ANGELES CITY -- Mayor Carmelo "Pogi" Lazatin, Jr. is gearing up this city to be the country’s next Smart City.

IC Calaguas, the long-time political officer of the Lazatin family and now the chief adviser and tactician of Lazatin Jr., recently made the announcement.

Calaguas said the free internet for all Angelenos will pave the way to the convenient linking of government systems throughout the city. She said transactions with the City Government will be done online.

"For the last quarter of the year, Mayor Lazatin will be deploying payment kiosks for business tax, real property tax and even simple traffic violations," Calaguas said.

Lazatin will be deploying payment kiosks to all barangays and will also use kiosks at convenient stores for tax payments.

Lazatin will also fund the second phase expansion of its Angeles City Emergency Disaster Command Center to monitor traffic and for peace and order.

By October, Lazatin will be testing cashless payment in public markets and public transportation.

“We will pilot test it in selected public transport and public markets, once na-perfect ang system, Mayor Lazatin will roll out the use of cashless payment throughout the city,” Calaguas said.

Calaguas was also the head of the Angeles City Information Communication Technology Division was back in 2001 during the time of then-mayor Carmelo “Tarzan” Lazatin.

The full computerization of the city government revenue offices was also certified as ISO 9001:2000 in 2002, the first local government unit outside Metro Manila to receive the certification.