BAGUIO CITY – The City Council approved a resolution requesting concerned departments of the local government and stakeholders to conduct regular hose flushing activity in the city’s public market to bring back the cleanliness of the city’s show window and to empower market stallholders and vendors to be responsible stewards of the facility that provides their sustainable source of livelihood.
The resolution authored by Acting Vice Mayor Leandro B. Yangot, Jr. stated that studies show hose flushing as compared to hand sweeping is the most advantageous and effective where there is a large amount of dirt or mud adhering to pavements and areas having large numbers of parked vehicles or in market areas like the prevailing situation in the various sections of the city’s public market.
“The joys of viewing an attractive city is one of the benefits derived from clean streets and a sanitary market, however, the introduction of disposable containers and products had significantly contributed to the huge amount of street refuse and added to the city’s street cleaning problems through the years considering the enormous growth in the influx of people visiting the city’s public places,” Yangot stressed.
He pointed out the education of the populace towards prevention of litter, particularly at the city public market and other public places, is still lacking considering that the city’s street sweepers patrol the areas daily and clean more than 9 kilometers of curb per shift under favourable conditions.
According to him flushing the streets, alleys and wet sections of the city public market will scour the pavements of unsanitary or loose garbage, remove the necessary sediments, built up silt and biofilm, and clear the drainage systems of discoloured water and residuals that may cause odor problems that will taint the image of the market in the perception of the thousands of market goers daily.
Yangot underscored regular flushing is an important component of a comprehensive water management program where pipes are cleaned along the rest of the system, thus the need to replicate the same in the public market to make sure that the streets, alleys and drainage systems will be cleared from unnecessary waste that stock up and are not removed by the hand sweepers.
The resolution tasked the concerned departments of the local government to make a regular schedule of hose flushing in the various sections of the city public market which could be done weekly, monthly or quarterly depending on the need to conduct the said activity so that cleanliness will be restored in the said facility.
The conduct of the regular hose flushing in the public market will be done in close coordination with the different associations of vendors in the market so that the overall cleanliness in the city’s show window will be restored for the appreciation not only of the residents but also the tourists who frequent the different sections for desired goods and souvenir items, among other purposes.
By Dexter A. See