Naga’s new Sangguniang Panlungsod vows faster, more pro-poor ordinances

By Paul John F. Barrosa

NAGA CITY -- With a new Sangguniang Panlungsod office as well as a new set of legislators, the 11th Sangguniang Panlungsod of Naga under its new leader, Vice Mayor Nelson S. Legacion, pledged to push for reforms more efficiently and more openly.

In his inaugural speech on June 29 at The Tent, Avenue Plaza Hotel, Legacion said that the SP’s performance will be measured in two key points: promptness to pass sound legislations; and capa-city to pass “welfare legislations.”

For the first one, the city council has already set in motion the conduct of paperless sessions through full computerization of its system. The new Sanggunian Panlungsod Session Hall, which was inaugurated July 2 showcases computers on individual tables of the councillors as well as state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment.

Codification of ordinances is also intended to be done “to ensure a more systematic arrangement of law” in Naga.
For delivery of welfare legislations, Legacion said that the SP intends to achieve this by engaging the people to participate in policy-making.

“Bringing legislation into the realm and consciousness of the masses is clearly one of our major priorities... With the wider and more welcoming new office of the Sangguniang Panlungsod, more members of the public and press can be accommodated. A greater number of audiences can observe and participate in the deliberations and debates of the Sanggunian,” he said.

Mayor John G. Bongat expressed support to these new initiatives of the city council.

“We started as a team and we shall continue as a team. Though there is a clear separation of power between the executive and the legislative, we shall always support each other for the betterment of the city and our constituents,” Bongat said.