THE Provincial Government will transfer its loan application to Land Bank from the Municipal Development Fund Office (MDFO) for the development of the 40- hectare Capitol employees' Housing Project in Barangay Mansilingan, Bacolod City.
Board Member Salvador Escalante revealed Wednesday, April 10, that the Provincial Council during its regular session held at the Panaad Stadium Wednesday morning removed the authority for Governor Alfredo Marañon to negotiate the loan with MDFO and gave him the authority to negotiate and transfer the loan amounting to P400 million to Landbank.
Escalante revealed that Land Bank has offered the province the same interest rate with that of the MDFO of 4.25 percent per annum.
"The province has applied for the loan with the MDFO since last year but it was not acted upon by the agency that forced the Governor to negotiate with other banks", Escalante explained.
The Capitol employees’ housing project is located in Barangay Mansilingan, Bacolod City.
The P400 million is intended for the development of the housing project.
"Our engineers have also expressed apprehension that the delay of the project may affect the costing or re-pricing of the materials that's why the governor made an action to apply to other banks,” Escalante further explained.
The Provincial Government of Negros Occidental has allocated a total of P667,408,492 for the housing project.
Of the total project cost, P267,408,492 is for the equity component and P400 million from the loan applied for by the province as stipulated in the project report prepared by Provincial Planning and Development Office head Ma. Lina Sanogal.
The housing project, which aims to provide employees access to affordable lots, is planned as one of the incentives to retain the services of these employees and award those who have been members of the organization on other capacities for the period 2010 to 2019.
Sanogal said members who can qualify to avail include elective officials, consultants, all employees (permanent and contractual) who are willing to comply with the terms of payment which will be based on tenure or capacity to pay of the applicant or whatever is set in the Implementing Rules and Regulations approved by the provincial board.
The objective of the project is to recover the cost of acquisition and development of the land, generate additional revenues for the provincial government and meeting the intrinsic need of the employees thereby lifting their morale and further improve productivity, Sanogal added.