DICT, DILG should help LGUs transition into smart communities

Please allow me to supplement the view of Guillermo M. Luz that “an intelligent city uses information and communications technology to improve a city’s operational efficiency, share information with the public, and improve quality of government services and citizen welfare,” (“The need for intelligent cities, municipalities,” Business Matters, 01/19/23).

Simply put, a city is said to be an intelligent or smart city when it adopts and operates mobile transactions, receives electronic payments, conducts paperless meetings, live streams the sessions of its sanggunian, provides user-friendly digital services and self-service portals, allows internet-based dialogue or engagement with its constituents, advertises virtually all its services, programs, projects, and accomplishments, among other things. Moreover, when all these can be accessed or viewed in a single and internet-enabled platform, the city is even more intelligent, attractive, and competitive.

However, we should not lose sight of the purpose of why a city needs to transform itself into an intelligent city. Establishing an intelligent city should premise itself from the current and potential needs, aspirations, wishes, and interests of the people. Stated otherwise, it is to ensure safety and enhance the welfare and happiness of the people that an intelligent city is established.

There are challenges though to overcome. The people should be receptive to a new lifestyle being offered by an intelligent city. Resistance to change is inevitable, but this should be outweighed by the many benefits to people of a technologically enabled city. The people, in turn, should actively engage or utilize the smart technology adopted and implemented by the city. They should help improve and sustain the intelligent city through feedback.

Intelligent city is no longer a fuzzy concept or a pie in the sky. Nowadays, many local government units in the country are transitioning into intelligent or smart local government units (LGUs). The national government, through the Department of Information and Communications Technology and the Department of the Interior and Local Government, should assist these LGUs to invest in smart technologies in order to promote a safer and more progressive Philippines.

REGINALD B. TAMAYO,

Marikina City,

reginaldtamayo@yahoo.com