Lucena fire prompts calamity declaration

A LOCAL fireman trains his hose on a portion of the public market building in Lucena City that was razed by fire on Wednesday. DELFIN T. MALLARI JR/INQUIRER SOUTHERN LUZON

LUCENA CITY—The city government here has declared a state of calamity for the quick delivery of assistance to victims of the fire that destroyed a 40-year-old public market building here on Wednesday.

Amid the celebration of the city fiesta on Friday, the Sangguniang Panlungsod held a special session, upon the request of Lucena Mayor Roderick Alcala, to approve the resolution declaring a state of calamity in the city.

It allows the city government to tap the P19-million quick response fund (QRF) to help the fire victims. The QRF came from the savings of calamity funds in 2011, 2012 and 2013.

Councilor Victor Paulo, chair of the council’s committee on public markets, hawkers and slaughterhouses, said each victim would receive cash assistance of P10,000 for big-stall owners and P5,000 for small vendors.

Paulo said a total of 403 dry goods stalls in the market building, which was built in the late 1960s, were destroyed in the blaze that started around 8 p.m. on Wednesday. It was put out by 1 a.m. the next day.

The fire could have been caused by faulty wiring and illegal connections, said Councilor Dan Zaballero, quoting an  initial investigation report from Lucena firemen.

Zaballero said the city government had started negotiating with the owner of a vacant lot two blocks from the burned market building to become the temporary dry goods section of the public market.

According to Mayor Alcala, the city government would quickly build a new market on the same site of the burned building.

The distribution of cash assistance has hit a snag after it was learned that some market vendors owned several stalls they rented out to other vendors, Paulo said.

He said the city council had decided that only actual fire victims should  receive  financial assistance and not the registered stall owners.

Some of the victims, particularly owners of big stalls who lost all their stocks, tagged the cash assistance as too small.

The victims, asking not to be named, said what they needed was immediate access to government financial institutions to secure new capital to revive their businesses.