Officials from Sta. Rosa, Laguna, on Thursday lauded the city governments of Bayawan and Dumaguete in Negros Oriental for embarking on multi-million peso projects on septage wastewater treatment plants.{{more}}
The officials toured the said facilities in aid of legislation for an ordinance on septage wastewater treatment in their city, after being named one of four areas to be provided technical assistance by the Philippine Sanitation Alliance-United States Agency for International Development (PSA-USAID).
Councilor Luisito Algabre, however, admitted that they could not possibly replicate the Bayawan and Dumaguete models due to limited public lands in Sta. Rosa, a city with rapid economic growth with real estate and commercial establishments sprouting everywhere.
The Sta. Rosa officials will instead consider engaging the services of a private desludging company or other service provider that has its own treatment facility, Algabre said.
He also said they will work on crafting a similar ordinance on septage wastewater treatment and conduct public consultation and information dissemination on the need to have the project in place to avoid contamination of their water supply.
Both the Bayawan and Dumaguete septage wastewater treatment plants were funded by the local government units with the USAID providing technical assistance via the PSA and its predecessor, the Local Initiatives for Wastewater Treatment (LINAW) project.
USAID-PSA Consultant Andrea Trinidad Echavez said the facilities in Bayawan and Dumaguete have been chosen for familiarization tours for local officials from other areas in the Philippines because of their best practices in line with the countryí¢â‚¬â„¢s Clean Water Act.