I FULLY agree with the Department of the Interior and Local Government's (DILG’s) call for local government units (LGUs) to draw their updated local economy recovery plan amid the continuing fight against Covid-19.
It is a timely and right move so the LGUs can effectively and comprehensively address the deepening crisis caused by Covid-19.
In this time of crippling crisis, it is an obvious fact that LGUs play the lead role in recovering the local economy and spurring sustainable growth. The reason is quite clear - LGUs are the only institution that has the power, authority and resources to bring life to a dying economy. Of course, this is on the assumption that LGUs take seriously their governance or their reason for being. Forget about this when LGUs are deeply rotten.
Having a recovery plan is critical to easing the economic and social impact of Covid-19.
Since there are still more LGUs which have not completed or don’t have yet approved Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP) and Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP), the two basic plans mandated on LGUs under the Local Government Code, they have to give this priority first, and therein integrate the local economic recovery plan.
CLUP, as LGUs are supposed to know and practice, sets its strategic physical or spatial development plan, basically for every 10 years, though most urban and environmental planners encourage longer coverage, like 15 to 20 years. It defines how the LGUs should manage their lands and assets vis-à-vis population growth, planned growth, resource requirements of growth, management of protected areas, climate change and disaster risks, among others. This is important to ensure that the present generation doesn’t compromise the needs of the next generations.
Once the CLUP is established, the CDP follows because the latter based its goals, policies, programs and investment for the inclusive development of all sectors and communities in its area of responsibility. The CLUP and CDP are key to the comprehensive city or municipal development.
They can also serve as the basis for the anti-Covid and post-anti-Covid economic recovery plan. Most of the components of the recovery plan are in fact already laid down in the CDP, e.g. food security, jobs generation, social services, and support to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), among others. All it needs is to beef up the capacity of the LGUs for a pandemic-adaptive health system, and utilize whatever funds and resources available and accessible to them.
Obviously, their value is so great that they cannot and should not be compromised nor replaced by the wish list, whims and caprices of the politicians, who just come and go in the LGUs.
They are not just the basis for projecting revenues and incomes; they as well serve as license and pass cards for getting development investments from both public and private, from local, regional, national and even international.
Sadly, the CLUP and CDP remain highly downgraded, neglected in a number of LGUs nationwide. In some LGUs, I learned that CLUP is updated in compliance with HLURB and DILG, but the politicians hardly read it or use it for their programs and project identification and setting of their local development investment plan.
Feedbacks from local LGUs sometimes expose the contempt of some local chief executives (LCEs) on CLUP and CDP, deriding them by saying “why bother about CLUP and CDP when we have huge Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA), and we can go straight to congressmen and senators for project funds.”
This is so unfortunate that some LGU officials have made CLUP and CDP victims of their own brand of narrow and self-serving politics.
This also kills any effort to address the deepening economic and social crisis caused by the pandemic.
I still hope that good LGUs and LCEs should stand up and be the exemplary institutions and leaders for spurring truly inclusive, sustainable, smart and resilient local development.