December 2, 1999 NEWS RELEASE

Governors led by League of Provinces of the Philippines (LPP) president and Laguna Gov. Joey Lina today threw their full support behind President Estrada’s mass housing program as they vowed to fast track the construction of attractive, durable and affordable houses to be built by local government units (LGUs) for low-income groups.

In a covenant signed between LPP officials and heads of various housing and funding agencies at the close of today’s two-day housing and manpower development twin summit in Laguna, the country’s governors unanimously decided to embark on a series of measures to help the administration build about 1,000 housing units a day for the next four and a half years.

Among the measures contained in the covenant presented to President Estrada are the mobilization of resources for mass housing, organization of beneficiaries into housing associations to avail of cheaper construction and financing costs, and the finalization of comprehensive land use plans.

Other measures include inventory of all national and local government-owned lands and existing local government housing projects and the creation of local housing boards and of one-stop offices to process and approve permits for developers.

Also presented to President Estrada today was a covenant on manpower development and technical education that resulted from the twin summit’s first part that aimed to map out strategies to strengthen LGUs in providing community-based skills training to meet local needs and enhance livelihood opportunities.

"An effective and efficient delivery of system for devolved technical education and responsive skills development for disadvantaged sectors to make them globally competitive is the ultimate goal of LGUs," Lina said as he described the covenant forged by governors and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) director-general Edicio de la Torre.

Today’s summit on housing began with an overview of the national housing situation by Senate housing committee chairman Sen. Rodolfo Biazon who painted grim picture of the enormous housing shortage and National Housing Authority general manager Angelo Leynes who outlined the various measures being undertaken to help the underprivileged.

Also present to give their insights were top officials of Home Insurance Guaranty Corporation, Development Bank of the Philippines, Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council.

Later in the afternoon, President Estrada led inaugural rites in Laguna for model houses made of steel frames with fiber cement boards and long span roofs that are currently being eyed for possible adoption in all provinces.

Allan Santos, Laguna’s action officer for housing, said the houses dubbed as "ERAP Homes" with its design conceptualized by Lina will be made available in 30, 45, and 60 square meter floor areas fully painted and complete with ceiling and will be priced as low as P150,000, P260,000 and P300,000, respectively.

Today’s housing summit also underscored the need for governors to finalize their comprehensive land use plans (CLUPs) in line with a directive of President Estrada to ensure that all LGUs have CLUPs adopted by their Sangguniang Panlalawigan not later than March 31, 2000.

After such date, LGUs will not be allowed to grant development permits unless they are in accordance with the adopted CLUPs, the President’s directive said.

The one-stop offices to be manned by designated local government personnel will take charge of the processing, approval and issuance of clearances, permits and licenses of socialized housing projects within 90 days from the date of submission of all requirements by participating developers.