The Regional Award Committee (RAC) concluded the eight-day Onsite Validation for the 2023 Local Legislative Award (LLA), which ran from September 25–29 and October 2-4, 2023. This is relative to the LLA RAC Table Assessment conducted on September 19, 2023, where 14 out of 17 provincial and city nominees made the cut for the Onsite Validation of Sanggunians per category.

The 14 LLA Regional Finalists per award category that were validated onsite were the following: Highly Urbanized City (Tacloban City); Independent Component City (Ormoc City); Component Cities (Baybay City, Leyte; Borongan City, Eastern Samar; Maasin City, Southern Leyte); 1st–3rd Class Category (Basey, Samar; Dolores, Eastern Samar; Kananga, Leyte; Laoang, Northern Samar; Sogod, Southern Leyte); and 4th–6th Class Categories (Capoocan, Leyte; Liloan, Southern Leyte; Salcedo, Eastern Samar; San Roque, Northern Samar).

The 2023 LLA, in partnership with the Vice Mayors’ League of the Philippines (VMLP) and the Philippine Councilors League (PCL), recognizes the exemplary performance of city and municipal Sanggunians from July 1, 2019, to June 30, 2022, for legislating measures that help build the foundation of meaningful local administration and development.

Moreover, RAC members for the onsite validation include Regional President Vice Mayor Dennis L. Sy from VMLP Region 8, Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Assistant Regional Director Aleli N. Hernandez and DBM representatives, Regional Focal Officers from Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Region 8, and representatives from Sangguniang Bayan Members (SBMs), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) 8, Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) 8, and Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) 8.#