Quezon City District 2 Councilor Winnie Castelo is urging the city government to allocate P1 billion as additional “ayuda” or financial aid for the city’s poor families.
Castelo said COVID-19 cases have shot up more than 100 times from about 300 before the Christmas holidays to 33,169 on Monday due to the spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant.
“Our proposed P1 billion ayuda is a small fraction of the city budget, a mere 3.3 percent. Let’s not deny that token assistance to the poor.”
“That is why more people, including our constituents in Quezon City, are opting to stay home to avoid getting infected. Poor residents of the city need additional help,” he said.
He said many of these residents did not receive financial assistance from either the national government or the city last year because their names were not in the master list.
Besides the poor, those who were missed out included workers who have been rendered jobless by the pandemic, those working for three days to four days a week whose earnings are not enough for their daily needs, and lowly government and private sector employees, including teachers and policemen, he added.
Castelo pointed out that the city council has just approved a P30-billion budget for this year.
“Our proposed P1 billion ayuda is a small fraction of the city budget, a mere 3.3 percent. Let’s not deny that token assistance to the poor, he stressed.
Under the proposed ordinance, qualified beneficiaries would receive P1,000 per individual or a maximum of P4,000 per family.
Castelo and two other city councilors suggested the additional financial aid under Proposed Ordinance No. 462, filed in August last year.
His two co-authors are Councilors Karl Edgar Castelo of District 5 and Melencio Castelo Jr. of District 6.
Under the proposed ordinance, qualified beneficiaries would receive P1,000 per individual or a maximum of P4,000 per family.
The authors suggested that their proposal be known as “Social Amelioration Program 2 in Quezon City Ordinance.”
