THE NATIONAL Housing Authority-Davao Region (NHA-11) office is aiming to start the construction of relocation homes for families in Davao del Sur province displaced by the series of earthquakes in Oct. and last Dec. 15. “We are are conducting field investigations for the relocation sites and hopefully if okay na, we can immediately start the building of the housing… before the end of first quarter of next year,” NHA-11 Regional Manager Rolando I. Teves Jr. said in an interview in Padada, one of the hardest hit towns. The NHA program covers families whose communities have been declared as “no-build” zones. Under the program, local governments will have to acquire the land for the relocation site while the NHA will provide an allocation of P260,000 per house. The relocation site will have be certified by the Mines and Bureau Sciences Bureau and the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology as safe areas. Mr. Teves said some of the towns such as Hagonoy will seek assistance from the national government to purchase the land. Aside from Padada and Hagonoy, the towns that need to establish relocation sites include Magsaysay, Kiblawan, Matanao, and Bansalan. A total of 81,444 families in Davao del Sur have been affected by the earthquakes, of whom 7,720 are in evacuation centers (ECs) while 21,600 are also displaced but not within the ECs, based on data from the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council as of Dec. 23. — Maya M. Padillo

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR