EDITORIAL - Attention Citom

Most government officials who occupy positions of influence over policies ride cars that are either theirs or issued them by government. This effectively detaches them from certain realities on the ground, so to speak.

Take for instance the supposedly strict implementation of the jaywalking ordinance. We say strict because once you are caught, there is no way out. You cannot talk yourself out of the corresponding fine.

Actually we have nothing against the jaywalking ordinance. If it is for the good of everyone, then we are all for its strict implementation. There, however, is the rub. If there is any strict implementation at all, it is, by latest count, in only three places.

In other words, what legal and moral authority does the government have in "strictly" implementing an ordinance in only three places and turn the other cheek and virtually throw its hands up everywhere else?

Worse is when, in at least two of the only three places where the jaywalking ordinance is supposedly being "strictly" implemented, there is even no strict implementation at all on account of palpable exemptions being unilaterally granted by enforcers of the ordinance.

On Osmeña Boulevard fronting the City Central School, ambulant vendors of rags, bottled water, cigarettes and candy criss-cross the street with impunity, right under the very noses of those orange-clad jaywalking enforcers.

At the junction of Colon, Osmeña Boulevard and P. Lopez, it is even worse. Vendors with carts are parked right on the street, as are taxis whose hawkers call out to passengers right on the road.

Given the apparent toleration extended to these "small businesses," one begins to suspect that some people must be getting a cut from sales or earnings. Otherwise, if no one makes anything, then an exemption exists that is not in the law and therefore illegal.

To be sure, the real blame goes all the way back to the city council, from where all ordinances emanate. Prior to crafting ordinances, our honorable councilors should have at least tried to determine the feasibility of enforcing the ordinances they make.

For of what use is a really good ordinance if it is only good on paper. The work of a truly conscientious councilor does not end with the approval of his ordinance. He has to remain awake and vigilant. He has to constantly monitor that the law is not miscarried and ignored.

The city spends good tax money in the crafting of each and every ordinance. Then it spends more to see to it that each and every ordinance is implemented. Isn't it a waste then that such purposes of the expenditures never seem to get carried out?