MORE NEWS, BAGUIO CITY

If establishments don’t have sound-proofing devises: Nightspot owners to be jailed
By Julie G. Fianza

BAGUIO CITY – Owners of nightspots would be imprisoned if found out they violated city ordinances by not setting up adequate sound proofing devises in their establishments.

Following reports that several business permits were pending due to lack of soundproofing devices, Vice Mayor Daniel Farinas, as officer-in-charge issued Administrative Order 59 last week.

The AO created an inspection team, headed by health services office chief Dr. Florence Reyes; city treasurer Thelma Manaois, licensing officer Cristio Lagyop and public order and safety division chief Gregorio Deligero as members.

Secretary to the mayor Ronald Perez acts as action officer of the body.

Farinas said there were several tourist-oriented establishments that have complied with the requirements but could not operate fully due to notations on their business permit applications.

He added inspections started Thursday so that pending business permits would be processed immediately.

Earlier, Ordinance 17, as approved by the city council last March 10, required night establishments like folk houses, disco pads and night clubs where live music is played as part of the entertainment but are near hotels, inns and residential houses to install and provide sound proof devices or noise absorbers to lessen volume of the sound.

The team is expected to inspect if the mentioned ordinance was complied with and submit a recommendation to the office of the city mayor, for approval or disapproval of the business permit.

Business establishments in violation of the ordinance would be meted out, for the first offense, ten days of imprisonment for the owner or a fine of P1,000 or both; for the second offense, 15 days of imprisonment or a fine of P2,000 or both; and for the third and subsequent offenses, 60 days of imprisonment or a fine of P3,000 or both.


Dev’t plan set for razed Baguio public market
BAGUIO CITY – Following the fire last week which razed the old city public, the city government will implement a market development program to improve the trading center supposed to be the show window of the city.

Vice Mayor Daniel Farinas said this was the consensus reached by city officials led by Mayor Reinaldo Bautista Jr. after the fire that burned 56 stalls.
Farinas said the fire showed the precarious condition of the city market necessitating action from the city government.

He said this prompted city officials’ decision to push through with market improvement projects that have long been shelved due to pending court cases between the city government and vendors groups protesting the city’s market development deal with the Uniwide Sales Realty and Resources Corp.

Farinas said in deference to the court cases, the officials agreed to focus the development thrust on areas that are not covered in the Uniwide deal like the blocks 3 and 4 and the Rillera building.

But he said the area affected by the fire, although covered in the deal, had to be
prioritized due to pressing need.

Stallholders displaced by the fire appealed to the city council for their temporary relocation to allow them to continue their business, a request which the city council granted.

Farinas said the market development project is the top concern identified by Bautista in his list of priority projects to be funded under the supplemental budget to be pushed at the city council soon.

The other projects listed in the top ten priorities are the solid waste management project particularly the purchase of ten dump trucks and construction of 15 materials recovery facilities; purchase of police motorcycles, improvement of city hall park, rehabilitation of bulldozers; implementation of security sticker project; conduct of Centennial celebration; publication of the Baguio City coffee table book; purchase of firefighting equipment; and multi-level parking.


Fil-Am docs respond to urgent pleas of patients
By Ramon Dacawi

BAGUIO CITY -- Cordillera expatriates keep tab of news back home and sometimes e-mail them to us when we’re too busy to have read them.

Dr. Lauro San Jose, a 50-year old neurosurgeon based in La Trinidad, Benguet, got one recently from Denver Marines, of San Diego, California.

It’s about Joshua, a five-year old boy whose head has been swollen by too much fluid in the brain. Aside from this condition, medically diagnosed as hydrocephalus, Joshua has a pesky tumor at the base of the skull, a growth doctors call posterior fossa mass lesion.

When told he needed two surgeries estimated to run in the hundreds of thousands, Joshua’s mother, Fortunate, who is unemployed, started knocking on doors. She’s fortunate Marines opened the Baguio news websites – and then the door.

The only child of a cook who is estranged from his wife, Joshua will meet San Jose tomorrow morning, for the preliminary tests to determine the kid’s fitness to undergo the initial procedure to drain the excess fluid from his brain.

As soon as Joshua’s ready, San Jose would then do the more delicate tumor excision, also pro bono, in keeping with the mission of Shunt for Life, a foundation he co-founded and to which Marines belongs.

