STAKEHOLDERS are duty-bound to do their share to revitalize and clean the Balili River, which is designated as Water Quality Management Area (WQMA).
Mayor Mauricio Domogan, during the celebration of the Balili River Day, said stakeholders are obliged to ensure the waters of the Sagudin River, the headwaters of the Balili River, situated in the city is clean when it flows to the creek or wherever it will go because it is the right thing to do. It must be maintained and cleaned as this is the source of water of our children and the future generations, he stressed.
The Environmental Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resource (EMB-DENR) designated the Balili River as WQMA last January covering the areas of La Trinidad, Sablan and the city. The designation of the river system as WQMA is intended to improve the quality of its waters, which has deteriorated through the years, to regain its Class A classification.
He recognized the voluntary and harmonized efforts of the Balili River System Revitalization Coalition (BRSRC) to address the concern of the BLISTT areas or the Baguio-La Trinidad-Itogon-Sablan-Tuba-Tublay and noted the shelving of parochial interest which used to be the practice in the past.
Sablan Mayor Arthur Baldo agreed it is the duty of those in the BLISTT areas to revitalize the Balili Rriver underscoring its significance as the source of water of the Hydroelectric Development Corporation (HEDCOR) mini-hydro power plants situated in Sablan. The town gets share from the collection of taxes from Hedcor's mini-hydro project boosting its coffers.
Baldo commended the efforts of the coalition to rehabilitate the river system. Saving the Balili River is helping the municipality of Sablan, he added.
For her part, La Trinidad Mayor Edna Tabanda, who was born and raised in the town and knows the real situation of the river system then and now, assured her support to all the programs and projects of the WQMA and the BRSRC.
Domogan suggested the inclusion of Tublay as part of the WQMA as the Balili River system also traverses the municipality of Tublay before it flows downstream to Sablan. He also acknowledged the coalition's website development which he said is a concrete example of synergism in the hope this would help in the rehabilitation efforts.
The BRSRC launched during the Balili River Day its One-Stop-Shop research-based website with a pollution monitoring system developed by the University of the Cordilleras. The monitoring system has SMS alert and SMS map features to track complaints and feedback in the affected barangays for barangay officials and other stakeholders to address concerns.
Apart from the coalition's profile and basic information, researches, news and updates and discussion forum, other features of the web include water quality data readings and Google satellite imagery of the river stretch including designated water sampling monitoring stations.
La Trinidad and city barangay officials who were present during the launching took turns registering to form part of the directory of the web's monitoring system. (Susan Aro)