• GILBERT P. BAYORAN
About 300 families residing within the 6-kilometer extended permanent danger zone of Kanlaon Volcano in La Castellana, Negros Occidental, have expressed their willingness to be relocated, Local Disaster Risk Reduction Management Officer John de Asis disclosed on Friday.
The 8.6 hectare private property in Barangay Talaptap, La Castellana, is set to be purchased by the provincial government, for internally displaced persons who can no longer return to their homes that are within the 4-kilometer permanent danger zone of Kanlaon Volcano.
De Asis said the transaction for payment of the lot is now ongoing, to be followed by land preparations for site development.
Data from the La Castellana Municipal Social Welfare and Development Office showed that there are still 61 families, or 213 individuals, staying in four evacuation centers. They are residing within the 4-kilometer danger zone.
Each of the 300 households, who will be accommodated in the 8.6 hectare lot, may also have farm lots to cultivate, Governor Eugenio Jose Lacson disclosed earlier.
The Negros Occidental provincial government is also eyeing the purchase of another 11 hectare property, to be used as another relocation site for IDPs in La Castellana.
As Alert Level 2 still prevails over Kanlaon Volcano, the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology maintains that there should be no human activity within the four-kilometer danger zone.
Since Kanlaon Volcano’s alert status was downgraded from Alert Level 3 to Alert Level 2 on July 29, most of the internally displaced persons in Bago, La Carlota and La Castellana in Negros Occidental and Canlaon City in Negros Oriental who evacuated after the explosive eruption on Dec. 9, 2024, have returned home.*
