Let Us Save the Home of Our Less Fortunate Lolo’s and Lola’s in Quezon City

As most of our media and public’s attention is focused on the forthcoming national election in May, a national government facility which is almost an historical institution is about to be taken away from us. Actually, it has already started and is now ongoing.

Last April 16, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) started to transfer 29 elderly residents and 8 contract of service workers to take care of these residents from the Golden Acres Home for the Aged in Bago Bantay, Quezon City (at the back of SM North) to the newly built Haven for the Elderly in Tanay, Rizal (beside Camp Capinpin).

The Golden Acres (GA) is one of the three (3) residential care facilities of the DSWD for neglected and abandoned older persons (aged 60 years old and above). The other two facilities are in Tagum City (Region XI) and Zamboanga City (Region IX) in Mindanao. These facilities serve as residential homes addressing the various needs of elderly residents to ensure their health and well-being. Social workers and house parents work on shifts to attend to the elders' needs.

The Golden Acres was created through an executive issuance and has been with us for almost 81 years since July 1929. From San Lazaro Hospital it was relocated to the Welfareville Compound in Mandaluyong and then finally moved to its present site. Then President Ferdinand Marcos issued on April 14, 1968 Proclamation 380 providing a parcel of land (about 10,000 square meters) situated in Bago Bantay, Quezon City as a site for the Home for the Aged and Infirm. On September 30, 1969, this Home for the Aged was inaugurated and named “Golden Acres” under the auspices of the Ministry of Social Services and Development (MSSD). The facility is now being managed by the DSWD National Capital Region (NCR).

Meanwhile, the Haven for the Elderly in Tanay to be managed by the DSWD Region IV-A Field Office was built from funds amounting to about 230 million pesos received by the DSWD from the Congressional Spouses Foundation in 2007 and from Congress in 2008. Once finished, this facility can serve 270 older persons. This new facility could help decongest Golden Acres which at present has a 235-bed capacity and a staff of 70 but serving an average of more than 300 senior citizens from 2004 to 2008.

Originally, then Secretary Corazon “Dinky” Soliman plans to have Haven in Tanay as additional residential care facility for the elderly aside from the Golden Acres in Quezon City. But when Esperanza Cabral took over as DSWD Secretary, this plan was changed. The DSWD Management decided to close Golden Acres and transfer its program, residents and employees to the Haven for the Elderly in Tanay the moment its construction was finished. The sale of the lot to be abandoned in Quezon City was then seriously considered by the DSWD Management.

It was rumored that SM Properties was interested to buy the lot but this was later denied publicly by Mr. Henry Sy himself. The site where Golden Acres is at present is located in the government planned Quezon City Business District Area.

Cabral claimed that the new site in Tanay would be much better for the elderly because the air is more fresh and clean, the climate is colder, the surroundings more quiet, and much safer from fires and flood.

Her claims are exaggerated. Pollution level at the site is lower if not at par with the pollution level for the rest of Metro Manila. There are fire exits and fire safety measures in place at the said facility and it was flooded only once during typhoon Ondoy when almost all of Metro Manila were also flooded.

Try to visit the the Golden Acres in Quezon City and find out for yourself. It is more accessible to needed services such as good hospitals. It also enjoys ample donations from generous donors who take time out to personally deliver goods and stuff to the residents. There are also volunteers and on-the-job trainees at the center helping not only the GA staff but also augmenting expenses for operations through the training fees.

Almost all of the lolos and lolas of the Golden Acres are unwilling to transfer because they fear that the friends they have gained there would have a hard time visiting them when they are already transferred to Tanay which is about 57 kilometers away from Metro Manila. One of them even pleaded: "Antayin niyo na lang kaming mamatay bago ilipat ang Golden Acres sa Tanay!"

For these reasons and to protect the rights of employees to be affected, the Social Welfare Employees Association of the Philippines (SWEAP), the employees union of the DSWD, has been protesting this transfer and closure of the Golden Acres in Quezon City since 2007 even up to now that the transfer has already begun.

The SWEAP thinks that the transfer to Tanay last April 16 was made in haste. The Haven’s electricity and water sources are still temporary. Its fences are incomplete. There are is no telephone connection and no stand-by ambulance available yet at the time of the transfer. It’s ground is too bare from trees and other greeneries making it so hot for the residents to go outside of their cottages.

Despite SWEAP protests and petitions, the DSWD Management persisted to proceed with the transfer saying the plan is already fixed with Vice President Noli de Castro attending its inauguration this April 28. The second batch of elderly resident and staff from Golden Acres were then transferred to Tanay on April 28 so that the Vice President would have an audience for the opening ceremony of the new haven for the elderly.

For this anuguration, the DSWD Management planned to transfer 50 more lolos and lolas from Golden Acres to Tanay but they were only able to transfer 30. The other 20 elderly residents were unwilling to go while the rest were bedridden or were not physically ready for the 2-hour travel going to Tanay.

The present DSWD Acting Secretary Celia C. Yangco said that there is no plan to sell the lot to be left by Golden Acres in Quezon City. But it has to be closed, she said, to become the site of a new temporary shelter facility of DSWD for our older persons. However, up to now, the draft concept paper of it is still a draft. Meanwhile, the transfer would continue until Golden Acres is closed leaving Metro Manila without a national residential care facility to serve abandoned and neglected older persons.

Let us not remain silent over this. We fear that Golden Acres facility will be closed so that it can be eventually sold. Please help us. We can appeal to our government decision-makers. We can email this message to DSWD Secretary Yangco (ccyangco@dswd.gov.ph): SAVE THE GOLDEN ACRES IN QUEZON CITY FOR OUR LESS FORTUNATE LOLO’S AND LOLA’S.

[Contact Person: Manny R. Baclagon, SWEAP Spokesperson, @ 931-8101 local 229 & 09065798359]