DAGUPAN CITY - The city government of Dagupan has trimmed down its bloated bureaucracy as a prelude to the reorganization program and to generate savings of at least P1 million a month.

In his talk to media, City Administrator Raffy Baraan explained why Mayor Benjamin S. Lim ordered the termination of technical consultants and emergency workers effective at the close of office hours of August 31, 2006.

Baraan said that the reorganization plan is now on its final stage prior to its implementation even as he pointed out that the termination of emergency workers forms part of the whole reorganization process.

Baraan assured that the services rendered by the city government will not be affected as the positions held by the emergency workers will be replaced by regular employees.

He clarified however that EWs who handle vital and highly specialized positions will not be terminated. He cited as example the POSO traffic enforcers who underwent long training before they were deployed to man the traffic.

I always say that some EWs are performing very well but we have to give up most of them temporarily, Baraan stressed even as he said, that the EWs will be given the first crack to fill in regular positions later during the reorganization process.

Baraan said that the action will allow plantilla position holders who were then not being maximized by their superiors a chance to shine and perform their duties efficiently.

“We have to judiciously use our scarce resources and therefore we do not want to waste the money we are paying for our regular plantilla position holders by hiring emergency workers to do their job,” Baraan said.

Before the termination of the employees, a team was created to study the procedure in order not to affect the quality of service of the city. The team was made up of the personnel office, the city mayor’s office, city accountant office, city budget office and city treasurer’s office.

The team had a meeting with each department head to assess the function and responsibility of each emergency worker assigned in their respective offices, whether they can be replaced by a regular employee or not.

The team finally submitted to the mayor and the city administrator the matrix containing the names of each emergency worker and hsi or her subsequent replacement from the ranks of regular employees. Baraan said that about 65 to 70 per cent will be removed from the total 255 emergency workers employed at the city government before the massive streamlining of the bureaucracy.

Baraan also said during the interview that during the reorganization only 400 plantilla positions from the original 600 posts will be filled up. There will also be no emergency worker during that period, he said.

On separate occasion, Baraan said that the ultimate goal for the reorganization is to make the bureaucracy “lean but mean.” (CIO)