Benjie the ‘fund lobbyist’ raises P1.05B for projects

CITY HALL BEAT

Aileen P. Refuerzo

BAGUIO CITY – In between running the city’s affairs and fulfilling civic duties that included witnessing for a high profile Senate inquiry, Mayor Benjamin Magalong had taken on another role in which he had so far been proving to be effective – as the city’s biggest fundraiser.

The mayor, since assuming as the city’s chief executive last June, had raised an initial amount of P1.05 billion in pledges from various national government sources to finance major city projects. 

He had been squeezing in time to personally haggle and lobby for funds with senators, congressmen, department secretaries, line agency heads among others despite his busy schedule as the city mayor and even with the taxing Senate proceedings now tossed in. 

The funds he raised along with the projects for which they were meant had been incorporated in the Annual Investment Plan which lists the development projects for implementation in 2020.

The AIP was unanimously approved by the mayor-led City Development Council (CDC) also composed of the city’s punong barangays and civil society groups in a meeting facilitated by the City Planning and Development Office under Engr. Evelyn Cayat last Oct. 8.

“This is the way to go; raise funds from external sources to finance our major projects so we can devote our internal funds to other programs that can benefit our residents through the barangays,” the mayor said.

The mayor said lobbying is a must for the city to be able to keep up with other local government units in the race for national funds.

In the AIP, all the priority projects programmed under the external fund category save for one, were those solicited by the mayor with a total amount of P1,557,554,180.

These are the sewerage system projects amounting to P850 million; road widening projects P200 million; repair, recovery and improvement of sidewalks, P124 million; rainwater harvesting facilities, P100 million;

Construction of drug rehabilitation center, P5 million; construction of command center, P200 million; hog-raising livelihood, P10 million; and livelihood projects, P10 million.

 The mayor said there are pending fund negotiations for other infrastructure projects like parks, barangay halls, satellite markets, agricultural projects, textbooks and others, all of which he promised to follow through in the coming days.

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Mayor Magalong said the city needs to build as many parking buildings as possible as one of the solutions to easing the city’s worsening traffic problem.

In the meeting of the mayor-led City Development Council attended by the punong barangays and civil society groups in the city, the mayor said the city is looking into at least ten sites on which to build car parks.

“We need to build enough (of these parking facilities) to accommodate if possible all the 64,000 vehicles plying the city’s roads daily based on the 2018 survey and that does not include the 2019 vehicles vis-a-vis the city’s total road capacity of only 15,000 vehicles,” the mayor said.

The areas eyed for car parks are the Jadewell site at the back of the Ganza Restaurant to accommodate 550 cars, the private lot along Abanao St., the owner of which already agreed to construct a modular parking structure, the site of the City Hall Annex at the Baguio Fire Station where the city plans to put up an eight-story building with parking facility with 450-500 slots;

The old library site which upon development will devote two basement car parks; the Athletic Bowl where a modular parking facility will also be built; the BIBAK lot along Harrison Road; the Wright Park (modular); at the back of the Baguio Convention Center where a multi-level parking building will rise with 800 slots; the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) property near Victory Liner; and at the Bayan Park at Bayan Park Village.  

The mayor said he will continue to negotiate with concerned groups and individuals as well as lobby for funding for the parking plans to materialize.

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Mayor Magalong is encouraging groups to undertake tree-farming or the planting and rearing of tree seeds on vacant private and public lots in lieu of conducting tree-planting in forest reservations to ensure high survival rate of the seedlings planted. 

“I am now discouraging the planting of tree seedlings in watersheds and protected areas because of the low survival rate of the seedlings and instead let us build tree farms in vacant lots where we can nurture seedlings for two to three years before replanting them into our forest reservations,” the mayor announced Oct. 7.

 “This way, the seedlings will have higher survival capacity and therefore would make our reforestation program more effective,” he added. 

He called on private individuals who have idle lots that they do not plan to use for the next two to three years to volunteer their properties to the city government for conversion into tree farms and nurseries.

“This is for the love of the environment and for the love of Baguio,” he said.

Interested individuals may contact the City Mayor’s Office at 442-8920 or the City Environment and Parks Management Office at 443-3511 or 300-6535.

The mayor earlier directed the CEPMO under Officer-in-Charge Engr. Moises Lozano and Asst. Department Head Rhenan Diwas to develop available lots into farms to tend tree seedlings of different endemic species.

Two lots are now being planned for development into botanical rearing facilities located at the Tiptop Ambuclao Road and another at Irisan barangay.

The city’s two tree nurseries located at Busol watershed and the Botanical Garden are also programmed for upgrading into modern propagation facilities soon.

The mayor said plans are also afoot to saturate appropriate areas like Quezon Hill with bamboo nurseries.

“Bamboos have been found to have carbon dioxide sequestration capacity three times higher than any adult tree so we should also delve on bamboo propagation,” the mayor said.