Pangasinan town thumbs down Dagupan landfill plan

DAGUPAN CITY — Earlier exposed as a "stinking deal," this city’s landfill plan now appears headed to the garbage.

This, after the municipal council of San Jacinto, where the city government intended to purchase a property for the landfill, passed a resolution last Monday rejecting the project.

The San Jacinto council backed the opposition of residents of Barangay Awai, where the property is located, to the proposed landfill.

Ermin Garcia Jr., publisher of the local weekly The Sunday Punch which exposed the controversial land deal, said Dagupan Mayor Benjamin Lim should have looked first into the acceptability of the project.

The other day, Lim suspended negotiations for the landfill site after The Sunday Punch claimed that the city government was buying the piece of land, owned by Jose Mariano Cuña, a supposed business associate of Lim, at a price more than double its market value.

The Dagupan City council, in turn, approved Thursday night a resolution holding in abeyance an ordinance ratifying the proposed absolute deed of sale worth P16.1 million for the 299,932-square-meter property.

The ordinance, however, has yet to become effective because Vice Mayor Alvin Fernandez has yet to sign it.

The resolution noted that Lim was authorized sometime last year to search for and purchase a piece of land as site for a landfill which would be an alternative to the existing dumpsite in Bonuan Boquig here.

The city council said it had received a resolution from leaders of Barangay Awai objecting to the landfill project.

"While the Sangguniang Panlungsod supports (Mayor Lim) in his quest to solve the garbage problem, it cannot wager public funds due to the supervening events," the city council’s resolution stated.