Im interested in investing and building Dormitoriies and commerical buildings in Tacloban but my recent application for Location/Zonal Clearance with the City Planning prevents me from pursuing the project.

Reasons:
1. application forms and procedures being witheld by the City Planning clerk to prevent us from completing our application
2. financial demands made by the city planning clerk to ease/facilitate the smooth process of the application
3. withelding zoning maps to confuse applicant.

Are their any agency that can help me process my Location/Zoning Clearance?

I found this comment on another website:

"I'm a businessman planning to invest in tacloban. i have submitted a zonal application to City planning but i can t deal with the corrupt officials of the City Planning office. do you pay them for "grease money" or are their any agency that can help me."

Is this also from you? Because this is pretty much about the same issue .. !? Have you ever tried talking to the mayor himself? Try calling the Tacloban City Hall, this is the office of the City Mayor Alfred Romualdez. The number is: 0063.53.321.3369

We must fight corruption wherever it occurs !!

Good luck and let us know what happened ..

with kind regards,
Admin TCF

Can you tell us the name/s of the corrupt city planning official/s .. !?

Hello. You can write to the City Mayor regarding your problem. You can indicate there where you had the problem, who you had a problem with, etc. You can even forward your concern to the Mayor's Action Center. I remember a qoute, "The only way for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Forward your concern, back it up with data and evidence. :-) There is also an offer by Bayantel, i-txt mo si mayor. There are details all around downtown. Just look for the tarpaulines. A letter would be great since it is formal and it is in writing. Mas maupay!

Thank you for the feedback. Here are the updates,

1. Spoke with different lawyers for legal advice. Unfortunately, there is no lawyer in Tacloban that deals/specializes in Real Estate or Zoning.
2. Got same feedback from some contractors in Tacloban. Its common and usual practice for contractors and engineers to give monetary "help" to City Planning and City Engineers office to facilitate a smooth approval for their applications.
3. based from what I hear, "monetary help" goes to high places. That means I need to be carefull whom I talk to for help because they may be involve, putting myself and project at risk.
4. I just found out that the Zoning Map for tacloban city is attached in the Tacloban City gov official website. this gives me a concrete evidence that my zoning for the property is different from what the city Planning officials are telling me.
5. Calling the Mayor. Hmmm. I am sure (assuming) that he knows whats going on. The question is, how can i convince him to do something about it.
My proposal is to advice him to put video cameras in and around City Planning and City Engineers office. I think its called "Hawthorne Effect" meaning--people tend to do well/good when they know that they are being watched. Funds to put this up will be coming from business donations.
What do you think?

you can file a formal complaint

As much as I want to put faith in our government but I think filing a complaint would probably get you nowhere soon. There's simply too much corruption embedded in our society. Might want to go to an ombudsman but that will also take ages. Your cctv/camera idea would seem to be a novel approach, but then again it will not likely happen any sooner also. How about bringing in some popular media/TV shows that capitalizes on such? The more national the better.

If I was the one to make a business I think I wouldn't pay ..

I don't know if anyone would even dare to ask me for (bribe) money ..

I think I would get so mad and I would go public and I would not stop until that person is relieved from his job ..


Nice idea with involving the media .. I guess it shouldn't be that hard to find a TV-Station who would like to make it .. maybe with some hidden cams when your handing over the bribe money ..

its a good idea but i am a businessman not a journalist. how i see things is the "bottom line". simply, potential sales/income minus expenses(including unforseen expenses) . will i make a profit or not. so, if the location is too risky, the best decision is to move on to another location. like palo, leyte for example.

what is sad about this is that these kind of 'behaviors" from a specific department will reflect a negative perception of "tacloban city" as a whole, hindering further economic growth. it will also reflects a bad perception on the current leadership of the mayor of tacloban city.

looking back at my experience, as a businessman, ill give myself a grade of c+. i had an excellent start by purchasing a strategically- moderately priced land near a well known school. business plan done and numbers look good. but all of these things cannot be put into actuality without "grease money" and more "grease money" to get an occupation permit when the building is done. and guess what, yup, you guessed it, more "grease money" for the business permit. and "yup" again to get water and power line. and on and on and on.

I had a great time though, meet a lot of people, i believe they were good people deep inside, its just that the system/environment that they grow up with is the problem.

now i understand why we see a lot of veteran chineese businessman running for office, i bet, one of the reason is to protect their businesses from these "risks".

anyway so muchfor my blubbering.... a good binagol and moron will probably ease the pain

hmmm di hra unta mag sugad h2n, kay kun pangurakot la it ira,... edi diri nra gin hhimu it ira trabaho kay bga la gjp it2n nra hin gn pupugngan it pag asenso hit Tacloban,.... nga dapat nabulig i2n hra ha Ciudad kay asya gjp i2 ada it nasweldo ha ira,... di nra gn sasakob ha kasing2 it ira trabaho...