THE Bacolod City Council approved on second, third and final reading the P1.230 billion budget of Bacolod City for 2013 during a session held Thursday.
However, opposition Councilors Archie Baribar, El Cid Familiaran, Sonya Verdeflor, Catalino Alisbo and Elmer Sy manifested a qualified vote and pushed for the quarterly reporting of expenditure to avoid a situation of over-spending, especially on the hiring of personnel. Verdeflor said they voted in the affirmative but qualified such votes, particularly on the conversion of five city departments and offices, namely the Department of Public Services, Bacolod City College, City Cooperative and Development Office, Bacolod Housing Authority and City Veterinary Office, into socio economic enterprise units of the City Government. The reason for this conversion, she said, was the Budget Notice from the Department of Budget and Management citing that the city has gone beyond the 45 percent ceiling on the hiring of personnel. What the administration did was to let Councilor Caesar Distrito file an ordinance to cure the said defect, she said. The ordinance was meant to pull out the said department and offices so that their personnel could no longer be included in the 45 percent ceiling. It was passed and was made retroactive January 1, 2012. "We did not support such ordinance because its effectivity was made on the middle or third quarter of the year but will retroact to January," she said. This was the reason also that they manifested a qualified vote in the passage of the 2013 executive budget, except for the portion on the economic enterprise. These departments and offices have already made a position paper that they could not sustain themselves as economic enterprise units of the city. She added that the colatilla or condition on the new budget was for the executive department to make a quarterly report on the utilization of the budget, especially on the General Services where the hiring of casuals and job order employees fall under. This is to make sure that they will not go beyond the 45 percent ceiling on the hiring of personnel, as set by the DBM. Meanwhile, those who voted in favor of the 2013 budget were Councilors Dindo Ramos, Al Victor Espino, Em Ang, Homer Bais, Mona Dia Jardin, Roberto Rojas, Caesar Distrito, Carlos Jose Lopez and Kevin Ramos. BY: CARLA CANET SUN STAR BACOLOD
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Categories
All
|