BAKUN, Benguet – Some 4,200 families in the town’s barangays will receive from the municipal government substantial relief assistance during the scheduled mass distribution of relief goods to the heavily impacted households in the municipality anytime next week.
Mayor Bill Raymundo said the local government will provide the households with half cavan of rice, sugar and lard that form part of the relief assistance to be distributed to them as part of the town’s efforts to mitigate the effects of the implementation of the extended Luzonwide enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) to the local economy and the sources of livelihood of the residents.
He disclosed that bulk of the municipal government’s P9.8 million Bayanihan grant from the national government will be used to purchase the next wave of relief goods to be given to the affected households to mitigate the impact of the prevailing ECQ to their living condition.
Aside from the procurement of the relief goods for these households, Mayor Raymundo reports that a portion of the grant will also be used to purchase the needed personal protective equipment (PPEs) and other medical supplies needed by the health workers to closely monitor the suspect and probable Corona Virus Disease (COVID) 2019 cases in the barangays plus the maintenance of the established quarantine facilities in the locality.
At the same time, Raymundo revealed the municipal government allotted some P2 million from available local funds which will be equitably distributed those left out in the grant of the government’s Social Amelioration Program (SAP).
The municipal chief executive stated that a total of 2,499 families were able to be given the financial assistance from the SAP where more than 850 families are beneficiaries of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program.
He admitted that there are still over 1,000 families in the municipality who were allegedly left out in the grant of the SAP, thus, the allocation of the P2 million from the municipal funds for the provision of minimal assistance to them in the spirit that all families in the locality will be granted any available assistance to allow them to cope with the impact of the ECQ, especially to their sources of livelihood.
Raymundo appealed to the families in the different barangays who had been left out in the grant of the SAP to make do with whatever the municipal government could afford to give them as assistance because local officials are trying to balance everything so that there will be no family that will be excluded from benefits as part of the overall efforts of the government to address the plight of the heavily impacted residents during the implementation of the ECQ.
He expressed optimism on the possible lifting of the ECQ by May 15, 2020 so that the local economy can slowly recover to allow the people to income and regain their livelihoods.
By Hent
