The Bacolod Sangguniang Panlungsod members will meet on Thursday to take up the schedule of a public hearing and the final deadline for accepting offers for the proposed new City Hall for Bacolod City, Bacolod Councilor Lyndon Caña said yesterday.

Caña said that after the SP passed a resolution Thursday declaring the inadequacy of the present City Hall, the next thing it needs to comply with under the Local Government Code is the conduct of a public hearing in order to get the opinion, comment and reaction of the public on the 15 or so proposed city hall sites, including the proposals of former Vice Mayor Ramiro Garcia and former Councilor Juan Ramon Guanzon. Garcia wrote the SP asking its members to seriously consider the Bacolod Airport as the new site for the City Hall, while Guanzon proposed to donate to the city his 5-hectare property in Brgy. Mansilingan.

Hopefully the public hearing will be held in February, Caña said.

He said the SP will also get reactions on what should be done with the present City Hall, which certainly will still serve a public purpose or function. Although there were suggestions that the present site be sold and its proceeds used to partly finance the construction of a new site, he said, however, nothing is final yet.

Caña said that if the SP decides on a site, this may probably be in March or within the first quarter. " But the final challenge is not so much on the site since we have a good number of sites being offered, but the way to finance the project, "he said.

Caña said it is possible that the SP may be able to select a site but if there is no feasible and doable funding plan for the building of the structure or the acquisition of the site, it may still be a problem.

He said the SP should have to decide what funding approach to take, either to use local funds, consider a Build-Operate-Transfer scheme, or sell the old site to partly finance the new building or solicit donations. These matters remain to be debated and discussed, he added.*CGS

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