MikeLigalig.com

Reported By Kit Bagaipo
As it appears in the front page of the Bohol Chronicle, Sunday Edition

Concerned city residents are still awaiting for the construction of a wastewater treatment facility at the drainage outlet in the Balong-balong area in Graham Avenue even as completion of the city drainage network outfall have been delayed.

With the onset of the rainy season and rising cases of dengue, residents fear that stagnant water in the drainage system will become breeding grounds of the dreaded aedes mosquitoes.

Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) District-1 Engineer Celestino Adlaon admitted in an interview with the Chronicle that completion of the P28-million drainage outfall project has been delayed due to a failure of bidding and the election ban on government infrastructure project implementation.

The DPWH has yet to schedule another bidding, Adlaon said.

Household and commercial wastes would pollute the bay area near the city wharf without the treatment plant as there are still 29 buildings and residences along CPG Avenue tapping to the drainage system, according to the district engineer.
          
He stressed the need to plug the illegal connections first before opening the outfall to the Tagbilaran Bay.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources has accordingly issued a Certificate of Non-Coverage (CNC) to the project as designed since it would only be a rainwater run-off facility.

However, with the illegal taps which would empty household wastewater into the drains, then, an Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC) would be due instead, environmental observers have commented.

According to Adlaon, an underground cave near the ongoing drainage outfall project is absorbing the water going into the drainage network.

With commercial and household wastewater going into the drainage network, environmentalists fear it might contaminate underground water sources.

Moreever, during heavy rains, wastewater is observed overflowing in CPG North Avenue near the Development Bank of the Philippines.

City Mayor Dan Lim made an assurance that he will not allow commercial and household wastewater in the bay area saying that a water treatment plant will be built in the drainage outlet.

The drainage network's masterplan includes the construction of two water treatment plants. One to be located in the Balong-balong area and the other in barangay Taloto.

In response to this concern, the provincial government has initiated the construction of a P2-million treatment plant for wastewater coming from the Capitol.

A proposed ordinance penalizing those who will connect to the drainage project is being reviewed by the Sangguniang Panlungsod. - July 15, 2007

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