The proposed housing project for hundreds of families who lost their homes in a blaze last month in Valenzuela City has become a step closer to becoming a reality.
Only recently, the city government and national government agencies signed the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) for a presidential proclamation to pave the way for the distribution of the two-hectare government-owned lot in Barangay Marulas, Valenzuela City, to people who have been living in the area for years.
The document sets guidelines and procedures for the implementation of Presidential Proclamation 770, series of 1996, signed by then President Fidel Ramos allowing the release of the property.
Under the IRR, the National Housing Authority (NHA) which was tasked to oversee the project would build 200 one-story units and medium-rise housing buildings for 383 beneficiaries.
It also provided for the creation of a Project Inter-Agency Committee composed of the NHA, the Information and Communications Technology Office-Telecommunication Office, Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, Valenzuela City government, Presidential Commission for the Urban Poor, Commission on Human Rights, TELOF Marulas Compound Multi-Purpose Cooperative, Inc., and People’s Organization (PO). Among its duties would be to ensure that the housing project would be developed into a viable community.
The city government, on the other hand, would assist the NHA on property valuation, relocation and the issuance of permits and licenses for the housing project.
In an earlier interview, Mayor Sherwin Gatchalian said that residents in the area who are all government employees, had been negotiating with the government for the distribution of the property.
However, a fire which broke out on Feb. 19, reportedly by a couple who were arguing, gutted some 350 houses and razed property valued at P5 million. It reached Task Force Delta before it was put out four hours later.
“They’re sitting on government property and they’re government employees and the land will be awarded to them soon, I believe,” Gatchalian said.