We never learn

The name of the village is ironic. Provident, according to one dictionary, means making provision for the future, being prudent. Another dictionary defines it as having or showing foresight; providing carefully for the future.

Indeed, a Google search reveals that the word is a favorite name of banks. Apparently, even here, we once had a bank named Provident Bank and it developed Provident Village in a flood plain. That doesn’t sound like the bank lived up to its name by showing no foresight at all.

I checked with an expert, Mahar Lagmay of the UP Resilience Institute and he confirmed: “Yes, it is a floodplain. It is definitely a high flood hazard area.”

Lagmay, who holds a doctorate from Cambridge University, led a team of scientists who did extensive work to produce geo-hazard maps for many areas of the country. He headed Project NOAH which used science to warn us about natural calamities and help mitigate loss of life and property.

Project NOAH did excellent work, specially during this time of climate change. Lagmay was particularly watching flood dangers and even adopted @nababaha as his Twitter name. But in the impeccable wisdom of our legislators in Congress, they defunded Project NOAH a few years ago, and DOST under Duterte didn’t fight for it. UP had to adopt it to give it a home.

Project NOAH – National Operational Assessment of Hazards – provided hydrometeorological hazard maps, which included barangay-level flood hazard maps for major river basins, storm surge maps for coastal communities, landslide hazard maps, and even hazard maps for debris flows.

Project NOAH provided excellent resource information for those planning to build their homes (and where they SHOULD NOT BUILD).

When Congress junked Project NOAH, the country lost the ability to provide “hazard specific, area focused and time bound warnings information” during disaster events, Lagmay told Philstar.com’s Gaea Katreena Cabico.

“That’s our biggest contribution because we were supplying information that government was able to use in near real-time because somebody was minding the store. I’m not saying nobody was minding the store, but it takes a lot of work and people to generate that information,” Lagmay said.

Prof. Lagmay told Philstar.com that more than the technology and tools, Project NOAH’s termination meant the loss of dozens of disaster scientists and researchers, and their expertise. There’s institutional memory there, they are trained and experienced people,” Lagmay said.

As for Provident’s tragedy, I also checked with other knowledgeable persons, including engineers, and I was told that it is on the part of Marikina River that has dried up over time and became known as Patay na Ilog.

The village shows in the map as a piece of land protruding right smack in the curve of a meandering Marikina river. During Ondoy, the water simply took the most direct path and went through the village.

Yes. It should not have been developed. During Ondoy, more than 70 persons drowned. An engineer told me that Provident Village is on land that forms part of the metes and bounds of waterways. Under the Water Code, it is not alienable. And yet, it somehow got developed as a subdivision.

That happened decades ago, but it could have happened just now. We always hear of forest and other public land that’s supposed to be not alienable eventually titled to private parties.

These murderous Provident floods supposedly happen in a 10-year cycle, give or take one year. Ondoy was 2009.  Smaller inundations in 1999 and 1989 – equivalent to 20-yr frequency. Most recent two decades are worse than before as typhoons in the age of climate change, and La Niña seem to carry a lot more rain.

A 10 percent risk of this every year is quite substantial, an expert told me. “I guess no one insures these houses for flood, and people seem to have accepted the risk (or have they?).”

So, the only measure left, aside from a full relocation, is for the LGU to strengthen its procedures for storms and invest in equipment and training for evacuations, assuming everyone deems the risk acceptable.

Pity the residents who sunk their savings into their homes. Most will take the risk of returning to their homes, even if severely traumatized by the recent experience of waiting on their rooftop to be rescued.

I think that national and local governments should work together to help Provident Village residents to relocate. Maybe a special law to condone the balance in their home mortgage can help ease the pain of moving out. That will teach banks to check out the geohazard maps before granting loans.

Then the whole area, most likely beyond the village, should be cordoned off and declared a green zone beyond the commerce of man. Mother Nature obviously wants the area back and unless we give it back, more catastrophic floods and tragic loss of lives are in the future of the residents.

The plan to build a dike may not work in a really big water flow from the denuded mountains of the Sierra Madre near the area. Water will always seek a way out somehow and make things worse for other residents in adjacent areas who are less able to move out.

Speaking of denuded mountains, the late Gina Lopez warned in her Facebook post on Sept. 20, 2017 that we should “rehabilitate this watershed because it is the first line of defense of Marikina, Quezon City, Antipolo, Pasig, Cainta, San Mateo, etc., against rainwater surging from the uplands of Luzon.

“As long as there is quarrying there and the Marikina Watershed is denuded, the Pasig River water will be brown!! And it will become more and more shallow - and it will cause flooding in Metro Manila! It is imperative that the Marikina Watershed is reforested!!!!!”

Gina was right. But the vested interests forced her out of DENR.

Unfortunately, in a few days the shocking stories of rooftop rescues at Provident Village will be forgotten. And we will be back to our old rotten merry ways until the next typhoon repeats the tragedy. We never learn!

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @boochanco