For the second year in a row, the City Government of Tagbilaran clinched the Civil Service Commission’s PAGASA Award, according to a report of the City Media Bureau.
In 2020, Gerard Lavadia of the City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office won the prestigious recognition for the Communication Line for Emergency and Alarm (CLEAR) system.
This year, the Civil Service Commission (CSC) recognized the Coronavirus disease (Covid) Task Force composed of City Mayor John Geesnell Yap II, City Health Officer (CHO) Dr. Jeia Pondoc, nurse Reina Torralba, medical technologist Emma Sagaral, and midwife Hannafil Pacomios as the regional winners for 2021.
The CSC lauded the management of Tagbilaran City of the Covid pandemic, where massive testing was launched, coupled with the implementation of strict health protocols.
As a result of these initiatives, citizen confidence was restored, enabling Tagbilaranons to engage in local business transactions and as a result managed to keep the city’s local economy rolling amidst the pandemic.
The strict health protocol implementation in the city coupled with the strict quarantine rules greatly helped in the containment of the Covid virus.
Thus, despite the pandemic, the City of Tagbilaran exceeded the collection targets set by the Bureau of Local Government Finance (BLGF) in both business and real property taxes as of December 2020.
Moreover, new businesses opened up in the city despite the health crisis we are in.
To date, 579 new businesses or P727 million worth of fresh capital was infused into the local economy of Tagbilaran City in 2020.
Tagbilaran City also exceeded the target set by the BLGF in 2020 in all four local fund sources.
In fact, Tagbilaran City won the Most Business Friendly Award in 2020 given by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI).
Tagbilaran City also won 3rd Place in the Digital Governance Award – Business Category.
The Department of Health (DOH) Region 7 also recognized the efforts of the Tagbilaran City Health Office in infant immunization.
Tagbilaran City also increased its ranking in the Cities and Municipalities Competitive Index, from rank 26th last 2019 to rank 20th in 2020, maintaining its position as the Most Competitive Component City in the entire Visayas.
The City of Tagbilaran also won the Pagkilala sa Natatanging Kontribusyon sa Bayan – Gawad sa Paglilingkod sa Sambayanan (PANATA-GAPAS Award).
Tagbilaran City was cited as the Outstanding Local Government Unit (LGU) in the Implementation of the Sustainable Livelihood Program – Employment Facilitation Model for 2020.
Mayor Yap said that the Covid pandemic is definitely one of the difficult challenges that his administration has faced, especially with its effect on the local economy.
However, the local chief executive is also not shying away from the challenge and stressed that this is not the time to dwell on the difficult situation.
“We may have been delayed by the challenges brought about by the threat of COVID-19, but we will not stop achieving our targets. We will not stop growing and we will look forward to the things we have planned out to do prior to this pandemic. It’s not important what happened in the past; the important thing is where we are heading. We will keep our priorities in focus”, Yap said.
Furthermore, Pondoc has also not shown signs of slowing down.
“I have always been a hard-worker. I don’t stop until I finish my job. If there are things that remain undone, I finish it myself. Some of my staff would probably never understand the way I work. But I learned from my mentors that to be an effective leader, you have to lead by example. Even if the job is difficult, you have to do it”, Pondoc emphasized.