BAGUIO CITY– The City Council passed a resolution that approved the local shelter plant 2018-2026 of the City of Baguio to serve as a blueprint in the implementation of housing projects for the benefit of the populace in the coming years.
The resolution authored by Councilor Edgar M. Avila, stated that the newly approved local shelter plan will address the needs of both the formal and informal sector, define the objectives for the development of shelter conditions, provide information on the analysis of local housing situations, including the identification of housing problems and future housing needs, and determine the affordability of targeted beneficiaries and identify the resources available to meet the prescribed objectives and the means by which the resources can be used most cost effectively and set out the responsibilities and time frame for implementing various measures.
Section 39 of Republic Act (RA) 7279 otherwise known as the Urban Development and Housing Act of 1992 provides that the local government units shall be charged with the implementation of the Act in their respective localities in coordination with the Housing Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC), the national housing agencies, the Presidential Commission on the Urban Poor (PCUP), the private sector and other non-government organizations.
In compliance with the said mandate, the Housing and Urban Development Board adopted the Baguio City local shelter plan 2018-2026 during its meeting on October 11, 2018.
Earlier, the local shelter plan was presented to the City Development Council (CDC) and was subsequently approved on December 19, 2018.
The formulation of the local shelter plan is anchored on the Local Government Code of 1991, RA 7279 and the Philippine Development Plan and with the passage of the said laws, shelter planning has become a responsibility of the local government unit wherein it is mandated to provide access to housing opportunities and services for an adequate, decent, affordable and disaster-resilient housing for every household.
Among the objectives of the local shelter plan is reduce the housing backlog through the implementation of low cost and socialized housing projects; provide adequate and comfortable housing for transient students and workers through rental housing; provide a sustainable housing community; maximize land use, allocate funds for socialized housing; provide an environment-friendly and energy efficient housing design; invoke 15 percent balanced housing from developers of subdivisions and 5 percent compliance of project cost for condominiums and partnership with the national agencies and private organizations.
The target population of the local shelter plan are the informal settlers or those whose shelters are within reservations, the doubled-up households or unit sharers and the new households to be formed due to rapid population growth wherein there are a total of 3,361 identified informal settlers within reservations in the city; doubled up households was computed to be 2,230, and with an average annual growth rate of 1.54 percent, an additional 13,483 new households are expected to make up the future need within the prescribed period covered by the plan. Data on homeless households was assumed to be zero since there are no manifestations of literally homeless people.
By Dexter A. See
Banner photo by Meryl N. Perez
