PROTOCOL P-10 | Coordination & Alignment

Inter-Agency Coordination Protocol

TRIGGER When a grievance or concern involves more than one institutional actor; when community concerns span jurisdictional boundaries; when LGU and national agency responses are inconsistent.

STEPS

1. Identify which institutions have jurisdiction over the concern

   Use the Governance Gap Mapper to confirm which institutions have mandate coverage. For each relevant institution, identify the focal person responsible for this project type.

2. Establish a coordination group before conflicts arise

   At project inception, convene a meeting of all relevant institutional actors: developer, LGU, national agencies, and any other parties with regulatory or service delivery roles. Agree on: how concerns will be shared across institutions, who leads on which concern types, and what the escalation pathway is when a concern falls outside any single institution's mandate.

3. Assign a coordination lead for each concern type

   Not every concern requires full multi-agency response. Designate which institution leads on: land and tenure concerns; environmental and resource concerns; safety concerns; livelihood and compensation concerns; governance and regulatory concerns.

4. When a cross-institutional concern arises, notify all relevant institutions within 48 hours

   Do not wait for the concern to escalate before cross-notifying. Share: what the concern is, which community members or groups raised it, what has been done so far, and what coordinated response is needed.

5. Convene a coordination meeting within 5 working days for unresolved cross-institutional concerns

   Attendees: relevant institution focal persons, the ComRel officer, and, where appropriate, community representatives. The meeting should produce: a shared response plan, assigned leads, and a timeline.

6. Communicate the coordinated response back to the community

   Communities should not experience the coordination process as invisible. Inform them: which institutions are involved, what response is being coordinated, and when they will hear back. Use plain language.

7. Document the coordination process and outcomes

   Record which institutions were involved, what was agreed, who is responsible for what, and the timeline. This is part of the GRM record.

PURPOSE

To define how developers, LGUs, and national agencies coordinate responses when concerns span multiple institutions, and to prevent the pattern where communities are referred from one institution to another without their concern being addressed by any of them. Inter-agency coordination is not a courtesy, it is a functional GRM requirement.

Roles and Responsibilities

Primary:

Actor: ComRel Officer / PCO
Responsibility: Identifies cross-institutional concerns, notifies relevant institutions, convenes coordination meetings, and communicates outcomes to communities.

Participating:

Actor: LGU Focal Person
Responsibility: Represents LGU in coordination; acts on concerns within LGU mandate; escalates to higher authorities when needed.

Participating:

Actor: National Agency Focal Person(s)
Responsibility: Represents agency in coordination; acts on concerns within agency mandate; escalates to policy level when concerns reveal regulatory gaps.

Notified:

Actor: Project Manager
Responsibility: Briefed on all cross-institutional concerns and coordination plans; provides authorization for developer commitments made in the coordination process.

Field Notes and Adaptation Guidance

• Field Note — The referral chain is not a coordination mechanism

  'You should raise that with the LGU' / 'The LGU referred us to DENR' / 'DENR said this is a developer matter', this is the referral chain. It is experienced by communities as deliberate obstruction, even when it is merely institutional confusion. The Inter-Agency Coordination Protocol replaces the referral chain with a shared response mechanism.

• Field Note — LGUs often lack the technical information to respond

  At multiple sites, LGU officials were asked questions about the project that they could not answer, not because of evasion but because the project team had not briefed them. LGUs are often the first institutional contact for community members with concerns. If they cannot respond accurately, they lose credibility with their constituents. Regular LGU briefings are a coordination requirement, not a courtesy.

• Adaptation Guidance

  In areas where relevant agencies have limited field presence, consider a quarterly multi-stakeholder coordination session that brings institutional actors together proactively, not just reactively. This builds the relationships and communication channels that make rapid coordination possible when a concern arises.

Required Output / Documentation

• Inter-agency coordination record (concern description, institutions involved, agreed response plan, leads, timeline)

• Community notification of coordinated response

• Escalation to policy level if the concern reveals a governance gap that cannot be resolved operationally