Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama has to deal with an unfriendly majority in the City Council, which will scrutinize his proposed annual budget for 2016. Would it get approved more easily if there’s nothing there to slash?
Mayor Rama says his ‘People’s Budget’ still meets all needs
For 2016, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama has submitted his leanest annual budget proposal for the city government at P8.9 billion.
The amount is one-third smaller than the current year’s budget.
His official reason: With elections ahead, it’s up to the new set of officials to set their priorities.
Another reason, which Rama told reporters, is to avoid having his critics in the City Council delay approval with excessive scrutiny.
“It’s our considered stand that by having that amount, perhaps the City Council won’t be spending much time tinkering with it and come up with what they believe should be approved,” Rama said in a text message.
Rama submitted his “People’s Budget” last Friday, the Oct. 16 deadline for all local government units.
“Aware of the forthcoming elections next year and the term limits of elected officials, we consciously proposed a leaner budget but still in accord with our administration’s established budget parameters embraced in the acronym BARE, which stands for Balance, Adequate, Responsive and Effective budget,” he wrote in his cover letter.
In contrast, Rama last year proposed a budget more than double this amount at P18.9 billion which the City Council reduced to a more manageable P13.4 billion for the year 2015.
Rama said his administration will spend the biggest part, or half of the total pie, next year for “development administration,” with a focus on empowering barangay officials and communities because they are “our first responders to disasters and calamities” and provide front-line service.
Second priority is “social development” with 25.3 percent of the budget.
This is followed by infrastructure at 15.4 percent, environmental development at 7.76 percent and only 1.13 percent for economic development.
Rama said the budget will be used “to fund major infrastructure projects, such as the rehabilitation of Pasil Market and the completion of Carbon Markets”, the new Cebu City Medical Center and construction of a modern abattoir, among others.
For flooding, however, “we don’t see a need to appropriate some funds for major drainage projects for the ensuing year, considering that there is still sufficient allocation that can be utilized.”
As fund sources, Cebu City officials expect to raise P4.1 billion in tax revenues next year and collect P2.79 billion as sales proceeds from the SM-Ayala Consortium and Filinvest Land Inc.
The payment from private developers is the first of three annual installments from the remaining P8.3 billion proceeds from the sale of two SRP lots bidded out earlier this year.
The tax collection target of P4.1 billion is bigger than this year’s P2.9 billion target.
Of the expected amount, P1.5 billion will be from Real Property Tax (RPT), P450 million from the Special Education Fund (SEF) Tax and P2.2 billion from other local taxes for amusement, business, and community taxes among others.
The expected Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA) for Cebu City next year is P1.5 billion.
In a separate interview, City Budget Officer Marietta Gumia said the budget is smaller because officials who are elected next year will come up with their own Executive-Legislative Agenda (ELA) for the next three years.
Another consequence: More supplemental budgets will have to be passed to answer for needs that arise during the year.
The new set of public officials can come up with additional budgets once they assume office, said Jose Daluz III, the mayor’s former executive assistant, who is running for a seat in the City Council.
Rama was a member of the Local Finance Committee (LFC) which prepared the 2016 budget.
“We’re just being very prudent. We just put in the basic necessities. We will have a lot of money next year, because they (opponents in the City Council) don’t want us to spend the P8 billion. It’s up to the next administration, hopefully us, to craft a new (supplemental) budget,” Daluz told CDN.
Daluz also said several projects funded by this year’s budget, mostly infrastructure projects, have not been fully implemented.
City Councilor Margarita “Margot” Osmeña declined to comment on the 2016 budget proposal, saying she hasn’t seen it yet.
Asked if she was surprised with the smaller figure, Osmeña, who heads the council’s finance committee, said “not really.”
Mayor Rama acknowledged the strain between his office and the city legislature.
“As your Local Chief Executive, I am aware that I am submitting this Proposed 2016 Annual Budget against the backdrop of some political bickering and skirmishes which, by the way, is inherent in a democratic society such as ours,” Rama wrote.
“In these trying times though, our values and principles are put to test, our patience stretched to the limit, our true characters either will surface or will be thrown inside the garbage bins. But all these should not deter nor preclude us from performing our functions as faithful stewards for the betterment of our city and its people,” he added.
A proposed P2.8 billion supplemental budget no. 1 remains stalled in the City Council.
Solely funded by sales proceeds of the SRP lots, it was supposed to wiped out the city’s Japanese loan for the SRP.
The mayor’s critics have voted down attempts to resume discussion on the measure.