Correcting Barangay Laws 1

Correcting Barangay Laws: Factors That Cause the Ineffectiveness in Barangay Law and Its Solutions Sungmin Kim High 3F, Xavier School School Year 2012 - 2013

Correcting Barangay Laws 2

I. Introduction: A. Reason why the researcher chose this topic B. Objectives C. Limitations D. Definition of Terms Thesis Statement II. Reasons for inefficiency of implementation of barangay rules A. Inappropriate Punishment System B. Lack of Manpower and Methods of security C. Lack of Motives Among the People in Abiding the Laws III. Conclusion

Correcting Barangay Laws 3 Introduction As the researcher has been living in the Philippines for almost 7 years, he has noticed that the ignorance of a person can affect others just as much as the how tippling one domino can cause a ripple effect, affecting others. One of the best examples of this is the irresponsibility among the people in obeying the laws and regulations of the barangays, which result into littering, since there is no one to apprehend the violator. The researcher has seen those who open dump, such as disposing of trash directly into sewers, who drawing graffiti on walls of streets, and violating other simple law. The violators do not conceive their wrongdoings as violations to the law, rather a part of their lives. In addition to that, what has caught the researchers attention was the ineffectiveness in giving out sanctions by barangays. According to the barangay law, minimum penalty for petty crime is 1 month imprisonment, along with maximum P1000.00. (Sample include littering, vandalizing, among other.) The expected effect of this sanction would be the lessening in numbers of petty criminals, but sadly, it fails to serve its purpose. Therefore, to make these effective, the researcher suggests that changes must take place in the barangays themselves. The changes could instead be giving out the community service orders as sanction for petty criminals, increasing barangay personnel, and urging the residents to follow the law. (Community service order is a sanction wherein the violators must work for the benefit of the public with no compensation.) Although the paper focuses about the factors that contribute to the failure in effectively implementing the rules in the barangays, it is important for the readers to be aware of the limitations of this research. Due to the lack of information about the barangays, it is hard to pin-point the exact numbers of barangay personnel, therefore

Correcting Barangay Laws 4 the researcher had to estimate the numbers based on his observation of barangay personnel in his own barangay. On top of that, it is nearly impossible to tell how many people in the Philippines receive community service as a sanction because such government statistics are not disclosed to the public. Statistics about barangay violations are not available. The goal of this research is to show people why the current punishment system for petty crimes doesnt work, as it is expected to be able to, and what the barangays must do in order to make their punishment be more economical, and effective. The following word will help the readers in understanding the research when it comes to the sensitivity in meanings of the words shown below: - Community service order: A sentencing option for persons convicted of crimes in which the court orders the defendant to perform a number of hours of unpaid work for the benefit of the public. (Community service order. (n.d.). Retrieved January 12, 2012, from:http://legaldictionary.thefreedictionary.com/ Community+service+order) - Sandiganbayan: A special court which has jurisdiction over criminal and civil cases involving graft and corrupt practices and such other offenses committed by public officers and employees, including those in government-owned or controlled corporations, in relation to their office as may be determined by law. (Art. XIII), 1973 Constitution. (Sandiganbayan.(n.d.). Retrieved March 04, 2012, from: http://sb.judiciary.gov.ph/about.html)

Thus, to make the barangay laws effective in implementation, change in sanctions and rewards for the officials, manpower of barangays, and passive mentality of the residents must happen.

