Bulacan votes 'no' to San Jose del Monte as highly urbanized city

MANILA, Philippines: Residents in Bulacan rejected a proposal to convert San Jose del Monte into a highly urbanized city (HUC).

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) reported on Wednesday that a total of 820,385 individuals voted «no» to the proposal to make San Jose del Monte autonomous from the provincial government during a plebiscite conducted on October 30, the same day of the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections (BSKE).

Based on the certificate of canvas a total of 620,707 people voted yes to the petition to ratify Proclamation 1057 proclaiming San Jose del Monte as an HUC, which was signed on Dec. 4, 2020, by then-president Rodrigo Duterte.

The 18th most populated city in the Philippines, San Jose del Monte meets the requirements of an HUC.

Aside from a population of 650,000, which is more than the 200,000 minimum as per the Local Government Code of 1991, the first-class component city had a net income of P141 million in 2022.