Tag Archives: HOUSING
Tribal housing project to rise in TALAINGOD, Davao del Norte
HUDCC Asec. Atty. Wendel Avisado (4th right) and Vice Gov. Victorio Suaybaguio, Jr., together with the recipients of the ‘Pabalay sa Lumad’ tribal housing project in Sitio Paiton, Dagohoy, Talaingod, Davao del Norte. Noel Baguio/PIO
HUDCC Asec. Atty. Wendel Avisado and party, together with Vice Gov. Victorio Suaybaguio, Jr and local officials applaud the entertaining dance number of tribal kids at the ‘Pabalay sa Lumad’ tribal housing project site in Sitio Paiton, Dagohoy, Talaingod, Davao del Norte. Noel Baguio/PIO
Hundreds of ethnic families belonging to the Langilan-Manobo Tribe will benefit from “Pabalay sa Lumad”, the country’s first housing project for indigenous communities in Sitio Paiton, Dagohoy, Talaingod, Davao del Norte.
Atty. Wendel Avisado, Deputy Secretary General of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) led a visiting team on the project site on July 26, 2011 to validate the project, which will soon be implemented by the National Housing Authority (NHA).
Asec. Avisado said his visit was sanctioned by Vice President and HUDCC chair Jejomar C. Binay, pursuant to President Benigno Aquino III’s thrust of providing decent shelter to the indigenous people (IP).
It can be recalled that the vice president, during his visit to Davao City last May, said the IPs would become “part and parcel” of his new program on housing that is being strengthened in partnership with the local government units (LGUs).
Avisado said the Province of Davao del Norte was the LGU to submit a proposal for a tribal housing project.
He named the Paiton Tribal Housing Project as a pilot project among the many IP communities throughout the country.
Avisado’s party included NHA-XI Regional Director Engr. Carol Angel, HUDCC Regional Coordinator Engr. Rose Taasan, HUDCC Policy Division Director Ronald Fontanillas, and Vice Governor Victorio Suaybaguio, Jr.
The HUDCC official bared the design of the houses will conform to the culture and traditions of the Langilan tribe in the area.
Governor Rodolfo P. del Rosario, the Pabalay as a component of his human-centered development strategy, known as P.E.O.P.L.E.
Some 111 tribal families will benefit from the project, which is expected to cost more than P6 million.
Tribal Chieftain Datu Oscar Bug-ot allocated some five hectares within the ancestral domain for the project site, more than a kilometer away from Lake Paiton.
The project was identified earlier as a relocation site for the Lumad families living near the lake, in order to reduce run-off to protect Lake Paiton, which is being developed by the province as a promising eco-tourism destination.
Asec. Avisado and party were welcomed by jubilant Lumads garbed in colorful native attires, who showed their gratitude through a beautiful thanksgiving dance by the native children. NOEL BAGUIO
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PUBLISHED IN THE DURIAN POST NO.72, August 1-7, 2011
PUBLISHED IN THE DURIAN POST NO.72, August 1-7, 2011Binay chips in P10M for Davao City flood victims
VICE MAYOR RODRIGO DUTERTE SURVEYING DAMAGE OF THE JUNE 29 KILLER FLOOD. photo by BONG GO
By ROGER M. BALANZA
Vice President Jejomar Binay is allocating P10 million for Davao City’s urban housing program, to benefit victims of the killer June 29 flood who lost their houses.
Binay chairs the Housing and Urban Development
VICE PRESIDENT BINAY
Coordinating Council (HUDCC), which manages government program for homeless urban poor.
CABLING, standing left, briefing beneficiaries of the city's socialized housing program for reloction to Los Amigos Resettlement
City councilor Arnolfo Ricardo Cabling said the fund would be utilized to build 100 houses at P100,000 each for 100 victims of the June flood that swept through four barangays in the southern part of the city. Thirty people died in the flood which temporarily displaced more than 10,000 people.
The houses would be built in the city-government-owned 20-hectare relocation site in Los Amigos, Tugbok district.
Cabling said he was informed about the fund by National housing Authority (NHA) regional manager Carol Angel, who had been instructed by the vice president to allocate the fund for housing of the victims of the Davao City flood.
He said on top of the P10million, NHA would also be setting aside P47 million in additional fund for site development of the Los Amigos relocation area.
Earlier, City Planning and Development Office (CPDO) acting chief Roberto Alabado III said about 80 families who lost their houses to the flood have started to transfer to Los Amigos, after being assigned 80-sqm lots in the relocation site.
Ayala Land turns over P23M for Davao City urban poor housing program
BY ROGER M. BALANZA
Ayala Land has turned over to the Davao City government P25
million for the city’s Urban Land Reform Program in compliance with the 20 percent Balanced Housing provision of the Urban Housing and Development Act (UDHA).
The provision stipulates that high-end housing developers must allocate 20 percent of their development cost to low-cost socialized housing project.
