Garcia to check CCSC oval today

CEBU, Philippines —  Acting Cebu City Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia is inspecting the rubberized track oval of the Cebu City Sports Center today along with contractor Shaun Doherty of SBD Builders.

He earlier planned to do so last week but had to postpone it due to several prior commitments.

He had said, however, that he was already made aware of the incident, where athlete Karla Katrina Kim Arriba allegedly suffered a broken finger due to the defective rubber of the track while training for a karate tournament.

She is now seeking damages from contractor SBD Builders, Inc. totaling P880,000, which includes her medical expenses, loss of income, and moral damages.

Garcia had said he would “let the process take its course”, as he expressed that he was likewise “very concerned,” if indeed it is true that the reported athlete was injured because of the CCSC oval.

The Cebu City Council, in its regular session last week, pushed for the temporary closure of the CCSC, whose oval is set for repairs anyway, after the injury Arriba suffered as a result of the poor quality of work at the oval

The call was made after the privilege speech of City Councilor Rey Gealon, chairman of the committee on laws, ordinances, and styling, who pointed out the City Government just this year spent P53.76 million for the renovation of the CCSC, including the oval.

"The renovation, however, was only skin deep and instead of rehabilitating the track oval, has only further ruined it and left it worse than it was before," he said.

He was talking about the "noticeable lumps" in the oval just before the Palarong Pambansa began last July. He added that even during the Palaro games, rumors of the substandard oval were confirmed after an investigation revealed that the track oval fell short of the 400-meter World Athletics standard distance because of a mistake in the marking done by the contractor.

This error resulted in the nullification of 11 track records in four events - the 3000m steeplechase, 2000m walk, 400m hurdles, and 4x400m relay, which involve 19 athletes from five regions.

"Is it too much to ask for Cebu City to have first-rate track oval like in Minglanilla, especially when the City poured millions to rehabilitate the CCSC track oval? Comparative pictures show, even to an untrained eye, the glaring differences in terms of quality of the rubberized track oval in Minglanilla and in CCSC," Gealon said.

He was referring to the new Minglanilla Sports Oval rubberized track, which set to have its soft opening on October 1 but only for the exclusive use of Minglanilla residents, who would enjoy its use for free until the end of 2024.

Gealon said that just barely two months after the renovation of the track oval, its surface already had potholes and cracks, while the rubber steadily peeled off, producing an "uneven surface that poses hazards to athletes and other users of the track oval".

Then came what happened to Arriba, which prompted the City Council to call for the oval’s closure.

"Allowing the public to use the track oval without any safeguards despite its continuing state of disrepair is a reckless endangerment of the public and the City is unnecessarily exposing itself to liability for injuries to the hapless public," Gealon said. (CEBU NEWS)