NOTE: THIS STORY WAS FIRST PUBLISHED IN THE BOHOL CHRONICLE’S SUNDAY PRINT EDITION.

Certified as “urgent” by Bohol Governor Art Yap, the Sangguniang Panlalawigan last week approved another  P24.7M Supplemental Budget for “priority initiatives of the Provincial Government”.

Except for the “procurement of vehicles to transport cadavers”, none of the uses of the supplemental budget relate to health considerations.

Most of the funds will be used for the training of Agri-Fishery Resiliency Technicians, procurement of farm equipment, awards for prior year’s “Galing Purok” winners, insurance for government buildings and equipment and the renovation of the old Provincial Capitol for the use of Regional Trial Courts.

Likewise, for “the training and equipment of the Provincial Security Force”.

It may be recalled that the Department of Agriculture had already allotted P600B as a response to the challenges of the pandemic’s effect on agriculture. The agri-related uses of the P24.7-M budget can be presupposed to be merely supplementing the DA efforts.

The above projects will be funded by the appropriated surplus of Reverted Personal Services from the 2020 Supplemental Budget 1 appropriation, re-alignment of funds of the 2021 Supplemental Budget No. 1 for the Training for Agri-Fishery Resiliency Technicians and the 2021 20% Development Fund for the Establishment of a Food Dehydrator Facility.

The province had already approved a total of P4.6-B as the traditional budget for Bohol for the year 2021, a 33% rise over the 2020’s P3.4-B Budget.  Meantime, the P2-B Bank-financed water investment project of the province had only a few town takers.