QC IN SEARCH OF NEW SITE FOR CITY JAIL

The Quezon City government will soon give the more than a thousand inmates at QC Jail (QCJ) a decent detention site and comfortable housing too.

            Quezon City Mayor Herbert M. Bautista has ordered City Planning and Development Office (CPDO) Chief Tomasito Cruz to look within the soonest possible time for a lot where the city government will build the new city jail that will serve as temporary home of inmates while awaiting final court decision on their cases.

            QC government had vowed to allocate P33 million for buying the lot for the new QCJ building. The present site of the congested city jail is a city government property at the Bernardo Park in Barangay Kamuning.

            Bautista’s order came after House Speaker and former QC Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr. had assured the QC government of a P75 to P80 million Fund for the construction of the new QCJ building.

            “It is high time to look immediately for a lot which the QC government will procure for the relocation of the QCJ. It is for humane reason that this project must push through the soonest possible time. Our city’s inmates are suffering in our congested jail,” Bautista told city hall executives during a regular staff meeting at QC Hall Bulwagang Amoranto.

            Meanwhile, Insp. Alberto Mariano from the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP)-Real Property Division Directorate for Logistics, said that the bureau is presently awaiting for the lot to be donated by QC government to formally commence construction of the new QCJ building.

            In a telephone interview, Mariano said that the construction of the new QCJ is incorporated in their agency’s 2009 program for decongestion of Metro Manila detention cells including those in CAMANAVA and southern Metro Manila, for which a P200 million budget was allocated.

            At present, he said that CAMANAVA had already built new detention cell facilities amounting to P50 million, the same with southern Metro Manila which has a P40 million jail project located in Taguig.

            “We are just waiting for the availability of a lot for the new QCJ. Earlier, we submitted proposal for the new city jail facility in a lot in Payatas at Special Design Group at QC Hall but no update yet,” he said.

            The QC government has vowed to continue supporting national government offices in QC like BJMP as part of the administration’s effort to improve services to the people.

            The QC government had donated a bus and a van worth P5.1 million to the BJMP for the transport of inmates from the jail to the court during hearings. -30- Maureen Quinones, PAISO