CENRO blames overcrowding of inmates causes pollution
DISTRICT JAIL BY THE BEACH
THE city environment and natural resources office (CENRO) here gave recommendations to the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) for the pollution of the beach and the air pollution being suffered daily by the community it causes.
Edward Vergara, senior environmental specialist, said based on his findings two months ago, the facility far exceeded its intended capacity of 250 persons with current 800 inmates.
“Due to overpopulation in the facility, to include the inmates, visitors, employees of BJMP at any given time, the facility can no longer hold the excess water wastes”, said Vergara.
He said most of the water wastes are bath waters but he admitted a minimal amount of wastes already leak from the septic tank.
“We cannot deny that a little amount of water wastes is from the septic tank based on the color and even the odor of the wastes”, said Vergara who personally inspected the area with CENRO chief Celso Salazar.
The BJMP facility is located a hundred meters away from the shoreline of the Bonuan Tondaligan Beach and tourists including residents nearby continue to complain about the air and water pollution caused by the facility.
Vergara said the same complaint was already raised last 2008 and it was fixed by expanding the septic tank, however, the same solution can no longer apply because of the limited area of the facility.
“BJMP authorities attested that the septic tank was already expanded to its maximum, covering the whole area of the facility”, said Vergara.
He said they recommended instead the regular siphoning of the septic tank and planting of trees or plants around the area to absorb the water wastes before these reach the sea.
“We will monitor BJMP’s compliance or else we will be forced to ask the facility to secure a waste water permit which according to BJMP is not in a position to absorb because it has no budget allocation for it.”, said Vergara. “Or BJMP can ask the city government for assistance,” he added. (Hilda Austria)
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