A community food pantry of the CCPO in Barangay Guadalupe, Cebu City. | Photo courtesy Guadalupe Police Station
CEBU CITY, Philippines — With organized scheduling and monitoring, the Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) says that their food pantries under their Barangayanihan program is effectively implementing minimum health protocols.
This Police Lieutenant Colonel Wilbert Parilla, deputy director for operations of the CCPO, said after President Rodrigo Duterte mentioned on his taped weekly address earlier to let the public wait for government aid instead of going to community pantries since this could lead to surge of COVID-19 infections as health protocols like social distancing would likely be violated.
Parilla, however, said that coordination with the Local Government Units in Cebu City and their coupon system have helped them implement health protocols while providing residents with basic goods for free.
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“Natuman gyud ni atoang minimum health protocol kay ato mani gi arrange, gi by hour mani nato. Every hour, naa man tay gi allot nga mga tawo nga pwede ra muanha,” Parilla said.
(We are able to follow minimum health protocols because we already arranged this, we made it by the hour. Every hour, we allot a certain number of people to come.)
Last April 30, 2021, the CCPO successfully opened food pantries simultaneously in 11 police stations here.
Parilla said they have also set at least 15 to 20 individuals per hour to line up in their food pantry that they planned to continue every Friday, unless they will receive directives from the headquarters to end this activity.
“Mu minimum tag 15-20 so minimal ra gyud kaayo ang mga tawo nga makaabot gikan alas 8 sa buntag hangtod alas singko sa hapon. Atong coupon nga gihatag naka indicate didto og unsa sila orasa muanhi sa atong barangayanihan,”
(We have a minimum of 15 to 20 people, so there’s only a very minimal number of people who can come from 8 am to 5 pm. The coupons we give out indicate what time people can go to the barangayanihan.)
In a day, he said that they target at least 100 or 150 residents who can receive goods from their food pantry.
CCPO will provide the coupon while the LGUs are responsible to filter those less privileged families to receive these basic goods.
Goods found in the pantries are from the police and some from donations.
Following the statement of Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) director Police Brigadier General Ronnie Montejo that they welcome donations from anyone, Franklyn Ong, the president of the Association of Barangay Councils in Cebu City, donated goods, face masks, and face shields on Tuesday morning to the Mabolo Police Station.
/bmjo