Cebu City budget approved

CEBU CITY – Senior citizens got the biggest allocation in the city’s R6.29-billion budget for next year.

The budget, which Mayor Tomas Osmeña proposed, passed with no objections from the city council.

R606 million was earmarked as financial assistance to senior citizens.

The next biggest allocations were R507 million for debt service payments and R363 million for infrastructure construction and rehabilitation.

Other big ticket items were garbage collection and disposal (R313 million), programs on hospitalization and medical assistance (R213 million), scholarship program (R204 million), aid for the city’s barangays (R173 million), and heavy equipment rental (R65 million).

City Councilor Margarita Osmeña, head of the council’s committee on budget and finance, said there were only “minor” changes in the approved budget.

In a six-page committee report read by Councilor Osmeña, the Local Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Fund (LDRRMF) budget for relief and recovery was slashed from R55 million this year to R30 million next year.

The cut came about after a proposal to give R9,000 as rental subsidy for fire victims was dropped.

The R25 million was reprogrammed to other uses under the LDRRMF.