Saturday, September 13, 2008 Urban poor body asks City to develop relocation sites
AS IT improves collection and hopes to double last year’s amount, the Cebu City Division for the Welfare of the Urban Poor (DWUP) is asking the City Government to set aside funds for the development of existing relocation sites.
The occupied sites, the office said, are full because beneficiaries could not be dispersed yet to vacant areas, most of which are still “unlivable.”
An estimated 190,000 square meters of undeveloped land in hilly areas in five barangays, bought in 1997 to 2000, are unoccupied by any of the beneficiaries because these areas are forested, rocky and at least 30 degrees steep.
Unoccupied properties are among the reasons the City Government has not been able to fully recover the P428.4 million it invested in urban poor housing since 1993.
Excluding interests and penalties, the City still has to collect P350.914 million.
Requirement
City Hall housing consultant Charmae Pyl Nercua had said the City has to spend at least P29 million to make the lots livable, which means installing basic dirt roads, an open canal for drainage, and a riprap for the steep parts.
Fully developing the area will cost P50 million.
To improve collection, DWUP also asked for additional equipment, such as computers and survey equipment, and the approval of pending policies, like the penalty for lapsed contracts.
DWUP asked that the old penalty charge of one-fifth of one percent per day, which amounts to six percent a month, be changed to just one percent of the monthly balance.
This would encourage the beneficiaries to pay their monthly amortization and the corresponding penalty, Nercua said.
Collection
As of last July, DWUP already collected P13.099 million, 52 percent of which are penalties. The amount is more than double last year’s total collection of P12.102 million.
The August 2008 collection is P1.822 million, for a total collection of P14.971 million since January this year.
The Local Housing Board (LHB) has also drafted the guidelines for an estimated 1,000 people who bought rights from registered beneficiaries of the Cebu City Government’s socialized housing programs.
Banned
The sale and purchase of rights are supposedly banned under the City’s beneficiary selection guidelines, Nercua said.
But the LHB recognized that the problem exists and should be addressed, acknowledging that many are “buyers in good faith,” she said.
Nercua attributed the improved collection to policy initiatives, like the signing of a new memorandum of agreement with community associations; loan restructuring; budget allocations for four development sites, which “somehow encouraged beneficiaries to pay their monthly obligations;” and 60 to 70 percent “cost recovery efficiency” by DWUP. (RHM)
