WARNING: Long e-mail!<br><br>The municipal waters is actually on my future discussion agenda and I've done a bit of research about that recently.<br><br>There are actually several pieces of legislation/orders/bills regarding municipal waters:<br>
<br><b>1991 - RA 7160 (Local Government Code)</b><br>Section 131 (Definition of Terms) - "(r) 'Municipal Waters' includes not only streams, lakes, and tidal waters within the municipality, not being the subject of private ownership and not comprised within the national parks, public forest, timber lands, forest reserves or fishery reserves, but also marine waters included between two lines drawn perpendicularly to the general coastline from points where the boundary lines of the municipality or city touch the sea at low tide and a third line parallel with the general coastline and fifteen (15) kilometers from it. Where two (2) municipalities are so situated on the opposite shores that there is less than fifteen (15) kilometers of marine waters between them, the third line shall be equally distant from opposite shores of the respective municipalities;"<br>
<br><b>1998 - RA 8550 (Fisheries Code)</b><br>Section 4 (Definition of Terms) - basically repeats the Local Government Code verbatim<br>"Section 123. Charting of Navigational Lanes and Delineation of Municipal Waters. - The Department shall authorize the National Mapping and Resource Information Authority (NAMRIA) for the designation and charting of navigational lanes in fishery areas and delineation of municipal waters. The Philippine Coast Guard shall exercise control and supervision over such designated navigational lanes."<br>
<br><b>2001 - DENR Administrative Order No. 17</b><br>This AO prescribes the use of the archipelagic principle (see UNCLOS) to delineate municipal waters instead of the simplistic method stated in RAs 7160 and 8550. The DENR also mandated NAMRIA to undertake this delineation pursuant to RA 8550. Unfortunately DAO17 was struck down in 2003 as illegal since the "Department" in Section 123 of RA 8550 is the DA, not DENR.<br>
<br><b>2004 - DA Administrative Order No. 1</b><br>DA directed NAMRIA to delineate municipal waters, but without using the archipelagic principle. The mechanism used is the mainland principle, which unfortunately means that offshore islands *do not* generate municipal waters.<br>
<br><b>2007 - 14th Congress HB 323 (Amending RA 8550)<br></b>Rep. Lorenzo Taņada III basically wanted to amend 8550 to specifically use the archipelagic principle. This is still a bill AFAIK.<br><br><br><br><br>******* MORAL OF THE STORY *******<br>
We cannot delineate municipal waters right now since we don't know the process NAMRIA used (they discounted offshore islands). And the issue of the use of archipelagic principle is still not settled.<br><br>Please browse this *excellent* paper for a look at the problem with some graphical examples:<br>
<a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/4938593/Archipelagic-Principle-Towards-Charting-of-the-Municipal-Waters">http://www.scribd.com/doc/4938593/Archipelagic-Principle-Towards-Charting-of-the-Municipal-Waters</a><br><br>So my recommendation is: let's not tag municipal boundaries on water just yet.<br>
<br>I guess this means that the boundaries on Manila Bay have to go (for the meantime).<br><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 12:01 PM, maning sambale <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:emmanuel.sambale@gmail.com">emmanuel.sambale@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">I guess the group agree to most of seav's proposal on tagging<br>
admin_level (unless there are reservations please raise it here). I<br>
have another question though, how do we then tag municipal waters? As<br>
per RA 8550:<br>
<a href="http://www.lawphil.net/statutes/repacts/ra1998/ra_8550_1998.html" target="_blank">http://www.lawphil.net/statutes/repacts/ra1998/ra_8550_1998.html</a><br>
<br>
" 58. Municipal waters - include not only streams, lakes, inland<br>
bodies of water and tidal waters within the municipality ... but also<br>
marine waters included between two (2. lines drawn perpendicular to<br>
the general coastline from points where the boundary lines of the<br>
municipality touch the sea at low tide and a third line parallel with<br>
the general coastline including offshore islands and fifteen (15.<br>
kilometers from such coastline. Where two (2. municipalities are so<br>
situated on opposite shores that there is less than thirty (30.<br>
kilometers of marine waters between them, the third line shall be<br>
equally distant from opposite shore of the respective municipalities.<br>
"<br>
<br>
I can make a GIS operation to do this if we can add the boundaries of<br>
coastal municipalities in OSM. But AFAIK, what we have "on the<br>
ground" politically is not the same as what the law above defines.<br>
<br>
Any ideas? Of course we can leave that issue for the moment and<br>
proceed to adding the municipal boundaries.<br>
<div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
</div></div></blockquote></div><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><a href="http://vaes9.codedgraphic.com">http://vaes9.codedgraphic.com</a><br>