BAGUIO CITY – Mayor Mauricio G. Domogan ordered the City Building and Architecture Office (CBAO) to conduct another round of inspection relative to the compliance of building owners in bringing back their parking spaces which were converted to commercial slots to guarantee their sincerity in complying with their building and occupancy permits.
The local chief executive said there is a need for CBAO to make sure that building owners who converted their declared parking spaces to commercial areas will comply with the previous orders for them to restore their parking allocations to help provide their tenants with available slots for the parking requirements of their tenants and clients.
“We will remain firm to our previous order that those building owners who converted their parking slots to commercial spaces will bring back their parking areas to help in addressing the need for more parking spaces dedicated for motorists transacting business with the tenants of the said buildings,” Domogan stressed.
He said CBAO should immediately cancel the occupancy permit issued to building owners who failed to comply with the recent order for the restoration of their parking slots and eventually issue the closure order of the said structures if the owners defy the request from the local government to dismantle the commercial establishments that were erected over designated parking areas.
According to him, it is clear in the building and occupancy permits issued by the CBAO to building owners around the city that there are designated parking areas within their structures pursuant to the National Building code for the utilization of their tenants and their clients but for still unknown reasons, the erring building owners allegedly converted the parking slots to commercial spaces primarily to earn bigger profit from the lease of the said spaces.
He expressed his gratitude to building owners who immediately complied with the order from the CBAO because they were able to contribute in providing adequate parking spaces for their tenants and their clients so that they will not converge around the city’s major roads and contribute in constricting traffic around the city.
For those who remain to be adamant in complying with the said directive, he requested them to voluntarily remove the commercial spaces on their designated parking areas and for them not to await for the local government to cancel the issued building and occupancy permits that will result to the closure of their structures which will deprive them of their projected income.
For quite sometime, Domogan claimed building owners had been wrecking in profits from the lease of their parking spaces for commercial use that is why it is but proper for them to start giving up the lessees and use the slots for their prescribed purpose to avoid the imposition of the necessary fines and penalties against them.
He said that the local government will continue to monitor the compliance of building owners to the existence of their parking allocations to avoid the unabated conversion of parking spaces to commercial areas which had been tolerated in the past but will no longer be the usual practice this time.
By Dexter A. See