We are lucky that Ayala preferred us to handle its fund in compliance to UDHA, said Davao City councilor Arnolfo Cabling, chair of the committee on housing, rural and urban development.
Cabling said the P25 million housing fund for socialized housing given to the local government represents Ayala’s compliance to UDHA’s balance housing provision for ongoing projects nationwide.
Cabling facilitated the arrangement with Ayala to pour the fund here.
Ayala is the second high-end housing developer to assign their Balanced Housing compliance to the local government, which is allowed under UDHA, with Alsons Development turning over to City Hall a two-hectare property in Lasang for low-cost housing in compliance to the UDHA provision.
Ayala, whose biggest project here is the P3 billion Abreeza Mall in a joint venture with Floirendo Group, is one of the country’s biggest high-end housing developers and mall builders.
Ayala officials told me this is their way of assisting the homeless
DON ANTONIO O. FLOIRENDO at the Abreeza Mall Davao opening in May
urban poor in Davao City, their expression of support to the administration of Mayor Sara Duterte and Vice Mayor Rodrigo Duterte and their confidence in the economy of the city, said Cabling.
Davao City Muslims rise up vs. swine farms
Want hog farms out of Sirawan
A protest by Muslim leaders against hog and poultry farms in the upland of Sirawan in Davao City has been given the go-signal for investigation by the City Council.
The council last week approved on first reading a resolution seeking the closure requested by Alem Omar Abdullah of the Council of Elders of Kalagan/Muslim Community in Sirawan. He cited foul odor from the farms and threats to health to people of Sirawan, whose coastal area is populated by Mulsims, who consider eating pork as taboo to their religion.
The petition recalls an unresolved protest filed with the city council by Kevin Uraya of Uraya Land, whose high-end subdivision Elenita Heights, he alleges, is being cheapened by the presence of the animal farms.
The petition was heard by the committee on environment then chaired by councilor Arnolfo Cabling.
Davao Integrated Agricultural Foundation (DIAF) whose members run several farms in the area opposed the petition, citing their farms complied with zoning ordinance and environmental laws. The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in Davao City also said the city’s supply of pork and poultry would be affected if the farms were closed.
The DIAF composed of about 20 large and small poultry and swine operators and orchard farmers, also filed with the city council a petition to return the area to its old classification..
DIAF members who have been operating in Sirawan for more than 40 years said the local government erred when it classified their area—formerly agricultural–into a residential zone in the 1996 Amended Zoning Code.
Tourism, property development remain top Davao City investments
SELLING DAVAO. Mayor Sara Duterte sharing inputs with South Africa Amabassador to the Philippines Nyamande-Pitso on how to strengthen trade and tourism relations between Davao City and South Africa
By ROGER M. BALANZA
Housing and property development and tourism continue to be frontrunners in investments in Davao City, with the Davao City Investment and Incentive Board (DCIIB) approving projects worth P330 million in the first quarter of this year.
BDA Holiday Prime Properties Inc. with its high-end subdivision, the P220 million Orchid Hills, led four new large investors endorsed by Davao City Investments and Promotion Center. The project expects to generate more than 200 jobs.
The BDA Holiday project, along with the three others, are exempted from payment of the mayor’s permit fees, building fees, business sales tax and other fees and charges for three years from start of commercial operations, and exemption from payment of the Basic Real Property Tax for two years from the accrual of the real property tax.
Damosa IT Park by Davao Land Inc., with its additional building construction worth P52,230,590 came in next with the project that would provide employment to 176 workers.
Tourism threw in P29,638,331 in the Gumamela Caverock Farm Resort, the third biggest investor with jobs for about 200 people.
Another property development came in fourth, with Globalcrest Properties pouring P27.5 million into the three-storey 28-room boutique hotel Home Crest Residences.
Investments in tourism and property development, among priority investment areas, have been increasing partly lured by incentives offered by the local government.
Other areas of investment that could secure the incentives from the DIIB are those in recreational facilities, agri-business and food processing, light manufacturing and assembly, property development, transshipment infrastructure, establishment of foreign bank branches, medical, educational, training, and sports facilities, telecommunications, environmental enhancement and protection project, and information and communications technology.
Defaulting housing developers in Davao City warned
Vice Mayor Rodrigo Duterte said housing developers, including those who chipped in donations to his campaign funds, who default on their contracts would be axed.
This is swindling or estafa, he said on television.
Complaints of housing units unavailable despite buyers having been paid in full was brought up Sunday in Duterte’s television program Gikan sa Masa Para sa Masa on ABS/CBN
I will treat you as a pig (Magbabauyan ta!), he said, adding he would encourage those at the losing wend of the anomaly to file charges in court against the erring developers.
Earlier reports said a Balikbayan couple who worked for years in the Middle East to buy a housing unit here after their retirement could have not their house in a high-end subdivision despite having been paid in full.
