CITY OF SAN FERNANDO—The enforcement of standards and policies in constructing private homes and buildings as well as local bridges, roads, dikes and canals that are resistant to natural hazards including earthquakes boil down also to how building officials are designated and who oversees them.
In disaster-prone Philippines, they go through the recommendation first of the mayors before they get to be appointed by the secretary of the Department of Public Works and Highways.
Building officials are considered frontline personnel in disaster reduction measures because like the DPWH does for national projects, they enforce the National Building Code which was last updated in 2005. It carried a single chapter on seismicity after the DPWH adopted new structural concepts following the destructive July 16, 1990 earthquake.
“Building officials by law should be appointed by me. But since the provision does not include the corresponding salary and allowances that come with the designation, we coordinate with the respective local executives…to submit their recommendees for me to designate as building officials,” Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. said in an interview in Porac last Monday.
In short, building officials are paid by the local government and supervised by the DPWH.
Ebdane admitted that this set-up has resulted to “argumentation between my office and the local government executive as to who will be designated.” He did not elaborate but Punto Central Luzon sources in the agency and local governments said the conflicts stemmed from loyalty issues or corrupt practices at the local level.
Ebdane said that on his part, political endorsement does not weigh heavily. “The practice is to ask the mayor of his recommendee but for as long as his recommendee qualifies for the position,” he said.
Not only are there conflicts. There is also confusion in terms of accountability or responsibility. Some DPWH officials said building officials are “not under us.” But the DPWH provides them training related to civil engineering.
Two building officials reached for this report said they are directly accountable to the mayor and coordinates only with the DPWH.
NO INVENTORY
Again for lack of funds, building officials attending a disaster mitigation training last year reported not being able to conduct annual inspection or inventory of structures in their respective areas, according to Albin Carreon, chief of the DPWH regional planning and design division.
“Third and fourth class towns have only one building official. Most of the time, the building official is also the town or city engineer,” Carreon said.
Ebdane said building officials should watch out for private contractors who cheat on projects by using substandard materials or lesser cement content or deviating from the approved design.
Ebdane said building officials face administrative, civil or criminal liabilities if private and public structures that they certified to be ready for occupancy or use later proved to have caused deaths or injuries
The DPWH, he said, has started doing structure examination of national bridges and roads and public school buildings since 2005.
“In rural areas, we don’t have problems with our schools because most of these are one-storey buildings,” he said.
Highways, according to him, were built to specifications. “But we cannot discount that these may be damaged when the faults move,” he said.
Ebdane said in Central Luzon, the Carranglan (Nueva Ecija) portion of the Maharlika Road Network sits on a fault. The eastern side of that portion rose by four meters when the 1990 earthquake, of 7.8-magnitude, struck Central and Northern Luzon areas.
In disaster-prone Philippines, they go through the recommendation first of the mayors before they get to be appointed by the secretary of the Department of Public Works and Highways.
Building officials are considered frontline personnel in disaster reduction measures because like the DPWH does for national projects, they enforce the National Building Code which was last updated in 2005. It carried a single chapter on seismicity after the DPWH adopted new structural concepts following the destructive July 16, 1990 earthquake.
“Building officials by law should be appointed by me. But since the provision does not include the corresponding salary and allowances that come with the designation, we coordinate with the respective local executives…to submit their recommendees for me to designate as building officials,” Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane Jr. said in an interview in Porac last Monday.
In short, building officials are paid by the local government and supervised by the DPWH.
Ebdane admitted that this set-up has resulted to “argumentation between my office and the local government executive as to who will be designated.” He did not elaborate but Punto Central Luzon sources in the agency and local governments said the conflicts stemmed from loyalty issues or corrupt practices at the local level.
Ebdane said that on his part, political endorsement does not weigh heavily. “The practice is to ask the mayor of his recommendee but for as long as his recommendee qualifies for the position,” he said.
Not only are there conflicts. There is also confusion in terms of accountability or responsibility. Some DPWH officials said building officials are “not under us.” But the DPWH provides them training related to civil engineering.
Two building officials reached for this report said they are directly accountable to the mayor and coordinates only with the DPWH.
NO INVENTORY
Again for lack of funds, building officials attending a disaster mitigation training last year reported not being able to conduct annual inspection or inventory of structures in their respective areas, according to Albin Carreon, chief of the DPWH regional planning and design division.
“Third and fourth class towns have only one building official. Most of the time, the building official is also the town or city engineer,” Carreon said.
Ebdane said building officials should watch out for private contractors who cheat on projects by using substandard materials or lesser cement content or deviating from the approved design.
Ebdane said building officials face administrative, civil or criminal liabilities if private and public structures that they certified to be ready for occupancy or use later proved to have caused deaths or injuries
The DPWH, he said, has started doing structure examination of national bridges and roads and public school buildings since 2005.
“In rural areas, we don’t have problems with our schools because most of these are one-storey buildings,” he said.
Highways, according to him, were built to specifications. “But we cannot discount that these may be damaged when the faults move,” he said.
Ebdane said in Central Luzon, the Carranglan (Nueva Ecija) portion of the Maharlika Road Network sits on a fault. The eastern side of that portion rose by four meters when the 1990 earthquake, of 7.8-magnitude, struck Central and Northern Luzon areas.
