DENR sets public hearing on Baguio high rise building construction moratorium

By Aileen P. Refuerzo

BAGUIO CITY – The Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources Cordillera (DENR-CAR) has set a public consultation on key environmental issues facing the city which includes the draft executive order setting a moratorium on the construction of high rise buildings on July 29, 1 p.m. at the DENR-CAR Conference Room at Gibraltar.

DENR-CAR Regional Executive Director Ralph Pablo invited Mayor Benjamin Magalong to attend the consultation which will also tackle the requirements and procedures for the issuance of tree-cutting permits and Environmental Clearance Certificate, the geo-hazard status of the different areas in the city, solid waste management and the draft executive order setting the building construction moratorium.

 “Recently, the environmental state of Baguio City has been on the news due to various issues of public interest such as tree cutting, solid waste management and overdevelopment.  Hence, the DENR-CAR will convene various stakeholders in a dialogue to provide a venue to discuss these concerns, gather inputs and agree on courses of action and possible ways forward,” Pablo noted.

Last week, the mayor said he had worked out with Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu and Interior and Local Government Secretary Eduardo Ano the possibility of having the President issue an executive order mandating the rehabilitation of the city through a one-year moratorium on the construction of high rise buildings with the inclusion of a funding component for the city to implement priority rehabilitative projects like the expansion of the city’s sewerage treatment system.

In their meeting last July 9, Pablo and Magalong agreed that pursuing a halt in constructions in the city would give the city a much-needed breather from building activities and allow the city to concentrate on rehabilitating the city’s environs.

 The mayor said the city is lining up projects that would address its pressing environmental problems among which garbage and sewage management and the dwindling water supply and imposing a freeze on buildings will help the city concentrate its efforts on these aspects.   

Pablo said he is inclined to support the construction moratorium because of the city’s limited carrying capacity.

The moratorium on the construction of high-rise buildings which was first broached during the Senate hearing on the creation of the Baguio-La-Trinidad-Itogon-Sablan-Tuba-Tublay (BLISTT) Development Authority early this year has been the subject of debates in the city.

Moratorium advocates anchored their petition on safety concerns citing the city’s susceptibility to earthquakes and the need for the city to have proper urban plan that will include “properly conducted and peer-reviewed soil investigation and testing reports for foundations of structures, performed by a licensed geotechnical engineer and that no structures will be constructed over the 8 stories limit specified by the City of Baguio.”

Former mayor Mauricio Domogan said it is doable but would entail a whole new process of amending the Zoning Ordinance which had just been revised in 2016.

“If the issue is on the safety, I believe this had already been answered by experts who during the exhaustive consultations for the drafting of the City Land Use Plan, opined that the soundness of the structures does not depend on the height of the buildings but on ensuring their structural stability, which means compliance with the national building and safety codes including the soil test requirements. If the issue is overdevelopment necessitating suspension on high-rise buildings, then it has to go back to the city council, call back the experts and follow the process again,” he earlier said. – Aileen P. Refuerzo