EDITORIAL - Lost city

There probably would have been no problem with Cebu City trying to help as many sectors as its coffers can support if, in fact, its coffers are overflowing with cash and if, in fact, it has finished complying with the many basic obligations it needs to perform first.

But that is precisely the problem. The city coffers are not overflowing with disposable cash. Pretty much of what little goes into the city coffers are already obligated, to a great extent, into paying off its huge debts.

So little, in fact, goes into the city coffers that the city is now planning to increase rates in real property taxes. What that looks like to most people is that taxpayers who are already responsible for breathing life into the city will have to do more simply because the city cannot stop its profligate spending.

Providing financial assistance to solo parents is an unnecessary burden to be borne by taxpayers. While there may be some humanitarian value in providing similar assistance to senior citizens, the city is absolutely under no obligation to do the same to solo parents.

That is because unlike old age, from which there is no escape, solo parenthood is avoidable. Why should taxpayers who exercise responsible relations be made to shoulder the burden of those who don't? And while it is the taxpayers who must bear the cost of the solo parenthood of others, it's the politicians who get the credit.

Again, there would have been no problem if the city is awash with cash and it has already performed all its basic obligations before it decides to embark on unnecessary and useless expenditures. But look at the state of the city. What has it been doing with the basic services expected of it?

Many of the city roads are in bad shape. If bad roads are repaired, they are repaired badly and might as well not have been repaired at all. Many areas in the city continue to be flooded during rains, suggesting that the drainage works done previously were badly done and might as well not have been done at all.

And while it has miserably failed to provide even for just these two basic services, the city is now about to embark on throwing good money away to solo parents who got into a situation of their own choosing. Who is in charge of choosing the city's priorities? Who is plotting which direction the city must take?