Mayor Art Mercado says his administration is working to change the culture in San Pedro to bring in more investors and raise the city’s income. —MARIANNE BERMUDEZ
Often referred to as the “dormitory town” of Metro Manila, the City of San Pedro, Laguna, aims to veer away from the moniker and reintroduce what it can offer to residents, tourists and investors.
“‘That’s what we’re known for right now—as a residential community with plenty of residents working in other cities. That is what we want to change,” Mayor Art Joseph Francis Mercado told the Inquirer.
San Pedro, a third-class component city in the province of Laguna, plans to change this notion by attracting businesses and investors to the city to generate income and give employment opportunities to its residents within the city.
Despite being one of the smallest units in the entire Laguna province in terms of land area with only 780 hectares, San Pedro is the fifth most populous city in Laguna. It also has the highest population density in Laguna province and the entire Calabarzon region, with 14,000 people per square kilometer.
“My vision is for them to work here … in our city [and] to increase the city’s income,” said the mayor.
Mercado noted that the strategic location of the city is a good reason why investors should invest in the city. Lodged between Metro Manila and Laguna, San Pedro shares boundaries with Metro Manila’s southernmost city, Muntinlupa.
“Businesses also see that the expansion is gearing toward the south. We know that the value of properties in Metro Manila is expensive … So, it is a win-win situation for them. The property is cheaper, the land is cheaper and the salary, the minimum wage here in [region] 4A, is lower compared to NCR,” said Mercado.
“Our goal is for San Pedro to become a ‘smart city’ by 2032,” he added.
In line with this goal, the city has been taking steps to integrate the use of technology in its operations to improve public services.
Innovation, digitalization
While the city’s strategic location offers advantages, it also presents disadvantages. Being situated in the middle of the West Valley Fault System and near Laguna de Bay exposes its 326,000 residents to risks of earthquakes and flooding.
To address these risks, the local government unit (LGU) recently inaugurated a P300-million Command Center that will serve as the new headquarters of the City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (CDRRMO).The six-story building has an early warning and monitoring system, enabling the CDRRMO to efficiently monitor and respond to emergencies. The center is also equipped with generators, solar panels and satellite internet service powered by Starlink.
Mercado said during his speech at the building’s inauguration that the “state-of-the-art” Command Center “marks a fulfillment not only of our dream of upgrading our DRRM capabilities but also of our vision of making San Pedro a smart city that is sustainable and resilient from disasters.”
Art Joseph Francis Mercado Mayor of San Pedro, Laguna
Another key initiative of the city in pursuit of its smart city vision is the digitalization of government services, with the support of the national government and the private sector.
These efforts include signing a memorandum of agreement with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to streamline its business registration services. The partnership aims to facilitate the integration of the DTI’s business name registration system into the city government of San Pedro’s Business Permits and Licensing System.
The city also partnered with digital payment platform Maya Philippines to implement online payment systems for government services.
During the celebration of the Sampaguita Festival on May 3, the LGU launched the “San Pedro Green Card,” powered by Maya Philippines. The card serves both as an ATM card and as a secondary identification card since it contains most of the information needed for various transactions in the LGU.
The card will initially be used to distribute financial assistance online to senior citizens, persons with disabilities, scholars and other beneficiaries of the LGU, thereby avoiding long queues. The LGU plans to make it available to all San Pedrenses of legal age by 2032 as part of its smart city vision.
Applications for Locational Clearance and affidavit of ownership, as well as the list of requirements for various government transactions, are now also digitally accessible at San Pedro city’s official website.
“We’re planning to fully digitalize government transactions so that people will not have to go in person, and all transactions can be done online or via their cellphones,” said Mercado.
Education
In five years, Mercado envisions San Pedro to be one of the leading smart cities in Laguna. To achieve that, the LGU is also in the “early stages” of planning to build a business or information technology (IT) park in the city.
The LGU aims to build vertical structures such as call centers and IT businesses to make up for the lack of space, and to provide more job opportunities for residents. “When people ask me what is there in San Pedro… I always proudly say that our people are hardworking and talented,” said Mercado.
This plan goes hand-in-hand with the LGU’s commitment to education.
The mayor said they are planning to prepare the city college to focus on IT courses so that, upon graduation, residents will be ready for employment once San Pedro’s IT parks come to fruition.
The city’s biggest economic booster at present are businesses, with Alaska Milk Corp. (AMC) its biggest taxpayer.
“We’re very thankful to have them (AMC). They have been our partner for a very long time. Their corporate social responsibility [program] is a big help,” sawid Mercado.
The LGU and AMC have partnered on various programs such as the “Alaska Gawad Kalinga,” which helped build comfortable homes for over 120 families and gave numerous livelihood projects and opportunities to homeowners; and the cleanup activity “ALASKALIKASAN Project.”
Meanwhile, the city government is also expediting the completion of key infrastructure projects, such as the rehabilitation of the San Pedro City Plaza, the San Pedro Medical Center in Barangay Narra, and the development of a San Pedro Sports Complex.
In the Department of Trade and Industry’s 2023 ranking of component cities, where cities and municipalities are evaluated based on the sum of their scores in four pillars (Economic Dynamism, Government Efficiency, Infrastructure, Resiliency and Innovation), San Pedro ranked 24th out of 114, moving up four ranks from its 2022 position of 26th.
“The biggest attraction I see for investors to invest here is the state of the city. If you are an investor, you would first look at the LGU and how it is performing. We started by changing the culture of San Pedro, and then the rest will follow,” said Mercado, whose 2022 mayoral win ended the Cataquiz political clan’s decades-long hold on the city.
During his mayoral campaign, Mercado promised “change” for the city. “Good governance is very important when it comes to attracting investors,” he said. While he acknowledged that it would not happen quickly, he said the city would achieve it “one step at a time” — steady, purposeful progress that appears to be happening now.