Tacloban council eyes approving shelter assistance deal

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines – The City Council here is looking at approving a resolution authorizing City Mayor Alfred S. Romualdez to enter into a memorandum of agreement  with the Department of Social Welfare and Development for the distribution of emergency shelter assistance (ESA), a PNA report said.

This, after the City Council failed to hold Wednesday regular sessions in the past two weeks, causing the delay in the distributions of P315 million ESA funds turned over by the DSWD to the city government on November 24.

The DSWD recently approved Memorandum Circular No. 24 series of 2014 that sets guidelines for the implementation of ESA funds for families with partially and totally damaged houses due to typhoon Yolanda.

Under the guidelines, qualified as ESA beneficiaries are families who have no permanent source of income or whose income is below the regional poverty threshold.

Specifically, the grant enlists poor families whose house was either partially or totally damaged located in the safe areas; families who are renting or sharing houses which are totally or partially damaged; households whose head are not permanently employed; regular employees whose fix monthly salary is below P15,000; and individuals who are lone survivors.

The ESA amounts to P30,000 for the family whose houses were totally damaged, and P15,000 for families whose houses were partially damaged due to typhoon Yolanda.

More than P1 billion funding was approved for 57,000 families in the city. The P315 million recently downloaded to the city government represents the first tranche. — From the wires