ILOILO City – With the housing projects of the city government getting extensive, a new board is being mulled to oversee these.
The Iloilo City Urban Poor Affairs Office (ICUPAO) which used to handle the projects, particularly in the aspect of awarding relocation lots, will no longer have the powers it used to have, said Mayor Jerry Treñas.
He, however, assured residents that the implementation of the housing projects will continue uninterrupted despite the controversies hounding ICUPAO.
ICUPAO is undergoing a major overhaul after the recent discovery of the unauthorized selling of housing lots at the city government’s relocation sites.
Treñas is acting swiftly to address the matter. He fired all contractuals and job hires at ICUPAO to safeguard essential office documents.
He is now pushing for the creation of a housing board that will vet beneficiaries of the city’s housing program.
“ICUPAO will be part of the board but it will no longer have the powers it used to have” such as deciding on whom to award relocation lots, Treñas told city hall reporters.
The mayor also said it would be better to staff ICUPAO with regular city government employees, not job hires, “so there will be accountability.” These could be social workers, architects and engineers.
Under the plan, ICUPAO will identify possible housing beneficiaries and submit their names to the housing board that will do the vetting. The final approval will come from the mayor.
Effective Aug. 4, the services of 29 ICUPAO job hires were terminated.
“We are not saying tanan sila guilty of something but we just want to move forward correctly,” said Treñas.
He described as urgent the need to have a housing board to oversee the city government’s housing projects.
“We need to have the office already especially so because of the housing program of the national government. Kinanglan plastaron ta na ini para pagsulod sang housing program sang national government, plastado ang aton lakat,” said Treñas.
He revealed that the Department of Human Settlement and Urban Development informed him about a Swedish investor interested in housing projects, and a meeting will be held this weekend.
“If that happens mabuligan pa gid kita sa aton housing program. Bal-an man sang tanan nga isa ka daku nga problema ta gid ang housing,” said Treñas./PN