“I haven’t had time to read the local papers and it took Denver to tell me about Joshua’s plight,” San Jose said.

He recalled that Shunt for Life evolved after a medical emergency in 1999. That was when San Jose was sought out to remove a blood clot from the brain of a patient who was comatose.

The patient was the father of Melecia Madrid, a nursed based in San Diego, California. Their family was on a homecoming here when Melecia’s dad suffered a stroke.

Only three days after the surgery, the patient was able to fly back to San Diego.

A year after, San Jose visited his sister in San Diego. He met Melecia and the idea for a foundation to reach out to indigent patients took form. Melecia broached the idea to fellow nurses and other Filipinos in the West Coast.

“The scheduled first medical mission to the Philippines was supposed to be in 2001, if not for 9-11,” Dr. San Jose recalled, referring to the terrorist plane-bombing of the New World Trade Center.

Lugging medicines and medical equipment and paying their own travel tickets and accommodations, Melecia and 14 other foundation members finally made it to the first mission in 2002, at the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center.

“Everybody thought it would be a one-shot deal, until it was over, when som
ebody asked ‘ Saan tayo next year?,’” San Jose said.

So the mission returned, and returned, each time the medical volunteers and members had stocked up on medicines, equipment, vacation leaves and personal savings for the cost of travel and other expenses.

Shunt for Life has healed over a hundred lives, mostly children suffering from hydrocephalus and meningocele, the out-pouching of brain matter.

For his humanitarian vision and action, Dr. San Jose was back in the United States last year, to receive the Ten Outstanding Filipinos Abroad” award from the Ten Outstanding Filipinos Foundation.

The neurosurgeon is a very busy man. Last week, he found respite, or so he thought, with a much-needed rest day in Manila.

Instead, he got a call. One of his former classmates at the Fatima University in Bulacan where he finished his medical course just figured in an accident.

The victim needed emergency brain surgery. Hours after conducting the procedure, Dr. San Jose was on his way to Cagayan de Oro for a planning session with the YMCA of Baguio, which he serves as assistant treasurer.

On the plane, he thought of Joshua, the ailing boy he’ll meet tomorrow.


‘Death’ of Balili River seen
BAGUIO CITY – Environmentalists here predicted the eventual death of the Balili River in this city and nearby Benguet due to continuous disposal of wastes in the tributaries of the river by unscrupulous residents of this mountain resort city.

While the condition of the river continues to worsen everyday due to the dumping of wastes in this body of water connecting this city to La Trinidad, Benguet, pro-environment advocates believe the river could still be saved if people, particularly thousands of families living along its tributaries, do their part to rescue the river which serves s one of the major sources of irrigation for lowland areas.

Over the past several decades, the city government has failed to address the uncontrolled garbage disposal and direct release of sewerage and household water into the river, resulting in its moribund condition.

Local environment groups said addressing the serious garbage problem will help the government and non-government agencies in their efforts to revitalize the river, but the people living alongside its tributaries should cooperate.

Baguio City is one big area alongside a major tributary of the Balili River, which flows down to La Trinidad, Tublay, Sablan, Benguet and ends in La Union.

However, the Cordillera office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources declared that the Balili River is not yet considered a dead body of water because aquatic life is still evident, particularly in the La Trinidad and Tublay portions of the river.

Earlier, the La Trinidad municipal government repeatedly assailed the apathy of Baguio residents about the efforts to save the river.

Despite criticisms, barangays which are alongside the tributaries of the Balili River are doing their share in trying to minimize the pollution of the river.

For instance, Barangay Gibraltar, one of the headwaters of the Balili River, is spearheading a massive cleanup to minimize the dumping of garbage in its tributary. -- Dexter See


City execs start to rescind ‘irregular’ title issued to bizman over public land
By Isagani S. Liporada

BAGUIO CITY -- City officials have started moves to rescind the land title issued to a Chinese businessman below city hall saying its issuance was irregular.

Councilor Richard Cariño, in committee report bared possible actions to recover the disputed parcel of land along Chuntug Street, now titled in the name of one Yu Hwa Ping.

Cariño recommended the granting of authority to the city legal officer to prepare all documents regarding the matter and to request the Office of the Solicitor General, on behalf of the City Government of Baguio, to cancel titles issued to Hwa Ping.

