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Pasig City’s Local Government Projects
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nown as the “Green City”, Pasig has been one of the thriving residential communities in the Philippines and led it to be recognized as one of the most liveable cities in the world in 2013. For decades, there have been the same initials that reigned in Pasig until the recent election where a new and fresh name evolved and won the votes of Pasiguenos which was then immediately tested to the next level when Pandemic hit just months after this. Lockdowns and their extension made everyone question “what will happen to us now?”, “When will this ever end?’, and “where’s the government and what are they doing?”
In the first months and every rollout of heavy lockdowns in Pasig, there is the distribution of food packs and cash incentives for every family, done through the house-to-house distribution system to ensure that everyone would benefit even those in condominium apartments regardless of whether you’re a new Pasig resident. The local government also prioritized the A2 population of the city or the Senior Citizens along with essential workers upon the arrival of the vaccines due to their high susceptibility to the virus. With an estimated 45,000 senior citizens living in Pasig City, all of them have already been vaccinated with at least one dose of the CoVid-19 vaccine by late July of the year 2021. The city was the first Local Government Unit (LGU) to achieve this crucial community health goal for its senior citizens. Moreover, nearly 100% in Pasig City also have received at least one dose of the vaccines by mid-August of 2021. These milestones were made possible through its government officials and volunteer efforts. Aside from building an online platform for its citizens to register for the vaccine schedule, the government also conducted several Vaccine Registration Express drives on each barangay to make it even easy for people to be reached out. Volunteers also made house-to-house vaccine registration to especially, cater to senior citizens with the low capability of going outside and/or using gadgets to register for their vaccine schedule. It also served as a way to conveniently address other people’s doubts and hesitation towards the validity of being vaccinated. Pasig City also has reached an achievement even from the start of the year 2020 on February when the City saved P1.2 Billion credited to a successful exertion of transparency on all bidding process and the reform of now Pasig City Mayor Vico Sotto for Freedom of Information – which also earned him the title of “anti-corruption champion” by the US State Department. In line with this, the local government continues
By: ManilaTimes.com to establish a pool of capable and Civil Society Organization (CSO) observers and train all government officials to abide to the said transparency order. Since July 2019, several employees also have been freed from contractual status. There were 1,957 total numbers of Contractual LGU employees that has been regularized, some of them has been working there for quite a long term now and this regularization of employees will still continue along with regularizations of nurses and other essential workers. Several streets also have been lit up and many more to come since the local government started the “Oplan Kaayusan” (OK) project that installs several LED street lights to spots in every Pasig Barangays with dim to no lighting at all that could be a major cause of safety issues. Roads with much-needed maintenance and/or fix also were and will be benefited from the project. The Local Government of Pasig also offers livelihood programs for its residents and one of the newest was for the Pasig Weavers in partnership with Bayo Foundation. This supports and promotes tour local and high-quality textiles and gives basic/intermediate/ advanced training to those who are interested. A lot more projects were made despite the challenges caused by the pandemic. It includes; building and improving drainage on flood-prone parts of Pasig; Urban Farming; “Electrification” which gave parts of Pasig a legal connection line of electricity such as in SMTI, Maybunga that is consist of 27 households with an estimation of 50 families; Mobile drug Testing Clinic and a possibility of having one for Family Planning and HIV Screening for a convenient and extensive reach to more Pasig residents; distribution of tablets and laptops for all Pasig students and teachers in Public Schools including Monthly Connection allowance for College students of Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Pasig plus the allowance increase for the Pasig City Scholars; Infrastracture projects such as multi-purpose buildings on some of the barangay that needs it and school buildings such as the reconstruction of the long-abandoned amphitheatre in Rizal High School; and many more to mention. Pasig Government just proved that progress doesn’t just need a multi-billion budget or a staggering debt from who knows where to be achieved. It comes with high-quality servant-leadership and a good decision-making from the votes of its citizens.
