlier expressed suspicion of a highly overpriced concreting project considering that per estimates issued by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), a kilometer concreting project would only cost P11 million (at most) while the amount spent for the one-kilometer Gallares concreting reached P19 million.

"If there is nothing to hide, why will they not release the program of work," Rama questioned.
Included in the budget request was P3 million for "payment of job orders, launching activities" with no specific details while P600,000 was sought for payment of honorarium and P150,000 for consultancy services. Both requests did not include particulars on who will be given said honorarium and fees.

Others included in the budget request were: P4 million for honorarium for purok tanods; P4 million for honorarium for purok health workers; P300,000 for water sealed toilet project; P1.5 million for financial assistance for indigent/crisis intervention; P830,556 for payment of interest and bank charges; P250,000 for documentary stamps;  P500,000 donation for Bohol Chamber of Commerce & Industry (IT'S SAFE); P300,000 for contractual services and P8,306 for bank charges.

The budget request was signed by City Budget officer Rose Palma who was present during last Friday's session. However, she failed to present supporting details of the budget request.

Kagawad Glovasa is convening the appropriations committee on Tuesday to discuss the budget request after he failed to have the budgetary request approved as "special order of the day" during last Friday's session. Kagawad Lucio Balbin, is the committee vice chair with Kagawads Bebin Inting, Edgar Kapirig and Edgar Bompat as members.

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=20852.0