MEDIUM RARE
Jullie Y. Daza
For one whose life was once lived snapping a perpetual “Yes, sir” to his superiors in the military, where the unwritten law is “No talk, no mistake,” Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong is now saying that “people should feel government” enough to act and react, and expect to be listened to when they complain.
At age 61 and on his second term, the retired general and now tireless mayor has a 30-person staff whose ages range from 25 to 35 years (and no older). You can take his statement to the bank when he taunts, “Young people should be insulted when they are called future leaders” — because “kids are not our future leaders, they are our future.”
The future is present in the now when he takes the visitor to his Smart City Command Center, a ₱200 million hub linked by 112 cameras reporting to a video analytics map that shows people, including fugitives (through facial recognition) on the street, inside public buildings and vehicles, not to mention what the city looks like from the air and up close, hectare by hectare, tree by tree if you wish. The future was also yesterday’s plan to provide a secure environment for livable communities. The weather is only a small component of what those multiple screens are programmed to do.
Keeping a watchful eye on those screens are three silent staffers. Do they close their eyes every 20 minutes? They nodded their heads, seemingly afraid to take their eyes off the screen!
Mayor BM was inspired to locate his command center — at the Baguio Convention Center — after a visit to Guangzhou, one of China’s busiest cities with its proximity to Hong Kong and Macau. Luckily, at the right time and place, then President Duterte asked him what he wanted for Baguio, “So I said, ₱200 million.” Shortly thereafter, “Senator Bong Go handed me the check.”
In addition, a $660,000 donation arrived from the Korean embassy for an early flood warning and mitigation system.
But for a population of 378,000 living in 51,000 structures, how many know that only 10,000 of those structures have building permits?
Useless to blame the past? Looking future-ward, the mayor will build 25 condos to house 2,000 families in earthquake-free Tuba.