Road Maps of the LGU for that Better Balete than Yesterdays



My town, by local standards, has marked milestones over the years. The most prominent of which is when it was included among the 15 elite municipalities throughout the entire country to receive the much desired Seal of Good Housekeeping Award way back in 2010. Such feat it has maintained since then. Other towns in Aklan look at us in revered admiration whenever we are gathered together in certain occasion. Some, perhaps out of curiosity or of resolve to elevate theirs into our league, voiced out in wonder: Why is it that despite your poverty, you've done so much for your people? Responding to it, I simply state a fact: it is so because we are one. 

The baffled sophisticated inquirer however would not settle for such a simple answer. He wants complicated yet verifiable systems or approaches that brought us into such pedestal. So perhaps, the following "road maps" could satiate his curiosity and inspire him to replicate the same in his area of jurisdiction:



  & Balete  Citizen’s Charter (2010)
The Citizen’s Charter is a guidebook of key local government services.  Balete LGU subscribes to promoting integrity, accountability, proper management of public affairs and public property as well as to establish effective practices aimed at the prevention of graft and corruption in government. Thus it has enacted the Balete Citizen’s Charter with the hope of maintaining honesty and responsibility among its public officials and employees, and to promote transparency in each agency with regard to the manner of transacting with the public, which shall encompass a program for the adoption of simplified procedures that will reduce red tape and expedite transactions in government.

       Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP) –CY 2004-2014
The CLUP and its corresponding Zoning Ordinance is popularly called “the People’s Plan”. It is a 10-year plan to manage the local territory; a skeletal-circulatory framework of the territory’s physical development that identifies areas where development can and cannot be located and directs public and private investments accordingly. Balete is the first in Aklan to have a CLUP.

       Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP) for CYs 2010-2016
The CDP is a six-year term multi-sectoral plan primarily based on the Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP) of the local government unit to develop and implement priority sectoral and cross-sectoral programs and projects in the proper locations. Balete is the first in Aklan to have a CDP.


       Executive and Legislative Agenda (ELA) for CYs 2010-2013
ELA is a planning document, covering a 3-year period corresponding to the term of local elective officials that is mutually developed and agreed upon by both the executive and legislative departments of an LGU. Balete is the first in Aklan to have an ELA (2004).

       Annual Investment Program
The AIP covers the priority projects and programs to be budgeted and eventually implemented on a particular calendar year to approximate the ELA, the CDP and the CLUP. It also constitutes the annual slice of the Local Development Investment Program (LDIP) both of which are implementation instruments, referring to the indicative yearly expenditure requirements of the LGUs’ programs, projects and activities (PPAs) to be integrated into the annual budget.

       Environment Code (2004)
This is a codified instrument of all pertinent ordinances on Environmental Protection. It predates the Environmental Code of the Province of Aklan which was only enacted in 2007.

       Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP)
SWMP is a 10-year system plan of the LGU. It is a document that establishes goals and programs for the handling of solid waste in a manner that meets local needs and is consistent with the national government’s solid waste management priorities. It details the municipality’s waste management practices. In the plan, the LGU establishes waste reduction goals and identifies programs and policies necessary to meet them. The plan also describes the methods used to collect and transport solid waste and recyclables to disposal and processing facilities in an environmentally sound manner. 

       Local Poverty Reduction Action Plan
LPRAP is multi-sector thematic plan formulated in 2012 and for implementation starting 2013 until 2016. It employs bottoms-up planning to meet Millennium Development Goal in reducing poverty incidence in the community.

       Gender and Development Code (2006)
This covers all the local ordinances that supports/enables national and international laws concerning gender and development

       Children and Youth Welfare Code (2010)
The CYWC is the LGU’s testament in recognizing the importance of effectively promoting, fully enhancing, and institutionalizing the survival, development, participation and protection rights of children within the framework of advancing general welfare in furtherance of integrated, sustainable and equitable development. This code covers all the local ordinances that advances and protects the interest and rights of children and the youth.

       Code of General Ordinances (2011)
This instrument codifies all the relevant general ordinances of the LGU.

       Local Investment Incentive Code (2009)
LIIC is a policy document that covers all the local government investment policies and programs, Investments Priority Areas (IPAs), local incentives (fiscal or non-fiscal) available to domestic and foreign investors and the mechanics for availing them.

       Revenue Code (Revised 2008)
The Code of Revenue Ordinances of the Municipality of Balete is one of the oldest support documents as it serves as its basis in revenue generation. It has been revised in full in 2008 and the Sanggunian has from time-to-time made amendments on it in accord with the signs of the time.

       Compliance on Full Disclosure of Local Budget and Finances and Bids and Public Offerings
In support to the principles of Good Governance, Transparency and Accountability, the LGU sees to it that there is a method of full disclosure of all its financial and other fiscal activities readily accessible to the viewing public.

       Ecological Profile
The LGU has come up with an ecological profile, a document containing information about its immediate environment. It contains relevant data about the present flora and fauna (plants and animals) in the vicinity, the problems arising regarding these living things, the present and past state of the area's environment and other things.

A development model akin to the one adopted by the LGU in approximating that Better Balete than yesterdays. 

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