Cebu Governor Gwendolyn Garcia | CDN Digital file photo
CEBU CITY, Philippines — The Cebu provincial government will soon give up its management of two halfway houses for children in conflict with the law (CICL) and women, who are victims of abuses, to the Department of Social Welfare and Development in Central Visayas (DSWD-7).
Governor Gwendolyn Garcia said that DSWD-7 “is better equipped to manage social welfare facilities” like the MyHome facility in Barangay Tayud, Consolacion and the Women and Children Development Center in Barangay Lahug in Cebu City.
Garcia made the announcement as part of the first 100-days report which she delivered Saturday night, October 12.
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“This move will realize savings of P20-million for the Province,” Garcia said.
Garcia, however, did not mention when the official turned over to DSWD-7 will be made.
My Home is a provincial government-run center that caters to children in conflict with the law. | CDN Digital Photo / Rosalie Abatayo
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MyHome facility is a youth rehabilitation center developed by the Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation-Integrated Development Center (JPIC-IDC) Inc., a nongovernment organization managed by the order of the Society of the Divine Word (SVD) priests. JPIC-IDC turned over MyHome to the provincial government in January 2015.
The facility caters to CICLs aged between 10 to 15-years-old and who come from the component towns in Cebu province.
Meanwhile, the Women and Children Development Center is a P14 million facility inaugurated by the provincial government in December 2016 under the administration of former governor and now Vice Governor Hilario Davide III.
WCDC is designed to accommodate up to 33 people who are victims of domestic violence. It has rooms for legal, medical and psychological services, a chapel, an activity hall, and a livelihood training facility.
Former governor Hilario Davide III (2nd from left) and former vice governor Agnes Magpale (5th from left) led the inauguration of the Cebu Provincial Women and Children Development Center in Barangay Lahug, Cebu City in this 2016 photo. | Cebu Provincial Government
The management of the two facilities was placed under the Provincial Social Welfare and Development Office (PSWDO) and the Provincial Women’s Commission (PWC), which was headed by former vice governor Agnes Magpale.
Magpale, who lost her gubernatorial bid to Garcia in the May 2019 polls, earlier appealed for the new administration to retain these projects.
“I hope the new executive will not cut that (the support to the development centers). For the longest time, I have been asking for a women and children development center and finally, we already have one,” Magpale said in an interview on May 27.
“I hope ma-continue na kay we worked hard to have that and it’s not a waste of money. There was no amount of money wasted (on these projects)… There is no graft and corruption,” the then vice governor said. / dcb