CEBU City Hall lawyers yesterday assailed the civil suit filed by a barangay councilor and nine others against Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña and other officials relative to the City’s towing operations.

The complaint, they said, is tantamount to a “collateral attack” on the provisions of City Ordinance 2172 of the City Government, something that the mayor’s critics have denied.

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A summary hearing on the civil case filed by Tinago Barangay Councilor Joel Garganera against Osmeña and six others was held yesterday morning before Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 17 Presiding Judge Silvestre Maamo Jr.

Mayor Osmeña did not attend the hearing and instead sent City Hall lawyers— Ferdinand Cañete, Raffy Yap and Joseph Bernaldez – to represent him in court.

Traffic

Lawyer Perla Centino, counsel for Road Warrior, the towing company that that City Hall hired to implement the City’s towing ordinance, said that stopping the operations of the firm may result in “unmanageable traffic” in major thoroughfares of the city and that the court should not grant the injunction.

Centino believes there is no need for a public bidding for the operations of the towing companies since no public funds are being disbursed.

Quoting a provision of the Local Government Code, Centino said the law empowers a chief executive of a government unit to enter into an agreement for services such as towing operations.

But lawyer Neil Nuñez, counsel for Garganera and nine other complainants, clarified that they did not assail the ordinance per se.

Authority

What they were questioning was the authority of Mayor Osmena to give a “provisional authority” to the towing companies without prior authorization from the City Council as well as a public hearing, Nuñez said.

Nuñez said they are not even against the operations of the towing entities, for as long as the authority issued by the mayor to towing companies is legal.

Nuñez also questioned the “character” of the funds being released to the towing companies by the City Treasurer’s Office.

He said he was “mystified” by the fact that towing fees are being remitted to the treasurer’s office and “mixed up” with public funds the City has been paying to towing firms as their “share” for services rendered.

“If we will not constrain the towing operations, the discharges of public funds will be in quandary,” Nuñez said.

In the past years, he said, towing operations were “capriciously and arbitrarily” done in major streets of the city.

Nuñez insisted that the towing operations lacked the needed resolution from the City Traffic Operations Management board and the City Council, which he said is provided for under the existing laws and regulations.

“The contract and provisional authority (issued by the mayor) was illegal,” he said.

He asked the court to order an immediate stop to the towing operations and the collection of towing fees by the city treasurer to prevent the City Government from releasing public funds “pursuant to an illegal contract.”

But City lawyers denied that public funds are involved in the operations of the towing companies.

In a separate interview, Yap said the mayor gave authority to One Stop Towing for the company to implement the City’s towing operations.

Yap also dismissed the arguments of the complainants’ lawyer that public funds are involved in paying for the services of the towing firm.

Yap explained that towing fee collections are remitted to the treasurer’s office and are “held as a trust fund.”

He accused the complainants of “muddling the issue” in contrast to the legality of towing services.

After the hearing, Judge Maamo ordered both parties to submit their memoranda on Tuesday next week so he can note all the arguments.

Maamo also assured both parties that he would hasten the resolution.