Baguio, Benguet execs okay rules for Metropolitan dev’t authority

By Marlo T. Lubguban and Ma. Odette G. Abitan

BAGUIO CITY – The Metropolitan Baguio City, La Trinidad, Itogon, Sablan, Tuba, and Tublay Development Authority Council approved Oct. 12 implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of Republic Act 11932, creating the MBLISTTDA.
    The council was given 90 days from the approval of the law on July 30, 2022 to craft the IRR.
    The IRR was crafted by a technical working group led by Benguet Vice Gov. Ericson L. Felipe and composed of BLISTT vice mayors, Benguet provincial, city, and municipal legal officers, legal officers of the congressmen of Baguio City and Benguet, Sanggunian chairpersons of committees of laws, rules, and legal matters including representatives from regional offices of the Departments of Budget and Management, Interior and Local Government and National Economic Development Authority.
    The TWG defined key administrative, operational and financial concerns under RA 11932.
    The Council unanimously approved the IRR with minor corrections and improvements.
    The IRR will be published after effectivity of RA 11932, which is 15 days after its publication in the Official Gazette.
    RA 11932 institutionalizes the BLISTT inter-local cooperation by establishing a development authority that shall manage inter-local development and ensure financial support from the national government for the implementation of BLISTT-wide programs and projects.
    The MBLISTTDA shall support the BLISTT as the economic and educational primary growth center of the Cordillera Administrative Region.
    NEDA Cordillera Administrative Region has served as secretariat of the BLISTT Governing and Development Councils since 2014 and continues to provide technical assistance in the BLISTT’s transition from an inter-local body bound by a memorandum of agreement into a development authority under the direct supervision of the President of the Philippines.