A TOTAL of 26 additional housing units at the Gawad Kalinga-Bangusville in Bonuan Gueset were awarded to family-beneficiaries on April 1.

City Mayor Benjamin S. Lim with wife, Celia, and members of the Couples for Christ (CFC) led the turnover ceremony.

“Over 100 house units will be built here so that we can provide homes to more needy Dagupeños. We haven’t reached yet half of the target number, hence there are more to come,” Lim said.

The mayor announced that aside from the housing units, a school will be built within GK-Bangusville so that the children will not have to go far to study.

A two-classroom Day Care Center worth P300,000 will be constructed in the Bangusville. The structure will be called Sibol, a GK program which focuses on values-based education for pre-school children.

Out of the 26 houses, eight are row-type houses composed of four units each which was donated by the CFC members from Maryland, USA. Twelve more housing units coming from the donation of CFC-Maryland will be built.

Sixteen of the awarded houses are duplex units donated by various benefactors, while two houses belonged to the 20 units earlier awarded to certain beneficiaries but voided later on by the city government and CFC because the recipients did not occupy the houses.

The city government and CFC did not disclose who will be the beneficiaries of the 26 housing units until the turnover program. Even without knowing that they will be the recipients of the housing units, the beneficiaries still helped and rendered “sweat equity” in building the houses.

Lim solicited the commitment of the beneficiaries who already got their houses to carry on helping in the construction of additional units to show concern to other less fortunate Dagupeños who are likewise in need of houses they can call their own.

Lim reiterated the GK regulation in which vices, gossips and disputes within the community are prohibited.

“This undertaking of building houses for the poor is a way of thanking God for his goodness and blessings,” Lim enthused even as he pointed out that building more houses in Dagupan is part of the GK 777 program, which stands for 700,000 homes in 7 thousand communities in 7 years. (Sunshine D. Robles)