BUTUAN CITY, Aug. 20 (PNA) -– City Mayor Ferdinand M. Amante, Jr. highlighted the importance of the implementation of the Performance Government System (PGS) in his State of the City Address (SOCA) at the second special session of the Sangguniang Panglungsod.
In his speech, Amante said the PGS was able to help the city in redefining its vision to become a model for sustainable forest-based economy in the country with the highest per capita income growth in Mindanao by the year 2020.
In line with this, he also added that key initiatives that will bring the city’s inclusive growth were identified. Aside from this, the PGS is really about initiating behavioral change within local government units and incorporating sound strategic measures in addition to its core function of achieving optimum results.
In addition, he mentioned that since the city started undertaking PGS in October 2013, Butuan had already passed its first three stages: the initiation stage last April 2014; the compliance stage last October 2014 and the proficiency stage last may 2015.
He is also confident that the system will take Butuan to the global arena and may be the key to the city’s participation in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) to be held in the Philippines by November.
At present. the city is now preparing for another round of performance audit to be conducted by next week so that it could be chosen as one of the “Island of Good Governance of the Philippines,” which may be featured in the APEC by November.
Because of this, Amante believes the system, which he tagged as the most significant change he will share with his constituents, will help encourage the employees to be more involved in strategy execution and contribute directly to the development of the community.
“PGS will make Butuan become the ‘timber city’ of the South once more,” Amante said.
The PGS is an initiative from the mentorship of the Institute for Solidarity in Asia (ISA), a governance system modeled after a methodology from the Harvard Business School.
Moreover, Amante also highlighted some of the developments of his administration such as the rise of business registration figures in the city to 9, 638 in 2014. For the first half of this year, the city had already processed 9,254 business registrations.
“This is a big increase from only 6,000 in 2010,” he said.
The city also remains in a good financial position as revenues from its tax collection already Php111,000,00.00 for the first semester of 2015. With this, the city is expected to surpass 2013 and 2014’s tax collection figures, amounting to Php125,000,000.00 and Php141,000,000.00, respectively, by the end of the year.
Meanwhile, property tax figures for 2014 reached a total amount of Php110,000,00 which exceeded the city’s collection target pegged at Php98,000,000.00.
The mayor said that the increase in real property tax collection is partly attributed to the completed data bank system for real property units in Butuan City.
The mayor also reported an increase in the internal revenue allotment (IRA) of the city which also increased from Php773,000,000.00 in 2013; Php870,900,000.00 in 2014 to Php995,000,000.00 in 2015. For 2016, the city’s IRA will increase further to Php1,100,000,000.00.
Aside from these feats, other aspects of the city’s development which were mentioned in the address included progress in other fields such as economy, society, infrastructure, peace and order and the city’s “Vision 2020.” (PNA)