Correcting Barangay Laws 5 II. Body Ineffective sanctions Currently, there are more than 42,000 of barangays in the Philippines according to the NSCB (National Statistical Coordination Board), and each of them has their own unique sets of rules which the residents have to follow but despite the fact that these barangays have different kinds of rules, they all have the fundamental rules that everyone must follow such as maintaining the cleanliness of their areas, guaranteeing safety of properties of residents from thieves, among others. These are maintained by sentencing prisoners and ordering them to pay heavy fines to prevent people from violating theses basic rules. Unfortunately, due to the nature of current sanctions along with lack of manpower in barangays, and distorted mindset of people, it became a common thing to violate such rules. To clarify more on the current sanctions, Sec. 516 of the Local Govt Code of the Philippines will tell you that the barangays have the right to ask for maximum of P1000.00 fine along with maximum of 1 month imprisonment. The reason behind implementing rules and regulations is to lessen the harm that is being done to the people. But unfortunately, despite the presence of the fines and imprisonment, violators have been increasing in numbers. In fact, the numbers of trials by the municipal courts has increased from 0.77 in 2003 to 1.08 in 2009. As said in the introduction, it is impossible to say the exact numbers of crimes done in the barangays, but to talk about the crime as a whole, year 2009 became the peak season for the crimes by having 523.4 crimes from having 154.9 crimes in 2008, as mentioned by the NSCB (This data is based on 100,000 people, and the crimes have been increased onward.). As a matter of fact, based on this situation, it is evident that the rules are not the

Correcting Barangay Laws 6 reason for the increasing of crimes, but it is the corruption that hinders the proper implementations of the rules. When the violators are confronted with the barangay personnel, they are given a choice: to serve the sanctions that are due on them. But there is the other way, the other easy way that is the best solution for the problem: to pay off, or to bribe the officer, then off they go. To prove the evidence in increase of such corruptions, the NSCB statistics show us the increase in trials held by the Sandiganbayan, from holding 297 cases in 2010 to holding 482 cases in 2011.

To prevent this possible getaway for the violators and to let them serve the proper sanctions due on them, instead of neither sentencing imprisonments nor giving them the fines, community service orders must be given away to the violators, and along with this, rewards should be given to the officers of the crimes. If the officers are given rewards, such as a day-off or some cash prizes, then there will be no reasons for them to let the violators walk away. And also, this will push the officers to work hard to catch them. For the violators, community services can be a method of rehabilitation, proved by the research done by the Oregon Department of Corrections in the U.S in 2002.This showed that those who are given the community services as a sanction have the lowest possibility for reconvictions. In addition, implementing community services to the violators costs less money compared to imprisonments. Michael Tonry, a professor of criminal law also agreed in the benefits given by the community service in his book, Intermediate Sanctions In Sentencing Guidelines, in June 01, 1997, by saying, "...community service is a burdensome penalty that meets with widespread public approval. It is inexpensive to administer, and produces public value..." (p. 11)

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Community service is simple: They have all the freedoms like any others, but they must do some tiresome works on the streets for certain time. Forcing them at work which advocates the better welfare of the barangay, while giving them no salary at all, decreases the budget used for the barangay works such as street sweeping. Plus this also acts as the rehabilitation program for the violators. When these violators are faced with shame and hardships, they will not be willing to commit the petty crimes again since they will be noticeable on the streets.

Increase of Tanods and change in patrols in barangays The other reason that makes the barangays rules ineffective is the lack of manpower to regulate the respective areas properly and equally. With only few numbers of people working as the barangay officials, it will be impossible for them to watch over every single street; therefore, to raise the efficiency of the patrol, the officials roam around the streets by riding motorcycles. But unfortunately, this method is considered as a time-wasting method with no good outcome since those patrols are done too fast that it cannot guarantee the thoroughness of the search. Therefore what is needed is the walking patrol method done at night which had been the official method of patrolling in barangays in 2009. Walking takes longer time than riding motorcycles, therefore this gives more time for the officials to look and check around the streets. It is totally impossible for one official to stay all day and night on a certain street of the barangay. Therefore, as a solution to this problem, increasing the numbers of barangay tanod is the right way to aid in maintaining the order on every street of barangay. Day shifts and night shifts can be created under the increase of

Correcting Barangay Laws 8 manpower; therefore nobody has to worry about taking the shift all day long. Plus, to make sure that the new tanods are qualified to take care of the barangays, checkups of their performances on their designated streets by the barangay captains can be the good way to make the tanods be vigilant and hardworking.

