MANDAUE CITY, Philippines- The Mandaue City Council held a public hearing with representatives from the Visayan Electric (formerly VECO), telephone and cable companies, and department heads on Thursday, November 5, 2020, to discuss the proposed ordinance placing all electrical and telecommunication wires and cables within the business districts of the city underground.
Councilor Joel Seno, the author of the ordinance said that aside from being an eyesore, placing the wires and cables underground will also protect the public from dangling wires and leaning electrical posts.
He added that placing wires underground would make them less susceptible to the impact of natural calamities.
Dangling electrical lines, cables and electric posts will soon be a thing of the past is a proposed ordinance in Mandaue City gets approved. /Mary Rose Sagarino
“Also making the city resilient, dili nata ana’ng naay kahoy matumbahan, ang wire maka cause og power outage, ” Seno said.
Lawyer Jamaal James Calipayan, the city’s administrator, believes the ordinance is one step towards modernizing the city.
“Ang city, we are very supportive ani, we believe nga this is one step towards sa pagmodernize sa ato’ng dakbayan and to look towards the future cause ato’ng demand sa utilities such as telecommunications shall always be increasing dili gyud ni siya mo decrease, ” Calipayan said.
“All electric, telecommunications, television, and cable entities should install their lines and cables underground.”
The ordinance is also taking into account the range and scope it covers and the expected technical and financial requirements to be incurred by the utility firms.
That is why the implementation will be carried in stages – particularly in short, medium, and long term objectives – specifying the targets to be accomplished within the phased program of implementation.
The first phase (short-term objective) or the initial transition period involves the promotion of the rehabilitation and installation or restoration of utility lines within a three-year period upon the approval of the ordinance.
The second phase (medium-term objective) or the second transition period focuses on the promotion of the partial implementation for underground installation of utility lines to be undertaken within a year after the approval of the ordinance.
The third phase (long-term objective), which will also start three years after the approval of the ordinance, requires owners or operators to follow the mandatory grounding of all utility lines. /rcg