DAVAO City Library and Information Center (CLIC) urged barangays to establish reading centers for residents as the city aims for a child-friendly city.
“Isa man gud ni sa atoang kakulangan, especially nga naga-apply ta nga mahimong child-friendly city. Out of 182 barangay, 100 plus lang ang atong reading centers, kung mahimo natong perfect, why not? (We lack in this aspect in our bid to become a child-friendly city. Out of 182 barangays, only around a hundred have reading centers. If we can have all barangays have their own reading centers, then why not?),” Salome Enoc, Head of CLIC, said in an interview with SunStar Davao on January 20, 2023.
Enoc said based on the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) monitoring, only 113 reading centers were established in the city.
In a separate interview on Davao City Disaster Radio on January 19, she called for barangay officials to consider this proposition. If they do not have one yet, she encouraged them to make space for it. They can simply start by having a nook that could become a reading center.
“This is a call to all barangay captains to open their own reading center, maski’g nook lang (even if it is only a nook),” Enoc said.
Enoc said their office continues to distribute book titles to reading centers in barangays, with each reading center receiving around 300 to 500 book titles and reading materials.
Enoc said the CLIC is willing to help barangays establish their own reading centers as long as ample space that can be easily accessed by residents is provided. She said the generous donations that the city library receives will provide sufficient reading materials for each reading center.
“Kaning mga donations na gipanghatag diri sa atoang mga generous Dabawenyos, we are sharing this to the reading centers. Hinay-hinay nato ning gihatag sa ilaha kay usahay naa na may mga duplicate, triplicate diri so atoa ning i-share didto sa ilaha (We are sharing these donations given by our generous Dabawenyos to the reading centers. We are slowly distributing these to them because sometimes we have duplicate, triplicates here so we are share these with them),” she said.
In 2022, the CLIC distributed books to reading centers in 15 far-flung barangays and an elementary school in Marilog District.
“We are aiming for a child-friendly city, and one of the components is for us to build a library in our reading centers,” she added.
She said the establishment of reading centers at the barangay level may also help decongest the number of people going to the city’s main library.
“Naa man pud tay district libraries nga pwede nato mabisitahan, siguro wala kabalo ang uban (We also have district libraries that Dabawenyos can visit, probably they are not aware of it yet),” Enoc said.
She said they can only cater to around 250 visitors in a day as it is only the sitting capacity of the CLIC, excluding the coffee shop.
She added that there are district libraries in Calinan, Toril, Tugbok, and an incoming one in Bunawan. KSD with DAVAO CIO