Valenzuela gov’t allays fears of trash slide in city

The Valenzuela City government allayed fears that a trash slide such as the one in Baguio City would take place and affect areas near a controlled dumpsite in Barangay Lingunan, with part of its perimeter fence still ongoing repair due to the heavy rains.

Ahna Mejia, chief public information officer, told the Inquirer that a trash slide was “not likely” since the 13-hectare Lingunan dumpsite did not hold huge piles of trash, unlike the one in Irisan.

On Aug. 27, at least five people, two of them said to be children, were buried alive after the retaining wall surrounding the dumpsite in Baguio collapsed because of floodwaters brought about by Typhoon “Mina.”

“The area in Lingunan is flat. We make sure we don’t gather all our trash in one place. We disperse it,” Mejia said.

The height of trash in Lingunan, local officials said, reached only 2 meters.

Mejia said this was because some of the refuse from the city also goes to a sanitary landfill in Wawang Pulo, and to another in Montalban, Rizal, among others.

She added, however, that this did not mean that the local government would not continue its repair of some 30 meters of the one-kilometer perimeter fence surrounding the dumpsite that was left destroyed by the bad weather a few years ago.

“Of course we have to (do this) so that any other damages, such as flooding because of accumulation of trash in nearby areas, may be prevented,” she told the Inquirer.

At present, she said the City Engineering Office had put in place “first-aid measures” to prevent trash from the dump from spilling over to nearby areas.

These will be in place until the repair of the fence is completed, hopefully by next month, Mejia said.

Some of these first-aid measures include the use of rip-rap to cover the severed part of the fence.

“(The first-aid measures) worked since, this last typhoon (Mina), we didn’t experience much flooding there,” she said.