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Housing for teachers

Tuesday, April 15, 2008 [ suntar.com.ph ]
By Debra Magallon-Estero
Sun.Star Correspondent

PUBLIC school teachers and non-teaching personnel will now be able to benefit from a housing program of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) after the agency partnered with the Department of Education (DepEd).

Close to 1,200 public school teachers and non-teaching personnel of the DepEd in Central Visayas attended the region’s first Housing Fair held yesterday at the Eco-Tech Center Pavilion.

DepEd 7 Assistant Regional Director Recaredo Borgonia said the activity is a “significant step” in helping public school teachers to acquire housing units at affordable rates.

The two-day activity, which was organized by the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC), also aims to address the current housing backlog, which is at 3.7 million nationwide, said HUDCC Assistant Secretary Pamela Felizarta.

The housing fairs, which were launched by Vice President Noli de Castro in 2006, were initially offered to the police and military sector prior to being offered to the public teachers.

Felizarta added that the housing fair is also in line with de Castro’s plan of creating an environment that will support the affordability of house and lot units for Filipinos.

This started with the lowering of the Home Development Mutual Fund or Pag-ibig Fund interest rates, Felizarta said.

“Then other government financial institutions also pegged down their interest rates,” she added.

The program also endeavors to fast-track the disposal of foreclosed residential properties acquired by government finance institutions (GFI) like the Pag-ibig Fund, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), the Social Security System (SSS) and the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS).

Foreclosed

Based on Pag-ibig’s inventory of foreclosed properties, the agency has five foreclosed house and lot units in Talisay City with selling prices ranging from P430,000 to P930,000.

The BSP, on the other hand, has a total of 107 foreclosed residential lots available in its inventory within Cebu, Talisay and Lapu-Lapu cities. Lot areas would range from 40 to 1,000 square meters.

The BSP also has foreclosed assets in Aklan, Iloilo, Leyte and Negros Occidental, while SSS has in its inventory only one lot in Minglanilla, Cebu.

Private real estate developers who offer socialized housing products, or units which are priced at not more than P300,000, also took part in the activity.

Since the housing fair aimed to enable the teachers to avail themselves of housing units at lower prices, the GFIs will extend an interest rate of six percent for a maximum of P300,000 worth of property, said Tarsila Farolan, a member of the DepEd Task Force on Teachers and Personnel Housing Program.

Lowest rate

She added that this is the lowest interest rate for housing loans available right now even when compared to the regular Pag-ibig interest rate.

The housing fair will also address other housing concerns of the public school teachers like their unpaid housing loan payments to GSIS.

“There are also those (teachers) who paid the loans, but (the payment) was not posted and the interest rates have accumulated, making the teacher unable to pay for the loan,” said Farolan.

The DepEd task force is also conducting a study to determine how many teachers nationwide have remained homeless.

Although the Central Visayas data is not yet complete, Borgonia believes that the housing concerns of teachers within the Cebu province are less compared to those of other provinces in the region.

He said there are more homeless teachers in areas where most lots are owned by “hacienderos” like in Negros Occidental and Dumaguete.

But efforts are being done already to respond to the problem,” Borgonia said. He cited that Bohol and Negros Occidental were recipients of previous housing projects for teachers.

In Cebu, the Cebu Public Schools Teachers Association (CPSTA) is also talking to Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia to speed up the development of a 33-hectare land area in Busay which the CPSTA purchased during former governor Vicente dela Serna’s term.

Borgonia said they are requesting Garcia’s assistance to eject informal settlers currently occupying the lots to push through with the department’s plans of converting the area into a socialized housing area for public school teachers.

Aside from this, DepEd was able to talk to Bogo City Mayor Celestino Martinez about plans to create a housing area there in partnership with Gawad Kalinga.

Farolan said Martinez gave positive feedback on the plan and was even willing to provide lots for the project.

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