BACOLOD City Councilor Carl Lopez said he has already abandoned his proposal to rename the Fr. Mauricio Ferrero, OAR Street to Chicken Inasal Road since 2019.
This is in reaction to a recent online petition launched against the move to rename the street at the Reclamation Area in the city.
Lopez, chair of the City Council Committee on Agriculture and Environment, told SunStar Bacolod that the proposed renaming of the street sometime in August 2019 was to make the area a tourism strip where all kinds of "inasal" can be eaten.
Lopez said this will generate more businesses and highlight the culture, food and delicacy that Bacolod City is known for.
The official believed that this will also improve business and tourism in the area, as well as alleviate the income of the vendors. "We can also focus on sanitation and hygiene."
"Upon closer study, however, the street had a historical significance," Lopez said, adding that "[so] I decided to abandon the proposal."
On November 29, 2020, an online petition was made against the move.
The petition launched through change.org has already garnered 336 signatures as of December 2.
It stated that City Ordinance 473 S. 2008, an ordinance naming the road as the Fr. Mauricio Ferrero, OAR Street, was authored by then Councilor lawyerJocelle Batapa-Sigue.
It was passed in honor of the urban planner who planned out the city, the petition added.
In a statement, the councilor said that, in legislation, the first reading is a reading of the title followed by a public hearing.
"I did not pursue with the public hearing. I abandoned the proposed legislation and made it die a natural death," Lopez said.
The councilor added that "therefore, this is a non-issue to be debated or discussed since the proposed ordinance has been abandoned or aborted due to the facts I discovered as the author."
"You can be rest assured that there will be no change in the street's name," he added.
Lopez also said he looks forward to work with the people in his other ordinances like the Climate Emergency Resolution and Coal-Free Living Ordinance, which says no to the operation of coal-powered plants in the city.