Budget cut hurts STP rehabilitation

CEBU, Philippines - The rehabilitation of the non-functional Sewage Treatment Plant at the North Reclamation Area will have to be set aside by the Department of Public Services after the P20 million budget for its rehabilitation was not among the items approved by the City Council in the 2012 Annual Budget.

DPS chief Dionisio Gualiza said they are supposed to rehabilitate the STP on the second quarter of this year but because of the absence of the budget this will have to be postponed.

The STP is important because it is where the waste coming from the City Abattoir and the septic tanks from residential houses and commercial establishments shall be processed.

According to Gualiza, the rehabilitation of the STP is important because the closure of the Inayawan Landfill which has posed a challenge on where to dispose the septic waste they collect from government offices and other establishments.

The planned rehabilitation is supposed to be in partnership with the Metropolitan Cebu Water District.

MCWD is also planning to build a Septage Treatment Plant specifically to process and manage the septage of their consumers. This is under their Septage Management Program for Metro Cebu.

They are eyeing the use of the NRA for the Septage Treatment Plant. Aside from Cebu City, they will also build a Septage Treatment Plant in Cordova and in a northern town.

Meanwhile, the remediation of the recently closed Inayawan Sanitary Landfill might also take a longer time to complete because they were only given P8-million budget.

They requested P12 million for the purchase of 40,000 cubic meters of limestone for adequate soil cover of the trash in the landfill to eliminate the odor and prevent the occurrence of fire but only P8 million was approved.

Gualiza said they will request the other P4 million on the Supplemental Budget, if there will be a supplemental budget.

They also requested some P2 million for the rehabilitation of the perimeter fence of the landfill to avoid squatting and leakage or waste into the surrounding bodies of water but it was denied. — (FREEMAN)