He also recommended authority for CLO to “identify all persons involved and responsible for the processing of the title to Yu Hwa Ping and to file appropriate charges against them.”

Cariño chairs the council committee on laws, which include councilors Nicasio Aliping and Perlita Chan-Rondez.

Rondez during the March 10 council session however manifested inhibition as lawyer Teopisto Rondez, her father-in-law, represents Hwa Ping in the land controversy.
Aliping has yet to sign the committee report as of press deadline.

Earlier, the council, instead of referring Hwa Ping files to the committee on Lands, referred the same to the committee on laws.

Cosalan who chairs the lands committee is related to Victor Cosalan who is Department of Environment and Natural Resources’ regional technical director for lands.

“A neutral authority,” Cariño said, “instead of another council committee or a committee formed by the DENR is strongly recommended to remove any cloud of doubt as to the possible involvement of public officers in white-washing facts regarding the matter.”

Meanwhile, councilor Fred Bagbagen who authored the proposal for the filing of necessary land reversion suit and administrative charges against DENR officials vowed “to pursue land recovery to the hilt.”

Bagbagen in an April 12 letter requested DENR-Cordillera director Samuel Peñafiel for a copy of an investigation report of the DENR committee tasked to investigate the Hwa Ping land uproar.

“We understand you created a committee to look into the possible filing of cancellation proceedings apropos the title issued to Hwa Ping,” he said.

“Knowing that the committee was formed sometime between December 2007 and January 2008 and that the same was given limited time within which to conduct an investigation, we hope you could furnish us with their report so we could likewise complement your action with ours,” he added.

In a separate interview Bagbagen said, “If DENR is indeed sincere in protecting what we perceive is for the greater good of the people of Baguio, we do not see any well-argued reason for their investigation to drag on.”

Earlier, the DENR issued Special Order No. 14, “creating a team to conduct investigation for possible filing of cancellation proceedings over the title issued on a road-right-of-way,” right at the foot of city hall.

Peñafiel named lawyer Joseph Humiding as chairman, lawyer Cleo Andrada, engineer Wilbert Mangliwan, Evelyn S. Wales Norbert Aquino, and Filipinas Mallare to investigate how the title was processed.

The DENR probe team earlier requested that CLO define issues surrounding the city’s opposition to the award of the property to Hwa Ping.

But the Rabanes was unmoved saying the said team should know the issues they’re supposed to investigate.

Meantime, CLO’s Carlos Melchor Rabanes said, “We’re ready to go to court as soon as we receive the council green light.”

Seeing Hwa Ping priming up for a construction in the area, lawyer Rene Cortes earlier filed opposition with concerned local officials seeking to stop the latter from erecting vertical structures.

His main premise: the land cannot be disposed through Townsite Sales Application (TSA) because it is a part of a road-right-of-way along Chuntug; and that the parcel of land forms part of City Hall Reservation under Proc. No. 62.

Despite city declarations reserving the area for greenbelt purposes however, Hwa Ping was able to secure the title.


Baguio City officials want controversial Convention Center pine forest retained
By Aileen P. Refuerzo

BAGUIO CITY – Vice Mayor Daniel Farinas said Thursday the city government will not allow the reported plan to construct a commercial structure at the remaining forested lot within the Baguio Convention Center reservation without proper consultation.

Farinas said Mayor Reinaldo Bautista Jr.’s position to safeguard the city’s resources against wanton destruction remained firm.

Farinas said the reported deal between the Government Service Insurance System and the Shoemart Investments Corporation remained sketchy and the ownership of the subject area remained tainted with legal questions.

He said that even if these legal problems have been threshed out, the city will insist that parties should still impose limitations on the development plans to safeguard the environment.

Last Monday, the city council sustained the city’s stand to retain and develop the forested area.

Although they voted to slash P1.2 million from the P2 million appropriated for the development of the said forest park in 1993.

The aldermen made it clear that slashing the budget did not mean they have given up on the project or they were acceding to the reported development of the area into a commercial site.

The body decided to realign the P1.2 million to finance the improvement of the north-bound terminal, in the mean time that the tree park development project can not be expedited due to legal questions as to the ownership of the area.

But they said the city was ready to allocate the required fund if the project will be made ready for implementation.

At least three proposals are now pending before the city council calling for the preservation of the pine forest as such.

