BAGUIO CITY – The city council wants concerned agencies and departments of the city government to prepare a comprehensive master plan of the city’s sewer and drainage facilities to be used as blueprint in the implementation of future rehabilitation and repair of the said key facilities.
The council made the directive following the discovery of a task force on the numerous illegal sewer connections by large and small establishments to the city’s main drainage system that resulted to the clogging of the system and the subsequent release of foul odor from the said facilities causing inconvenience to the public.
Engr. Moises Lozano, chief of the liquid waste division of the city environment and parks management office, reported that while SM City Baguio, Abanao Square, Baguio Center Mall and Tion San stores are able to treat their respective sewage water emanating from the said establishments, the foul odor emanating from their waste water is not actually treated, thus, the same should not be directed to the city’s drainage system but instead connected to the city’s sewerage system to reduce the odor being emitted from the manholes and drain system.
He said illegal sewer connections in the city’s drainage system can be plugged, provided that the 3-notice rule for the establishments that have illegally connected to the drainage system had been complied with.
Cordelia Lacsamana, city environment and parks management officer, said the task force will again conduct an inspection on the city’s sewer and drainage facilities with representatives of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in order to pinpoint the needed interventions on how to go about the implementation of applicable laws to penalize those that illegally tapped their sewer lines to the city’s drainage system.
Lacsamana disclosed the pre-feasibility study on how to go about with the city’s sewerage system with the assistance of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) is on process that is why all available data is being gathered for the completion of the needed master plan to have a long-term solution to the city’s sewer problem and improve the drainage facilities to prevent perennial flooding within the central business district during the rainy season.
She assured that the city government will be closely coordinating with the Baguio City District Engineering Office (BCDEO) and the DENR in order to rid the city’s drainage system with illegal sewer connections that tend to clog the city’s drain tunnels resulting to perennial floodings.
At the same time, the task forced recommended that the city government should have its own seepage treatment facility in order to treat the waste water from the city’s public market before it will be drained through the city’s main drainage system.
The master plan will cover the city’s sewerage and drainage requirements in all its 128 barangays and the implementation of the appropriate projects that will effectively and efficiently address the illegal sewer connections in the city’s drainage system and to significantly reduce the floodings within the central business district area that pose serious problems for motorists and the general public who are mostly inconvenienced by the floodings during the rainy and typhoon seasons. By Dexter A. See
