Not one but three milestones have been reached by Valenzuela City as it wins big in the recently concluded Digital Governance Awards (DGA) 2020 last December 11.

Valenzuela City’s Paspas Permit placed Champion in the Best in Business Empowerment (G2B) Award in the city level, while ValTrace won Best in COVID-19 Pandemic Response – an additional category for this year’s awarding.

On top of this, Valenzuela City has been granted with a Huawei Special Award for Best in Business Empowerment.

Going online “the norm”

With government transactions becoming more in demand in the measurement of excellent public service delivery, the vision behind Paspas Permit is to make things more efficient, fast and convenient – and the more the system becomes vital in everyday transactions of taxpayers, the more the City Government of Valenzuela improves the system with consistent and “sustained” technologies that can efficiently serve taxpayers in the long run.

Launched last November 2019, Paspas Permit, dubbed as the 10-second business permit, is considered to be the only end-to-end business permit application system in the country and the fastest there is.

In ten seconds, a provisional business permit will be issued upon payment and post-audit inspection will be done after.

Valenzuelanos can easily start their businesses with expanded payment options and business plates and documents can be delivered to their homes.

Utilizing automation and technology in the entire business process, this new innovation manifests Valenzuela City as a renowned Business-Friendly City and a champion on e-Governance – officially winning DGA 2020’s Best in Business Empowerment Award in the city level.

Contact tracing app

Realizing that efficient and effective contact tracing helps in the localized targeted mass testing of the City, Valenzuela City utilized its technological capacities by coming up with its own Valenzuela Contact Tracing App or ValTrace.

Valenzuela residents and non-residents visiting enclosed indoor establishments in the City are mandated to use their own Quick Response (QR) codes to be registered at www.valtrace.appcase.net. City-based establishments are also required to scan all visitors using the application.

With ValTrace, the City discovered ways to minimize community transmission and contain COVID-19 cases with the application’s location history tracker. This aggressive contact tracing scheme grabs the top spot for Best in COVID-19 Pandemic Response of DGA 2020.

Valenzuela City also envisions to pioneer practices that may be adopted across governments. As of writing, ValTrace has been integrated with Pasig City’s PasigPass, proving the system’s replicability and a manifestation of the local government’s belief that best practices are “best shared” to achieve a COVID-free Philippines.  

The Digital Governance Awards or DGA 2020 is a joint project of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) and the National ICT Confederation of the Philippines (NICP).

DGA 2020 recognizes local government units for its revolutionary ICT initiatives in the delivery of public services.