City considers streamlining its agencies

City considers streamlining its agencies

JAKARTA (JP): The city administration is studying the
possibility of streamlining its 29 agencies by closing some and
putting others under one roof, Governor Sutiyoso said yesterday.

He said the move might ensure efficiency, which ultimately
would provide better services to the public.

Simplification of the city's agencies is in line with the
central government's instruction, he added.

"My staff are still intensively studying the possibility. I
hope the results can be presented to me in the near future as we
should speed up to realize it."

The move would also be in line with reform demands, he added.

The governor said he has asked his staff to consider the
possibility of eliminating agencies whose purpose was obsolete,
such as that for forestry.

"I don't see the relevance of this agency in the city, which
has almost no forest. Its existence is useless."

The merger of several agencies would create a one-stop service
procedure, which could eliminate unnecessary, lengthy
bureaucratic requirements.

"People, for example, would no longer need to go to several
places to process a particular document," he said.

City councilors supported the government's idea.

Head of Commission D for development affairs, Ali Wongso
Sinaga, said the realization of the idea would also contribute
significantly to reducing city expenses.

"We should examine any possibility which makes the limited
city budget sufficient. I think the simplification of the
overlapping agencies is one of the answer," he said yesterday.

Ali suggested the administration first group the agencies
according to their primary concerns before merging them.

The city administration's budget for the 1998/1999 fiscal year
has already been cut twice. From its initial level of Rp 3.2
trillion, the budget was cut to Rp 2.7 trillion and then to Rp
1.3 trillion as a result of the economic and political crises.

Head of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) faction, Lukman
Mokoginta, proposed that city agencies with similar activities,
such as plantation, forestry, agriculture, livestock husbandry
and fisheries, could be merged into one.

Park and public works agencies could also be put under one
roof, while the city's spatial agency, the building control
agency, the land's mapping and measuring agency and the mines
agency could also be merged into one, he said.

Lukman warned that the simplification process was not an easy
job as the administration would have to spend a lot to finance
the operational costs for the merging process.

"So the process should be done in steps," he said.

None of the councilors touched on what might become of
employees from closed agencies. (ind)