BACOLOD City Mayor Evelio Leonardia ordered the City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (CDRRMO) Monday, April 17, to enforce City Ordinance 749 requiring resort owners and similar businesses to hire certified lifeguards.
Leonardia said he instructed Executive Assistant Jose Maria Vargas, cluster head for CDRRMO, to review the ordinance passed in 2015.
“Resorts are good businesses and they can afford to hire lifeguards. If they cannot hire lifeguards they have no business operating because a lifeguard is supposed to be a regular fixture of any resort,” he said.
On Holy Week, a six-year-old girl was rescued by a lifeguard while swimming in a resort at Barangay Taculing. She was brought to a hospital and is now in stable condition.
A pregnant woman and her toddler son also drowned along the shoreline of Purok Malipayon, Barangay 35 on Saturday.
Vargas said most resorts in Bacolod don’t have certified lifeguards, especially in the area of Barangay Punta Taytay.
He said he will recommend to the City Council to amend Ordinance 749 to impose penalty or sanction to resort owners.
“We will require the resort owners to hire certified lifeguards first before renewing their business permits,” Vargas added.
The lifeguards will be trained by the Philippine Coast Guard.
Vargas said in 2007 and 2009, five children drowned in two rivers in Bacolod.
He said they will coordinate with the barangay officials to monitor the rivers within their areas of jurisdiction.*