08/10/2026
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On September 15, 2026, OIC-City Director Jean Redi T. Briones, MDM, CESE, of the DILG Tacloban City Office, served as a Resource Speaker during the High-Level Policy Dialogue on Barangay Amalgamation: Optimizing Futures-Ready Local Governance, held on September 15โ16, 2026 at the Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP) Conference Center in Tagaytay City.
The policy dialogue brought together key public sector practitioners and experts to discuss the prospects, challenges, and policy considerations surrounding barangay amalgamation as a potential mechanism for strengthening local governance and preparing communities for emerging governance demands.
OIC-CD Briones presented โSuper-barangays: The Case of the Barangay Amalgamation of Ormoc City,โ sharing the experience of Ormoc City in pursuing the consolidation of its urban barangays and highlighting lessons that may inform other local government units exploring similar structural reforms.
His presentation situated barangays as frontliners in the delivery of basic government services, emphasizing the need for local governance structures to adapt to a rapidly changing environment characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA), as well as brittleness, anxiety, nonlinearity, and incomprehensibility (BANI). It further framed barangay amalgamation as a form of political and spatial reengineering that can be supported by strategic foresight, digitalization, and new planning tools.
Central to OIC- CD Brionesโ presentation was the case of Ormoc City, a first-class independent component city and an agro-industrial and port city in Leyte. With a land area of 540.9 square kilometers and a 2020 Census population of 230,998, Ormoc City was composed of 110 barangays, including 29 barangays located in the city downtown.
The presentation traced the city's pursuit of barangay amalgamation against its vision of becoming an economic hub and disaster-resilient city in Western Leyte. Among the considerations identified were the restructuring of political boundaries, improved delivery of basic services and availability of barangay facilities, and the regularization and standardization of barangay workers to promote service competitiveness and continuity.
The case was also anchored on governance concerns identified in a 2019 study, including population requirements, inadequate manpower, unfilled elected positions, incomplete barangay-based institutions and facilities, insufficient equipment and development funds, limited access to social services, and emerging concerns involving peace and order, disaster resilience, and solid waste management amid urbanization and the conversion of city-center areas into commercial establishments.
Beyond the merger itself, OIC-CD Briones emphasized that structural reform must be accompanied by sustained institutional development. Among the post-merger interventions undertaken were the creation of a superbarangay transition team, inventory of barangay assets, turnover and digitization of documents and files, clarification of organizational structures and responsibilities, advocacy initiatives, implementation of a three-year superbarangay roadmap, and coordination on National Tax Allotment concerns.
For Briones, barangay amalgamation is not simply a change in administrative boundaries but an opportunity to transform local governance structures into organizations that are more capable, integrated, responsive, and prepared for future challenges. The presentation defines the goal of barangay merger as transforming fragmented and capacity-constrained administration into an integrated, future-ready local governance system that leverages appropriate technology, evidence-based decision-making, resilience, accountability, and citizen participation.
The policy dialogue provided an avenue for practitioners and stakeholders to examine the opportunities and challenges of barangay amalgamation while drawing lessons from actual local government experience.
OIC-CD Brionesโ presentation underscored that while amalgamation may address challenges such as limited manpower, inadequate resources, weak records management, and dependence on national transfers, successful implementation requires strategic resource allocation, digitalization, local revenue generation, strengthened administrative systems, and improved barangay facilities.
The presentation further introduced the DILG-Ormoc City Barangay Merger Toolkit, which covers legal bases, mechanisms for merging barangays, barangay profiling and community dynamics assessment, stakeholder analysis, communication planning, documentary requirements, plebiscite processes, post-merger actions, and monitoring and evaluation.
As local governments confront increasingly complex and rapidly evolving governance challenges, the experience of Ormoc City demonstrates the importance of combining strategic foresight, participatory governance, institutional strengthening, and evidence-informed decision-making in shaping the future of barangay administration.
๐๐ต๐ข๐บ ๐ช๐ฏ๐ง๐ฐ๐ณ๐ฎ๐ฆ๐ฅ ๐ธ๐ช๐ต๐ฉ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ญ๐ข๐ต๐ฆ๐ด๐ต ๐ถ๐ฑ๐ฅ๐ข๐ต๐ฆ๐ด.
page:
https://www.facebook.com/DILGTaclobanCity
