‘QC back on its feet’

An upbeat Quezon City Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr. told businessmen yesterday the city is finally "getting back on its feet" after being able to pay almost half of the nearly P3 billion in debt inherited from the previous administration.

Speaking at the 10th Metro Manila Business Conference, Belmonte said that only a year after he assumed office, City Hall has already paid close to P1.25 billion in debts owed to various contractors and overdue remittances of city employees to the Government Service Insurance System, among other financial obligations.

The city, he said, is also close to erasing a P1.4 billion loan with the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) incurred by his predecessor, former Mayor Ismael Mathay Jr.

To make Quezon City a better business destination, it must show that it knows how to handle finances well, the mayor told the participants of the conference, an annual project of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Metro Manila Chambers of Commerce and Industry. The Quezon City government is hosting the conference.

For the first time in several years, Quezon City now has in its coffers assets worth some P3 billion, with a cash balance of P1.7 billion.

"To think that only last year, when I assumed office, the city had a negative cash balance," the mayor said.

Belmonte said he was shocked upon discovering that City Hall had not been remitting its employees’ contributions to GSIS, as well as withholding taxes to the Bureau of Internal Revenue since 1995. He also found out that City Hall owed Meralco some P60 million in unpaid bills, and another P560 million in claims of garbage contractors and equipment rental companies.

"We are now able to pay our current financial obligations as well as inherited ones," he said.

He said his goal is to make the city competitive when it comes to attracting more investors, both local and foreign.

The key to this, he said, is productivity, which is the ability to do more with less. – Romel Bagares