Wastes moved to San Jacinto

AS ALTERNATIVE LANDFILL 
Dumped on private lot

SAN JACINTO–Unknown to many, it appears that more than 1,000 truck loads of decomposed and semi-decomposed wastes have been moved from the garbage dumpsite in Bonuan to a private property in barangay Macayug here since September last year.
All these were deposited on a two-hectare lot of one George Lee in sitio Patalan, Macayug evidently as landfill, near the Baloleng River, without prior knowledge of the barangay officials there.
The PUNCH obtained several photos and video footages on the lot of Lee now filled with decomposed and semi-decomposed wastes which were obviously leveled with a road roller. The place is now teeming with scavengers.
However, Dagupan City Waste Management Officer Reginaldo Ubando continues to deny this, even challenging the PUNCH to show the evidence.
Barangay Captain Vicente Agsaoay of Macayug guided newsmen to sitio Patalan where he showed the decomposed and semi-decomposed wastes that were deposited to Lee’s property which he bought from one Clarita de Guzman.
Agsaoay said no coordination was made whatsoever by Lee with the barangay council before moving the more than 1,000 truckloads of decomposed and semi-decomposed wastes into his property.
He said the barangay people are protesting because the transfer of this big volume of dried wastes into Lee’s property also severely affected them.
He said that in the absence of coordination with the barangay, the residents now suspect that he and other barangay officials were bribed by Lee to allow the dumping.
Councilman Marlino Cachero said the decomposed and semi-decomposed wastes were hauled by Lee to his property using his own dump trucks that were making some 50 trips per day sometime in September.
He said he stopped one or two of these trucks when they made a short cut to Lee’s property, passing his (Cachero’s) own property.
“We stopped one of these trucks but Lee told us that those being hauled by his trucks were only decomposed wastes that dried at the dumpsite for seven years. But we doubted because some of these were wet,” Agsaoay told newsmen.
Residents of Macayug, he said, protested when they saw plastic sheets strewn around along the road leading to Lee’s property.
He said Lee’s dump trucks passed through the town of San Fabian on its way to Macayug in San Jacinto, skipping the town of Mangaldan and the town proper of San Jacinto.
Agsaoay fears that if floods come, the decomposed wastes deposited into Lee’s property might be washed out to the nearby Baloleng River and cause bigger havoc to the environment, including the Lingayen Gulf.
He said he doubts if the Department of Environment and Natural Resources was consulted or issued the proper permit allowing the transfer of decomposed wastes from Dagupan to San Jacinto.
At the same time, Agsaoay also deplored the dumping of tons upon tons of garbage by the town of San Fabian into barangay Macayug at night up to the wee hour in the morning.
He said they already called the attention of the San Jacinto Municipal Council over this problem, including the dumping of 1,000 truck loads of decomposed and decomposing wastes from Dagupan.
Vice Mayor Manuel Ogoy already vowed to bring the matter to the attention of the DENR regional office.
The residents said they are still awake in their own homes when trucks from San Fabian arrive to unload garbage but are been afraid to stand up for fear that the trucks personnel might be armed.