BAGUIO CITY – The local government is now preparing its resources for the rainy season and other calamities that might happen during the remaining part of the year to ensure that the basic needs of the people will be given utmost attention.
City Social Welfare and Development Officer Betty F. Fangasan said that appropriate inventory and stockpiling of relief goods are now being undertaken to guarantee the local government’s readiness during the rainy season where a number of typhoons are expected to visit the city.
She added that because of the ongoing inventory and stockpiling of relief goods, the local government decided to close the operation of the city’s Corona Virus Disease (COVID) 2019 relief center based at the FVR Youth Center along Military Cutoff because substantial relief assistance had already been given to the thousands of households in the different barangays for over two months of operation.
However, Fangasan disclosed that there will be social and day care workers who will be assigned in the family life resource centers that will be established in the city’s 20 districts to cater to individuals concerns of the residents on relief assistance among other COVID-related concerns that people want to bring to the attention of the local government.
According to her, residents who want to raise issues on the relief assistance will have to visit the said centers for their queries to be addressed by the assigned personnel because the CSWDO will now be working on the preparations for the rainy season and other programs, projects and activities of the local government which had been affected by the implementation of the Luzonwide enhanced community quarantine (ECQ).
Fangasan claimed that the local government wants to ensure its preparedness to address future calamities that are expected to visit the city anytime, especially typhoons, because of the upcoming rainy season that is why it is also important for the city to pre-position available relief goods for future uses.
In the case of the residents who were not yet able to get relief assistance from the city during the ECQ, she revealed that such complaints will have to undergo validation by the assigned personnel because there are numerous instances that individuals who are complaining of not having received any assistance from the government have actually received the same based on their records.
Fangasan asserted that the local government has available relief goods for the households but the CSWDO is ascertaining whether or not they were not able to get such assistance during the ECQ before the same will be released to them.
The city social welfare and development officer claimed that there were over 90,000 households in the city’s 128 barangays who were given relief goods during the more than two months of relief operations that were undertaken since the declaration of the Luzonwinde ECQ last March 17, 2020.
Fangasan appealed to the residents for their understanding and patience because the local government is doing its best to address their individual concerns but they should not take advantage of the situation in making it appear that they were not given relief assistance when they were given based on records.
By Dexter A. See
Photo by Armando M. Bolislis
