Laoag City Mayor Michael V. Fariñas has vetoed seven items of the Sangguniang Panlungsod-approved 2007 annual budget as he strongly believed that these items would be prejudicial to the public interest. The vetoed portions of the annual budget were appropriations disapproved by the council. They are as follows: P70,000 information technology equipment/software for the city hospital; P20,000 budget for other property/plant/equipment for the city population commission; P300,000 for maintenance/other expenditure repairs/maintenance of other public infrastructures under the city engineering office (CEO); P250,000 land under capital outlay of the CEO; P500,000 for other structures-Day-Care/Health Centers, etc. also under the CEO; P500,000 for buildings under the capital outlay of CEO; and aid to PNP under the non-office/other purposes wherein P1,300,000 was appropriated but only P800,000 was approved. With this veto, Fariñas said he hopes the council would consider them for the continued full operations of the identified offices with their corresponding appropriated expenditures. Sangguniang Panlungsod member Vicentito M. Lazo presented the mayor’s letter containing the veto during the last regular session of the council. Lazo, who chairs the council’s finance committee, said, “We cannot override it. But we are requesting the local finance committee to come and attend the next regular session in order for us to be enlightened ken kayat mi a maamwan kadakuada no ana ti effect na daytoy vetoed items.” Lazo cited the P1,300,000 proposed aid to the PNP, wherein only P800,000 was approved by the council, explaining that it did not mean that the remainder of the proposed budget would not be approved in a separate appropriation ordinance as he stressed that they were just waiting to determine if the surveillance system, which the proposed budget would be used for, would be situated in City Hall or at the new PNP headquarters. Lazo also emphasized that the other expenditures were disallowed by the council as they wanted to know specifically where the amount would go. “We are not saying that we don’t want to release it but [we] only want to know kung saan gagamitin ‘yan. Then we will just pass an appropriation ordinance,” Lazo said. He also clarified that the appropriations for the CEO which were deemed disallowed had in fact been allocated for other projects of the city government since there was no specific projects that were identified. He added that these were also appropriated into infrastructure projects. “Kayat na nga sawen nga saan nga naikkat dagitoy nga amount no di ket naikabil lang iti sabali a proyekto,” Lazo said. Dominic B. dela Cruz
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