City can still get loan
SANS GOOD HOUSEKEEPING SEAL
Without a seal of good housekeeping from the Department of Interior and Local Government, can the Cebu City government still loan from banks?
The SGH is being conferred to local government units that have no adverse report from the Commission on Audit and have complied with the posting of 12 required financial documents.
The last time the city secured the seal was in 2011 but it is eyeing at making a P120 million loan to construct a new building for the Cebu City Medical Center. This amount is equivalent to 10 percent of the estimated cost of at least P1.2 billion and up to P1.5 billion.
Under the new circular of the Bureau of Local Government Finance, the following documents are required from a local government unit on top of the SGH: Letter-request from the local chief executive; certification from the local legislative body that the proposed project to be financed by the loan is included in the Approved Annual Investment Plan for the current year; authenticated copy of the resolution authorizing the local chief executive to negotiate and contract a loan; proof of compliance with the full disclosure policy of the DILG, among others.
Local Finance Circular 1-2012 requires LGUs to submit these documents to BLGF before they can be granted Certificates of Borrowing and Debt Service Capacities should they need to borrow money.
LEEWAY City Treasurer Diwa Cuevas said the city can still avail of a loan even without an SGH being directly affected by calamities such as super typhoon Yolanda and the magnitude 7.2 earthquake, both in 2013. The earthquake had damaged the old CCMC building severely that the structure had to be destroyed.
Cuevas said the city can also avail of the privilege once it reconciles the balances of two accounts Property Plant and Equipment and Inventory. These accounts will determine the financial condition and unsettled balances of the city.
“Once ma- address ni, COA can issue certification para maka- avail ta og loan,” she said.
The process, however, doesn’t end here and the city may have slim chance of availing of the 10 percent loan, which is a prerequisite to availing of the 90 percent grant from the World Bank’s Support for Strategic Local Development and Investment Project. The grant will cover the remaining 90 percent of the total projected cost.
This is because COA has rendered “adverse opinion” for at least three consecutive years following the “irregularity, insufficiency and omissions on the various records” of the city government’s transactions.
The circular, which was signed by Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima whose department oversees BLGF, superseded Local Finance Circular 1-2000 issued on January 19, 2000. CCMC The official composition of the Bids and Awards Committee for the procurement of CCMC was issued by Mayor Michael Rama.
The special BAC for CCMC is headed by Department of Engineering and Public Works chief lawyer Jose Marie Poblete together with his vice chairman Atty. Jose Daluz III (executive assistant to the mayor) and members Atty. Dominic Diño (chief of staff), Atty. Gerone Castillo (city attorney), and Dr. Daisy Villa (city health officer), Marietta Gumia (city budget officer).
CCMC director for medical services Dr. Gloria Duterte serves as representative of the requisitioner replacing City Councilor Mary Ann Delos Santos, chief of the ad hoc committee for CCMC.
Castillo explained that Delos Santos cannot sit as BAC member because the implementing rules of the Bids and Awards Committee composition for local government units and Republic Act 9184 or the Government Procurement Reform Act do not allow it.
The law provides that only employees with a plantilla position can be allowed membership in the BAC.