BCDA stops tree-cutting, John Hay illegal mines

A SECURITY employee of the government’s John Hay Management Corp. inspects a tunnel operated by an illegal small-scale mining group at Barangay Camp 6, within the forest reservation of Camp John Hay. RICHARD BALONGLONG/INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON

BAGUIO CITY—The Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) has stopped a government contractor from cutting pine trees to widen a circumferential road here.

BCDA officials are furious because the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) allowed the cutting of 19 trees in the city’s remaining forest reserve in Barangays Country Club and Happy Hollow, according to the John Hay Management Corp. (JHMC).

Clearance

BCDA president Arnel Paciano Casanova said the agency can cancel the DENR clearance to cut the trees because it covered assets inside BCDA property. Camp John Hay is a special economic zone.

“We, being the landowner, should [first] consent to the permit,” Casanova said.

In May last year, the city environment and natural resources office sued the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and its contractor for bulldozing 32 trees on the same circumferential road.

But a Baguio regional trial court junked the complaint. The DENR has since allowed the DPWH to cut trees standing in the way of the road project.

On Tuesday, JHMC also inspected pocket mine tunnels within the John Hay forest for which it served a cease and desist order on May 23.

Tunnels

Lawyer Michelle Regala-Niebres, JHMC vice president and chief operating officer, said the agency detected mining operations last year in Barangay Camp 6 but it had to seek out the mining operators before it could serve the stop order.

During the inspection, a JHMC team, accompanied by representatives from the Mines and Geosciences Bureau, recorded the existence of 12 shallow tunnels, two ball mills and a stretch of pipes that could have been used to funnel water or waste. Frank Cimatu, with a report from Richard Balonglong, Inquirer Northern Luzon