These people worked to death and they are treated this way, said Duterte.
Duterte said friends in housing development committing similar anomalies should be warned.
Without naming names, Duterte said a developer chipped in an amount to his campaign fund in the last elections.
How much did you contribute? P300,000? I will return that, he said.
Duterte irked by talks of ‘dirty money’ at SP
A resort owner seeking permit from the City Council who reportedly said councilors can be bought to approve the permit is in hot water.
That woman who said “pera-pera lang” ang mga city councilors, I am telling you, your application sleeps while I am the vice mayor, Vice Mayor Rodrigo Duterte said on television on Sunday. He did elaborate nor named names.
Defending the city councilors, Duterte said members of the city council are straight guys, with the younger ones being idealists.
At the Gikan sa Masa Para sa Masa television program on ABS/CBN, Duterte said he would resign as vice mayor if he is found to be mulcting businessmen even with a single centavo. He admits receiving money from businessmen, but only contributions to his campaign funds during elections.
But sarcastically, he said he “could sell his soul” and accept bribes to approve a development project if the price is right: P100 million.
Two years ago, some city councilors had been linked to the DLBM Gang, allegedly a group of councilors squeezing housing developers into coughing up huge sums for approval of housing permits.
That was before, but not now, said Duterte, when reminded of the alleged mulcting incident that happened while he was still the city mayor. Then Vice Mayor Sara Duterte had asked the Ombudsman to investigate the alleged corruption by the gang that carries the first letters of the names of the city councilors said to be involved in the racket.
Giving hint to whom he is referring to or what project is seeking a permit from the city council, Duterte said the applicant started operations without a single permit from the local government.
Tuesday last week in his Ato ni Bay television program, Duterte said some people start work on projects on land that needed conversion before the council could approve their application.
In the council session later, city councilors deferred discussion on the application for reclassification of Carmencita P. Molina, proprietress of Davao Eagle Ridge Resort, from “Medium Density Residential Zone” to “Commercial Zone”, of her property located at Purok 40-A, Km. 9, Upper Ulas, Talomo District.
The resort reportedly had already started operation before the council could act on her application.RMB
MGB not sold to Shrine Hills geo-hazard survey group
By ROGER M. BALANZA
A specialist from the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) in the Davao Region has expressed doubts on the capacity of a survey group from the University of the Philippines hired by the Davao City government to conduct a geo-hazard study on Shrine Hills.
Engr. Noel B. Angeles, supervising science research specialist, voiced the apprehension during a radio show two weeks back where fears of landslides and massive flooding was discussed once developments are introduced in the hill in Maa.
Face to face with leaders of oppositors to housing subdivisions in Shrine Hills, Angeles in the ABS/CBN/DxAB radio program Truly Yours hosted by Stella Alvarado, said the parameters of the study should be made public saying the engineering aspect may not be included in the study.
Angeles is the head of an MGB team that conducted, together with the City Planning and Development Office of the local government, the Terrain Analysis and Study in 2008.
The study showed housing developments can be introduced in Shrine Hills with engineering interventions to avoid landslides.
FEAR FACTOR. Atop Shrine Hills can be seen several housing subdivisions in Maa below protesting high-end housing development on the hill could trigger landslides and massive flooding.
The local government has commissioned a team from the UP-Diliman National Institute of Geological Sciences to conduct the study, funded with P750,000, headed by geo-hazard specialist and associate professor Sandra Catane.
Angeles said, basing from his own experiences, the amount was too small and the group may not come out with an in-depth study especially the engineering aspect.
In the show, city councilor Arnolfo Ricardo Cabling lost his cool and verbally trashed Norma Javellana, for saying that Davao City councilor are less honorable for approving housing projects in Shrine Hills.
Norma Javellana and Stacey Baird, who are officials of the Maa Federation of Homeowners Associations, were guests in the show representing the oppositors.
The federation is trying to stop the high-end housing projects—among them the DMCI-Urban Development of the Consunjis and Crown Asia of Senator Manny Villar— in the Maa side of Shrine Hills on fears of massive landslides and floods in future. Javellana’s group members have houses below Shrine Hills.
Cabling, chair of the city council committee on housing, lost his cool after Javellana said that she hoped members of the city council would be “more honorable” when the legislative body tackles the application for Development Permits (DP) of the two companies.
The council had approved Preliminary Approval for Locational Clearance (PALC) of the projects but put on hold action on the DP, while a private group conducts geo-hazard study on Shrine Hills.
The city council, meanwhile, issued a moratorium on approval of applications for housing developments on Shrine Hills, until after the UP-Diliman team submits it study to the city council.
In the session last week, Councilor Rachel Zozobrado, chair of the committee on housing for high-end projects, said her committee would act on the applications only after the Catane team would have submitted results of its geo-hazard study.
