Southern Leyte named as best DILG provincial office of 2012

DILG-Southern Leyte romped away with the major awards in the recent Yearend Evaluation of the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG – 08) held at the Tacloban City Convention Center on December 14, 2012.

Southern Leyte province was recognized during the Parangal Ceremony as Best Performing Provincial Team and Best in Annual Report, which greatly elated Provincial Director Johnny Badocdoc and his staff who were all present.

Coming in at second place  was Leyte province, and third was  Northern Samar. The ranking was made by DILG Regional office using the field units’ performance in pursuing their program targets. Meanwhile, Tacloban City edged out Ormoc City as Best Performing City Team. 

A day earlier, the DILG Team of Ormoc City garnered the top award for Best Annual Report in audio-visual form during the presentation of Provincial and City Annual Reports held at the DILG-8 Local Governance Regional Resource Center (LGRRC) at the second floor of the DILG Regional Office. The revival of the “Parangal” award was envisioned by DILG-8 Regional Director Pedro A. Noval Jr. as a way to recognize achievers and encourage further productivity among employees. 

Director Noval in his keynote address on December 14, urged all DILG-8 personnel to be champions of good governance as espoused by the late DILG Secretary Jesse M. Robredo, as well as  to dedicate themselves in following through the priorities  laid out by the new DILG secretary Mar Roxas. He noted with approval the region’s high performance in implementing agency programs, which he attributed to their all-out support to the team approach which he started employing in the region to promote knowledge management and better productivity.

Assistant Director Arnel M. Agabe in his welcome remarks, congratulated all personnel for contributing to the strong public satisfaction of DILG’s performance, as revealed by the recent Social Weather Station (SWS) survey on good local governance on August 2012 that was commissioned by DILG with help from Australian Aid and The Asia Foundation.

In that survey, 70% were satisfied with the performance of DILG for a Very Good net satisfaction rating of +63% and seven (7%) dissatisfied.  But he challenged all personnel to address the concerns of the remaining seven percent who were dissatisfied with the agency, by taking strongly advocating and explaining the department programs.

Tacloban City Mayor Alfred S. Romualdez, who served as guest speaker, gave tribute to the role of DILG in strengthening the capacity  of local officials in delivering basic services. This is the reason why, he said, that he committed to support the agency’s plan to put up a training center in the DILG compound.

“In 2010, many newly elected punong barangays texted me that they did not know what they had gotten into, but that they would follow my leadership. So I told Dir. Noval that we must really put up training centers to address this need of local officials”, said Mayor Romualdez.

The yearend evaluation likewise saw the launching of the Call Center on Local Governance, which aims to provide faster service to its clients who pose queries and information via phone. Further, the event marked the Graduation Rites for 20 Local Government Operations Officers II (LGOOs) who passed the intensive and multi-level Induction Training this year. The six-month Induction Training which is a must for one to be a full-fledged LGOO, is supervised by the DILG’s Local Government Academy (LGA) to prepare its personnel in providing technical assistance to LGUs and to respond to any eventuality involving local governance in their assigned stations