Complication in mentality of the crowd According to Licuanan, there is this unique attitude from almost all Filipinos towards the authorities that make them too much reliant onto them. (1994) This attitude was created through the passivity of the Filipinos. This mindset justifies the violations of people by saying that there will be someone who will fix the problem, but not me. The problem that lies in this mindset is the fact that this mentality is actually being passed down to the next generation over and over again, due to the extreme family-centeredness, as said by Licuanan (1994). When the elders of the family have a dominant idea over a thing, it is most usually accepted by the growing children, thus, the cycle repeats when those children grow up and have their own children. Unfortunately, this has been rooted deeply, and the only possible way to solve this is to widen the possible fields that grant reward that can encourage the people in becoming the pioneers of maintaining cleanliness and order within the barangays. The Civil Service Commission of the Philippines has already implemented the reward system but it only covers the services done by those working for the government such as public school teachers, government officials, among others. Now, the coverage of this rewarding system must be extended up until rewarding the diligence of a resident by the barangay in public, not just ending up in rewarding only the government officials. This diligence awards can be given to those residents who aid in the progress of the barangay such as pioneering in wiping

Correcting Barangay Laws 9 off the graffiti on the street walls. The reason why the researcher is stressing the public announcements is that, for every person has the competitiveness that dwells inside of him, awarding him in front of his neighbors will boost up his morale, sometimes even urging others to do the same. The researcher has felt the same way when he saw his batch mates receiving honors and awards in front of the entire high school community. In summary, using the rewards as bait is effective in eradicating the passiveness among the people, and making them the part of the progress of the nation.

III. Conclusion Every one of us is being victimized when we are victims of having graffiti all out of sudden on the walls of our houses. Sometimes, even robbers intrude houses despite the fact that there are the official announcements that assure us that we now have barangay watchmen who will secure our properties. Despite the efforts that the barangay, in general, is asserting to lessen the petty crimes, inappropriate sanctions or rather heavy and harsh sanctions, together with the incapability of implementation due to lack of human resources and deeply rooted negative mentalities, made the efforts useless. But all of these things can be altered by giving a change in

implementing a new way to approach petty crimes, which are first, to give away humiliating and tiresome community services, second, to have more watchmen efficiently securing the streets of the barangays, and last, starting the award systems to the fellow residence to urge them to be the role models, law-abiding citizens for the next generation. If people start to ignore even the basic rules of the society, and nothing is there to correct them, those so-called petty crimes will gradually be one of the nations biggest problem. Plus, letting petty criminals to do community work will

Correcting Barangay Laws 10 lower the cost used to use more manpower which will allow the government to invest more on the other sectors of the society. And when the common residents join in the manpower to maintain the order within the community to get the public attention by the barangays, we will be living in the cleaner and safer society wherein more improvements will be made in our society by our society.

Correcting Barangay Laws 11 References: Chung, Dong-Ki (1997), Community service order in korea, A Doctoral Dissertation, HanYang University De Leon, C. Reforms in the civil service the philippine experience. (n.d.). Retrieved January 10, 2012, from: http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/publi c/documents un/unpan007437.pdf Dy, M., Licuanan, P., et al. (1994). Values in philippine culture and education. Washington D.C.: Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Martin, G. (2003, February). The effectiveness of community-based sanctions in reducing recidivism. Corrections Today Magazine. Vol.65, (Issue 1) 26-29 President aquinos 2011 budget message. (n.d.). Retrieved January 09, 2012, from: http://www.gov.ph/2010/08/24/president-aquinos-2011-budget message/ Public order, safety and justice. (n.d.). Retrieved March 03, 2012, from: http://www.nscb.gov.ph/secstat/d_safety.asp Sandiganbayan case disposal up 74% in 2011. (2012, February). Retrieved March 04, 2012, from: http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/247851/news/n ation/sandiganbayan-case-disposal-up-74-in-2011 Tonry, M. (1998). Handbook of crime and punishment. New York: Oxford University Press Inc. Robespierre. Retrieved January 09, 2012, from: http://www.angelfire.com/ca6/frenchr evolution89/robespierre.html The local government code of the philippines. Retrieved January 09, 2012, from: http://www.chanrobles.com/localgov4.htm Virola, R. (2009, February). Thirteen barangays created; one city converted to highly urbanized city in the 4th quarter of 2008. Retrieved February 29, 2012, from: http://www.nscb.gov.ph/pressreleases/2009/PR-200902-PP2-01PSGC.asp