BAGUIO CITY – The city government streamlined the period for the issuance of business and building permits by the concerned offices pursuant to the mandate of President Rodrigo R. Duterte for local governments to fastrack the grant of permits and licenses to their clients based on the provisions of the law providing for the ease-of-doing business in the country.
City Administrator Engr. Bonifacio dela Peña, upon orders of Mayor Benjamin B. Magalong, worked with the City Treasury Office, the City Buildings and Architecture Office (CBAO) and the Permits and Licensing Division under the City Mayor’s Office to further reduce the waiting period on the issuance of business and building permits being applied for by residents for their businesses and structures in the different parts of the city.
Under the newly adopted set up, applicants for the issuance of business permits can get the permit that they have applied for in less than an hour, provided that, all the required permits have been given due course by the concerned offices and all the prescribed payments have been settled with the treasury office.
Further, concerned offices are given a maximum of 2 days on the application for the issuance of clearances such as the fire safety clearance, health certificate, zoning clearance, occupancy permit and building permit that could be simultaneously applied for by the interested individuals.
The city administrator explained the issuance of the business permit could be less than an hour depending on the validation of the concerned offices on the issued clearances.
If the concerned offices will not act on the request for online validation of the clearances within one hour, the applied business permit will be deemed approved and that the same will be printed upon payment and the same will be subsequently released to the applicant.
On the issuance of building permits, the CBAO is mandated to issue applications for simple building permits in 7 days, medium complex building permits in 22 days and complex building permits in 32 days, inclusive of the signing of the permits by the city building official.
Dela Peña disclosed that simple building permits are for structures below 3 stories, medium complex permits are for structures 3 to 8 stories but less than 10,000 square meters floor area while complex building permits are for structures having over 10,000 square meters.
According to him, there will be personnel of the CBAO who will first evaluate the application for issuance of building permits and if the applications will be returned to the applicant for lack of requirements, the counting of the number of days will not start until such time that all the requirements will be completed.
He added the city government will have to make do with the streamlined issuance of business and building permits for the meantime but efforts are being done to find ways on how to further improve the same pursuant to the pertinent provisions of the law on the ease-of-doing business in the country.
He urged the transacting public to be patient with the different offices of the local government as the present administration explores all opportunity to provide them with efficient and effective services that will warrant their utmost satisfaction. By Dexter A. See