The measures were proposed by councilors Richard Carino, Bagbagen, Isabelo Cosalan Jr., Elaine Sembrano and Betty Lourdes Tabanda.

The aldermen said removing the woodland would have great effect as apart from being one of the few remaining pine stands in the area, it supplies part of the water needs of the city.

They area “which stands within the Government Center Reservation was planted more than three decades ago under the direction of then First Lady Imelda Marcos who was also Minister of Human Settlements at the time, hence, it is a government forest.”

They said the Constitution mandates that “forests are inalienable natural resources of the State.”

“Public interest and welfare demands that the pine forest at the Baguio City Convention Center area should be preserved and even enhanced and not destroyed to give way to commercial development,” the aldermen said.


Number coding repeal, one-way traffic schemes planned
By Julie G. Fianza

BAGUIO City – The traffic number coding scheme may be repealed through city council action, Vice Mayor Daniel Farinas bared, even as other traffic solutions would be studied.

The vice mayor said that the city as a tourist spot should remain attractive to local and foreign tourists, thus, the looming repeal.

He cited the earlier holiday months where tourists abound for Baguio’s cool weather, the Panagbenga celebrations, graduation rites, for the city’s summer activities, and this summer term; for which the number coding is still suspended, until May 30.

There is also a possibility that the enrollment period this June would merit another suspension when students and their parents would flock to the city.

Not even the impending traffic problems would let the number coding stay, the vice mayor said. The traffic snarls were the very reason why the number coding was realized through an ordinance at the city council. Public utility vehicles were given certain days to “rest” from plying their routes, along and to the Central Business District.

The decongestion of the CBD however, should be through other means but not entirely dependent on the coding scheme, the vice-mayor emphasized.

All other solutions to traffic bottle necks are being closely looked into by the Baguio City Police Office-Traffic Management Group, Traffic and Transportation Management Committee and other concerned city bodies, he added.

Farinas also said the one-way traffic schemes in city roads, are due to be
implemented permanently.

Reports from the TMG and BCPO bared the one-way scheme was successful, and that traffic jams in intersections could be remedied trough public discipline and removal of barriers and structures.

The one-way traffic schemes are implemented at the city hall loop, Session road-SM loop and University of the Philippines loop.

All traffic measures would be finalized through ordinances to be approved by the city council.


Task Force Usig to release posters of suspects in slays

The police task force investigating the unexplained murders of journalists and leftist activists is set to release its most wanted posters of suspects in the killings.

Task Force Usig chief Director Jefferson Soriano also gave assurance that the task force is working at full speed to resolve the killings.

Soriano and representatives of the Department of Justice, Department of the Interior and Local Government, National Bureau of Investigation, Supreme Court, and Armed Forces of the Philippines had a meeting last week to discuss the status of cases still pending with the task force.

It was also agreed during the meeting to release posters of suspects in the killings and unexplained disappearances, he said.

Task Force Usig reported that not a single unexplained killing has been recorded during the first quarter of the year.

Soriano said there was a significant decline in unexplained killings by 83 percent from 2006 to 2007, indicating that the government, through the Philippine National Police (PNP) and other agencies, has been effectively addressing the issue.

“As far as our mandate to investigate the unexplained killings of militants and journalists is concerned, we have not yet recorded a single incident,” Soriano added.

There are at present a total of 161 people wanted for the killings, but only 66 of them have been identified and 23 have pending warrants of arrest.

Soriano said at least 27 cases have been pending before prosecutor’s offices, 13 others have been provisionally dismissed for lack of evidence or witnesses, and 14 other cases still under prosecution.

He said seven cases of unexplained killings have been referred to the special courts created by the Supreme Court to handle cases of killings of militants and journalists.
Soriano said Task Force Usig has been closely coordinating with the DOJ on the status of the different cases.

Soriano urged the human rights group Karapatan to allow the PNP and Task Force Usig to sit down and compare their reports on the killings.

Karapatan has been criticizing the PNP and the task force for downplaying human rights abuses allegedly committed by government security forces against journalists and leftist activists.

Karapatan claimed there are over 1,000 unexplained killings, which they blamed on the government and military, but the PNP said the group’s records were bloated with unconfirmed incidents.

Soriano said some of the alleged victims in the cases recorded by Karapatan turned out to be alive.