City wants buyers out from GSIS lot over pine stand

BENCHWARMER

Ramon Dacawi

No business enterprise would have its name smeared for having destroyed Baguio’s pine forest beside the Baguio Convention Center for the sake of profit.

This emerging view may yet save the man-made pine stand amidst renewed apprehension of city  residents and visitors over the refusal of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) to sell the lot to the city so that it be preserved for posterity.

Instead of accepting the city’s offer, GSIS upped the purchase price, prompting mayor Mauricio Domogan to seek intervention of President Rodrigo Duterte to save the pine-stand as part of Baguio’s legacy.

“Instead of maintaining its previous offer of Php 433,517,400, the GSIS increased it to Php 682,201,800 per its latest letter dated 23 April 2018 which or office received today, and is hereby attached as Annex “C”,” the mayor wrote the President.

“The city sent its reply containing its latest offer in the amount of P433,517,400 which is the exact amount that GSIS offered in its letter, Annex “A” hereof. The latest offer of GSIS increasing its previous offer from P433,517,400 to P682,201,800 is respectfully submitted as too high,” the mayor told the President.

City officials and residents were alarmed over the increasing price of the pine forest despite its being acquired for free by GSIS through the signature of then President Marcos.

Marcos, in an order, sliced off the present site of the Baguio Convention Center, the pine forest and adjoining areas with an approximate size of 33,606 square meters and transferred it in the name of GSIS.

The order mandated GSIS to build the Convention Center as site of the World Chess Championship series between Anatoly Karpov and Viktor Korchnoi.

Baguio residents of all ages took turns planting and caring for the pine trees that turned the once-barren area into a mini-forest that showcases Baguio’s past when it was called the country’s “City of Pines”.

Protests over the cutting down of the pine trees to give way to a commercial building may yet deter business enterprises from bidding for the pine stand  

“The pine trees growing in the area have become the best deterrent to investors who now have to think twice before bidding for the lot, knowing they would  meet stiff opposition the moment they start clearing the area of trees so they can build their commercial buildings,” a Baguio resident observed.

“If this happens, there would be an uproar among foresters, government officials and employees, students and laborers took turns planting and caring for pine over the years until the otherwise  barren area became the patch that it is today – a forest where we can still smell the scent of pine.”

In a letter to the mayor last May 25, GSIS president and general manager Jesus Clint Aranas said the price had been upped to Php 8682,201, to which the city agreed.

“We reiterate our motivation to purchase the said property, that is to preserve and maintain the area as a green space,” the mayor wrote Aranas. “This is part of the City’s environment policy to recover  public spaces and green areas for the benefit of our citizenry and also to contribute to sustaining our ecosystem and develop buffer areas for emerging environmental impacts in our urban setting’” the mayor noted.

The rapid urbanization of Baguio has led some citizens to suggest that the city, also known as the country’s “Summer Capital”,  be considered as another “Boracay” where environmental projects and actions can be set into motion to slow down its deterioration.

Upon learning the threat on the pine forest  has been resurrected, school children and teachers of the Baguio Pines Family Learning Center last Tuesday began hatching moves supporting the city’s bid for the two adjoining lots.

“Our kids plan to write President Duterte asking him to look into the possibility of his rescinding the order of then President Marcos assigning the two lost to GSIS,” school principal Leonila Dumawa Bayla said.

Former kids of the school began the campaign to save the trees years back, writing  then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to save the green patch. The kids enlarged their letters in tarpaulin which they hanged on the threatened trees.

Responding, then Presidnt Arroyo promised the trees would be spared from private development plans.  Eventually, mall chain Shoemart cancelled its plan to build a four-building condotel on the pinestand called “Baguio A Residences.

As they did in the past, Baguio residents are again asking expatriates and people who care for Baguio to write letters appealing to GSIS to let the city buy the choice lot it obtained for free.. – Ramon Dacawi.