Featured image above is Vice Mayor Gerardo ‘Gerry’ V. Calderon speaking about the Angono Dream, anchor of the town’s inclusive economic, cultural, social, and environmental progress. (Photo: SDN)
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PASIG CITY, October 24, 2024 (SDN) — For local chief executives of the Philippines’ 1,499 municipalities, it’s safe to say the dream is to have a progressive local government unit (LGU) that embraces inclusivity. Not just a dream of the LGU officials, but all the residents, for sure.
Who does not like to live in a community where the LGU takes care of its people, it minds peace and order, environment, culture, economy, tourism, infrastructure, and others, all rolled into having a more habitable society, not having to worry about day-to-day existence.
And that’s what former mayor, now Vice Mayor Gerardo “Gerry” V. Calderon of the progressive Angono municipality, had dreamed of and still dreams about. His municipality — 2,200 hectares with 120,000 population, is one of the two smallest towns in Rizal province, has 13 towns and one city, lying along the lake Laguna de Bay, some 30 kilometers east of Manila.
But its’ small size, next smallest to Teresa municipality, has not prevented it from what it is now, rising and continues to rise, thanks to its succession of leaders, aided adequately by the provincial leaders — the Ynares and Duavit clans of Rizal. From a dusty town with roads pockmarked with holes, Angono has climbed to a better stature.
Interconnecting roads lead Angono to progress, people-to-people contact
At a media forum, Calderon credited Rizal Gov. Nina Ynares and 1st District Congressman Michale John “Jack” R. Duavit for their support for Angono. He said the two political clans’ support goes back to when he (Calderon) started his political career in the municipality.
Watch: Vice Mayor Gerry V. Calderon explains the “Angono Dream”: https://youtu.be/ym9W0_CQY98?si=56NTPD_U5q1Ur8EC
The vice mayor met with reporters on October 23 at the Kapihan sa Metro East Media Forum, being held every Wednesday at 10 a.m. in Pasig City, Metro Manila.
He fondly spoke of trust and the importance of keeping that trust and translating it to doing right by those who trusted him.
“If you are trusted,” Calderon says, give it your all and soon you’ll be in a position to do more, apparently referring to being elected.
“The Ynareses trusted me. The Duavits trusted me. That was rare,” he recalls.
So, he paid it back. “When I was elected I (worked for Angono’s) peace, being pleasant, happy, and prosperous.” Calderon served the municipality for two three-year terms as mayor in 1998-2007 and 2010-2019.
He filed his Certificate of Candidacy (COC) as aspirant for mayor, signaling he wants to come back as local chief executive of his beloved Angono, popularly known as the “Art Capital of the Philippines”. His daughter Jeri Mae E. Calderon is the incumbent mayor, she’ll run for vice mayor and swap with his father.
His policies have been inclined towards taking care of the environment, which is no surprise because he was at one time assistant secretary at the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). His stint at the DENR was during the administration of then President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
Vice Mayor Calderon is also a well-traveled Filipino, even before he joined the political arena. He made several travels to the United States, Germany, and other European countries, as well as in Southeast Asia. Whatever country he visited, he was not just a traveler, not just a tourist, but someone who immerses himself and learns about the countries and cities he was able to visit.
He took the good things he saw and witnessed and put them in practice as a local government official.
What is the Angono Dream?
“We know that every Filipino has a dream. Like our (municipality), our dream is to environmental-friendly under Gov. Nina Ynares and Congressman (Jack) Duavit), to whom we are anchored.
“We dreamed, from being flood-prone, from being traffic prone, from 11,000 informal settlers in rivers, in the sea, in private lands,” the mayoralty aspirant says.
Further, he says: “Whoever leads, the leaders should have a dream. All leaders have dream.”
Used to be that the living and the dead shared a common sala in Angono. “We separated them. We gave homes to the living, and we gave a place for the dead to lie. Before, you did not know that your neighbor is a dead person.”
He recalled that as a kid he grew up in a community with roads full of holes, the men having drinking sessions in the streets, whistling at women.
