It is typical to distant areas to have limited access to basic services and to government aid. Help, not necessarily the one the residents of these areas were expecting, would usually arrive late, if at all. The establishment of the Dap-Ayan Ti Barangay in Gonzaga, Cagayan, helped the community members voice out their problems through a regular forum.

      The local government would not have found out that there were a lot of people with no jobs or with jobs that do not make full use of their abilities had this program not been instituted. To keep the program effective, weekly meetings among the municipality’s 25 barangays were held to serve as a venue for anyone to voice out their complaints over the radio or with the community members involved. Anyone and everyone who has access to the station and to the minutes of the meetings would know the issues that have been discussed and would also have the freedom and courage to voice out their own problems, as they arise.

      This information is then gathered and processed by the local government. The group looks through the issues, prioritized them, putting the most critical ones at the top of the list, and think of programs or projects that would address these.

      This program has been going on since mid-1998 and has not dimmed a bit. A lot of environment, cultural, social, and economic problems have been addressed, as seen in the influx of infrastructure projects, the protection of natural resources, and the self-sufficiency of the communities. Seeing the effectivity of this program, other municipalities in Cagayan also adopted this idea and saw its rewards.