Starting July, teachers’ salaries decentralized

CEBU — In what is to be a milestone in Philippine education, public school teachers will start receiving their salaries directly from the regional offices of the Department of Education (DepEd) next month with the implementation of the decentralized paycheck disbursement.

Cebu first district Rep. Jose Gullas, who is the author and sponsor of the bill for decentralized salary disbursement, will finally see his brainchild come to life as the first batches of paychecks will be released next month.

President Arroyo is reportedly coming to Cebu to personally give the first check to a recipient-teacher during the soft launching of the new system on June 20.

From then on, regional disbursements will be done through a computer-based payroll scheme, which is being viewed as a milestone because for many years, teachers’ salaries have been disbursed from the DepEd’s national offices, thus causing inevitable delays.

The scheme was meant to be a definitive move to eliminate unauthorized deductions and cut layers of bureaucracy in salary releases.

Gullas filed the bill shortly after he started his term in 2001 and saw it pass in the Lower House on Oct. 23, 2002. Since it reached the Senate, there has been no progress on the bill.

But the lawmaker said he will ask his brother, Eduardo Gullas, who was recently elected as first district representative, to re-file the bill in a relentless endeavor to have the bill eventually legislated.

Even then, Juan Miguel Luz, DepEd undersecretary for finance and administration, said both the DepEd and the Department of Budget and Management would issue a joint circular that would make the decentralization permanent.

Luz was in Cebu to demonstrate how the computer-based disbursement would work with the new payroll equipment.

Region 7 (Central Visayas) has more than 321,500 public school teachers, both in elementary and high school.

With the decentralized salary disbursement, what is left at DepEd’s Manila headquarters for paycheck processing are those for teachers of the National Capital Region, Region 4-A and B and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. Disbursements for the 13 other regional offices will now be decentralized.

In a domino effect, paycheck decentralization will also result in decentralized payments to the Bureau of Internal Revenue, PhilHealth and the Government Service Insurance System.

Luz said the DepEd has accredited at least 129 lending institutions, where teachers can apply for loans subject to salary deduction. With this facility, teachers are spared from unscrupulous creditors.

While the implementation of the decentralization scheme was originally slated in March, what delayed it was the lack of a room where the machines could be securely stored.

The room where the machines are now installed is manned by six accountants, 11 payroll clerks and one utility worker. — Freeman News Service