“So, we needed to uplift the living condition of our people. We took care of the roads. I grew up on street full of holes. When I grew up, I want to be living in a subdivision. So, we transformed our community into something like a subdivision,” he says.
“We took care of the squatters first, then infrastructure program, environmental program, education, social services, at the same time economic activities. So, the result is the realization of part of our dream.”
He adds: You need to work with your people. Sleep with your people and learn from you people. And that development should be inclusive.”
The vice mayor said it is also important to talk directly with investors and learn about their concerns, impress upon them political stability.
“Our motto,” he says, is “to uplift the way of life our people.” He adds that to do this, the leadership must do and fulfill their mandate.
Obviously, to achieve this, Angono has built roads to connect it to the rest of Rizal province, as well as to Metro Manila. “We developed a road connecting the town proper to exit going to Taytay-Pasig. In my time (as mayor), we opened the main road from the residential areas going to Taytay without going through the main road from the municipal compound to elementary school.”
He said the LGU also developed a by-pass road and another by-pass road in the upper portion of Don Mariano Santos Avenue going to Antipolo City through the leadership of Mayor (Nina) Ynares and Congressman (Jack) Duavit.”
The vice mayor said barangay roads, municipal roads, and provincial roads should interconnecting. Every infrastructure should bring about economic dynamism.
He recalled that Angono was flood-prone because of many quarrying activities. He had the rivers dredge to even more provide preventive measures for flood. “It makes you happy to see your townmates not being flooded during the rainy season. That kind of feeling, that kind of environmental security are fulfilling to me.”
Angono, of course, is the “Art Capital of the Philippines” and that the municipality has been promoting it and capitalizing on this cultural reputation. And the LGU is promoting this side by side with other developments.
Angono is the birthplace of two of the country’s National Artists — Carlos “Botong” Francisco for Visual Arts, and Prof. Lucio D. San Pedro for Music.
Still on the cultural side, the municipality is known for its many festivals, none more famous than the “Higantes Festival” where giant paper mache of over-sized human parade along the streets to regale visitors — from across the country and even tourists from abroad.
For the visitors looking to satisfy their palates, their craving for culinary delights, Angono now has food chains, including coffee shops, that are open 24/7.
LIPAD Project to take Angono to greater heights
Tourism is also booming, and the town has many resorts and staycation hubs. The vice mayor said around 25,000 tourists visit the town every month.
“Angono is now full of businesses, thanks to tourism. This is a result of the pandemic, during which people were seeking places to relax and unwind,” he points out.
To realize the Angono Dream, Vice Mayor Calderon says the LGU implements River Rehabilitation Program, Zero Squatter Program, Clean and Greem Program, Parks and Recreation Development, Tourism Promotion, Promotion of Arts and Culture Heritage, Peace Order Initiatives, Volunteerism, Upland Development Program, Disaster Resilience and Climate Change Adaptation Program, and Traffic Management.
As testament to Angono’s good governance, it has won many recognitions: Most Competitive Municipality, Gold Award (Manila Bay Clean-Up Rehabilitation), Galing Pook Awardee, Seal of Child Friendly Local Governance, Seal of Excellence Gawad Kalasag Award, and others.
But Angono’s development continues.
In the pipeline, and actually its implementation has already started after it was waylaid by the global pandemic of 2019 for some three years, the Light Industrial Park for Angono Dream, or LIPAD, seeks to emulate the Bonifacio Global City (BGC) of the Taguig City, Metro Manila.
LIPAD is targeted to be fully complete in 2025 even as incumbent Mayor Jeri Mae Calderon is seeking the assistance of the provincial government of Rizal and the national government.
“We can’t do it alone,” she admits in an article published on https://opinyon.net.
She said LIPAD is a 60-hectare commercial hub that is anticipated to generate revenue for the municipality and provide jobs for residents.
“Our town will boom economically and, of course, this will provide more income to the local government,” the lady mayor says with confidence in the article written by Juanmig Bustamante.
In the media forum in Pasig City, her father tells of following the footsteps of those who came ahead.
“What your big brother did, your parents, you should follow,” Vice Mayor Calderon emphasizes. (♡)