Thursday, January 03, 2008 Wenceslao: City's knee-jerk acts By Bong O. Wenceslao Candid Thoughts
GOOD that some Cebu City Hall officials are listening. I am referring to Councilor Edgardo Labella, who is urging local health officials (and indirectly, I think, some of his colleagues) to base their campaign against dengue fever on “hard and verifiable” facts. I have written about this after City Hall focused its attention on some lagoons in the city.
It now looks like City Hall will have to revise the lagoon-is-the-culprit theory, which became the focus in the campaign against dengue when Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña talked about it last month. Labella’s suggestions, like conducting studies and geographical mapping to find out where dengue-carrying mosquitoes breed, are sane.
I just hope that, with this experience, City Hall officials will now do things better, not only in the campaign against dengue fever but also in other aspects. By better, I mean that they will come up with drives and projects that are well planned and not knee-jerk. Or to put it in another way, whatever the mayor says does not necessarily mean it is good.
I have already mentioned “plans” to solve flooding in the city, like transforming our streets into rivers. I reckon that scientific studies have already been done on the flash floods that have bedeviled our existence the past several years and the recommendation is to solve the drainage problem. Other weird plans will only be a waste of time and money.
I don’t know how many other City Hall acts have been more of knee jerk rather than of their being well planned. But with the way the mayor has been running City Hall, it is possible there are a number of them. And with the many “knowledgeable” members of the Council, more willy-nilly moves may have resulted in wastage at the lower levels.
My biggest concern is, of course, the South Road Properties (SRP). I have long criticized the manner the lots are being disposed, which to me depends too much on the whims of the mayor. Everything done in the SRP should have been the product of careful planning by experts, including even the spending for that costly marker set up last year.
I mean, developing the SRP and the launching of other major campaigns and projects of the city should not be the knee jerk acts of one man or one clique.
(khanwens@yahoo.com/ 0915-9228651/ my blog: cebuano.wordpress.com)
