BACOLOD City’s solid waste management (SWM) budget for 2015 amounting to P149 million was already exhausted, thus the need for additional P62 million to help save Bacolod from stinking, a councilor said.
The P62 million is included in the request for the P225 million supplemental budget submitted by Mayor Monico Puentevella.
Councilor El Cid Familiaran said that Executive Assistant Ma. Fe Tresfuentes explained that the volume of garbage being hauled every day has reached 1,090 cubic meters, and the budget of the City is only for 722 cubic meters, or an excess of 368 cubic meters every day.
The City Council has allocated P192 million for the SWM program of the City, wherein the P149 million was set aside for the payment of the garbage hauling and services contract with Dynamic Builders Inc.
The P43 million was allocated for the garbage cells and others expenses.
"We can save more from our SWM expenses should we start to implement the provisions of Republic Act 9003 or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000 particularly on waste segregation," Familiaran said.
Meanwhile, the City Council is set to hold a special session on July 28 to take up the P17.5 million in accounts payable and other payable balances outstanding for more than two years which the mayor has requested to be reverted to unappropriated surplus.
The P17.482 million includes the terminal benefits of previous city employees and payments to suppliers, former mayors, and other elected officials, banks, schools, payments to the Bureau of Internal Revenue, Corazon Locsin Montelibano Memorial Regional Hospital, and the Municipality of Pulupandan.
The amount is also part of the proposed P225-million supplemental budget.
During a caucus in the middle of the session Wednesday night, Councilor Em Ang questioned Executive Assistant Sarah Esguerra where will they get the budget if the contractors, suppliers, and employees demand payment for their services in case the P17.5 million will be reverted to unappropriated surplus.
Ang also said some suppliers have informed her that they have been following up their payments which were not released by the City.
Esguerra assured the councilor that there will be enough savings to pay the suppliers and contractors and other individuals by the end of June or July in case they demand payment, and she suggested that they write the City Mayor’s Office for its release.