Where’s Metro Cebu drainage master plan?
WHEN street floods recur in urban Cebu, officials are asked for the nth time: Where is the drainage master plan?
The question is a timely one to ask with yesterday’s launch of September as the celebration of Mega Cebu.
An anti-flooding and drainage master plan for Metro Cebu has already been submitted to the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), but the final study will be finished in one to two years, said Evelyn Nacario Castro, executive director of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc.
She said the plan was presented to DPWH in 2013 while a resolution asking for assistance was passed in 2011.
The full cost and DPWH budget needed to execute it has not yet been revealed.
The study was made by private sector engineers with government counterparts to provide solutions to flooding in the metropolis and surrounding towns.
RAFI serves as the nerve center for the private-sector led Mega Cebu movement and its governing body, the Metro Cebu Development Coordination Board (MCDCB) with Gov. Hilario Davide III as chairman and Roberto Aboitiz as vice chairman.
To solve flooding throughout the metropolis and surrounding towns, it has to be looked at with a broader “metro-wide” and holistic perspective, said Nacario.
“We need to see it at a metro-wide context and at the same time, recognize that the LGUs have their own mechanism of addressing it (flooding),” she said.
LGUs with shared watersheds or river systems have to coordinate since these are the sources of water that often contribute to flooding, she said.
“The solution to flooding is not simplistic. But we can do simple things that can help minimize its effects,” she said.
“Engaging change” is this year’s theme of the second Mega Cebu Month launched at the Capitol Social Hall with a program that had a talk-show format.
RAFI Chief Operating Officer Dominica Chua said contests will be held for essay writing, poster making, song writing, and film making.
Mega Cebu counts seven cities and six towns in its fold.Governor Davide was represented by Provincial Administrator Mark Tolentino.
Mayors present were Michael Rama of Cebu City and Adelino Sitoy of Cordova town.
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