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