Makati City Mayor Abigail Binay reported on the city’s achievements in 2017 in her State of the City Address (Soca) delivered before Rotarians during the first monthly meeting of the Rotary Club of Makati held at the Peninsula Manila.
The mayor informed the Rotarians of the remarkable increase in the city’s total revenue collections in 2017, amounting to P16.97 billion, which is 116 percent of revenue target and 12 percent more than 2016 actual collections.
“We have reason to be jubilant about the two-digit increase because, based on official records, the city has only posted one-digit year-on-year increases for the past 12 years,” Binay said in her Soca on Tuesday.
The mayor added business tax remained as the top source of revenue with P8.22 billion, or a 10-percent increase over 2016, followed by real-property tax with P6.22 billion, higher by 15 percent than the previous year.
“We are heartened by the apparently robust state of our finances. We humbly thank you, our faithful taxpayers and stakeholders, for your contributions to Makati’s continuing progress,” Binay said.
The mayor underscored innovations done in the field of public health in 2017, such as the launching last July of the Eye Center at the Ospital ng Makati, which aims to give the best ophthalmic care to Makatizens.
The Makati Health Department has, likewise, been busy implementing vaccination programs among students and city employees in line with its thrust on preventive health care.
The mayor also shared that increasing the budget for the free-medicines program turned out to be a prudent decision, as the city was able to provide free maintenance medicines, vitamins and other medications to some 527,989 beneficiaries.
Last October the citywide Pet Microchipping Program was launched, making Makati the first city in Asia to use the PET iChip technology on a large scale. The program aims to promote animal identification, pet recovery and rabies prevention, the mayor said.
For the education sector, Binay reported that, for the first time, the city government has provided a pair of brand-new white rubber shoes to some 90,000 public-school students from kinder to high school, including special education (Sped) learners. The beneficiaries also continue to receive free school supplies, school uniforms and a pair of black school shoes.
The city government also distributed P5,000 cash incentive to each of the 557 SPED learners who were promptly enrolled by their parents in the city’s Sped centers last June, in line with its resolve that “no one gets left behind.”
Aside from new CCTVs, LED TVs and air-conditioning units, the city government also installed Tech-Voc Laboratories for 12 senior high schools, as well as the first Biotech Laboratory at the Makati Science High School.
The Launching of the University of Makati (UMak) School of Law (SOL) was another milestone for the institution in 2017. “Led by its founding dean, my father, former Vice President Jejomar Binay, UMak SOL, as we fondly call it, offers a juris doctor program to aspiring lawyers nationwide,” the mayor added.
The institution is supported by the city government with the passage of City Ordinance 2017-044 authorizing its establishment. It offers full scholarship for the 26 students from various parts of the country. They are also given P20,000 book stipend per year, and a P10,000 monthly allowance for the entire academic year.
The city’s College Scholarship Program for qualified students recently produced five successful graduates, including three cum laude graduates from the University of the Philippines (UP) and two from the Philippine Normal University (PNU).
To date, the city has five scholars in UP and nine in PNU. They receive a monthly stipend of P4,000 each for five months per semester, and book allowance—P5,000 for scholars in UP and P4,000 for scholars in PNU.
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If you walk around Poblacion, Pembo, Cembo, Pio del Pilar, La Paz, third world na third world ang Makati, Madumi, magulo at panget.