City spent P2.5-M for unbuilt Lying- in Clinic
WHILE the controversial Maternal and Children and Lying in Clinic planned by former Mayor Benjamin Lim never took off the ground, some P2.5 million was already paid by the city to its chosen contractor, A.S.S. Construction Co.
Records show the city paid the sum to the contractor after a public bidding was held without prior approval of the sanggunian panglunsod and without waiting for the endorsement of the Department of Education that would allow the construction at the site occupied by the Juan P. Guadiz Elementary School.
A report from the City Budget Office released to the media showed P1.4 million was paid to the contractor supposedly representing the 15 percent mobilization fee for design and build (Level 1-Special Function).
Another P1.04 million was paid to A.S.S. Construction, owned by Dagupan businessman Robert Sison, as 15 percent mobilization fee for site development.
Sison is the same contractor that started the construction of the unfinished Tsunami Hill in Pugaro Island.
Records showed the Maternal and Children and Lying-in Clinic was allocated P37.02 million, of which at least P30 million was supposed to be drawn from the 20% development fund at P10 million per year for three years beginning 2011.
The remaining P7 million would come from the Department of Interior and Local Government’s trust fund.
The project was, however, finally aborted when the Department of Education turned down the request of then Mayor Benjamin Lim to transfer the Juan P. Guadiz Elementary School to a three-storey building he constructed for P50 million at the back of the City Engineering Office.
Lim wanted to build the clinic at the existing site of the Guadiz school.
Mayor Belen Fernandez said in an earlier news conference that she does not intend to pursue the Maternal and Children’s Lying-in Clinic.
TSUNAMI HILL
Meanwhile, Fernandez has also suspended work on the unfinished Tsunami Hill project initiated by the Lim administration two years ago in Barangay Pugaro until a new concept to replace it is developed since residents have told her that they saw nothing useful about it.
She said the development cannot be stopped since the city already spent some P6 million for Phases I and II of the project but a concept must be drawn up.
Phase 1 of the construction of grouted riprap embankment of the Tsunami Hill cost P4 million while P2 million was already spent for Phase 2.
The mayor said the middle portion of the circular embankment could still be developed into a tree park that can become a tourist attraction in the village.
The funding for the Tsunami Hill was sourced from the city’s calamity fund.
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