Zamboanga City, September 23 – Social Welfare and Development Secretary Corazon Juliano-Soliman today announced that the number of evacuation centers is reduced to 35.

According to Secretary Soliman, from 57 evacuation centers being managed and assisted by Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), it went down to 35 centers with 18,112 families or 94,753 individuals. “The decrease was due to the merging of some evacuation centers with small number of evacuees.  However, families are continually being provided with relief goods,” Secretary Soliman added.

The grandstand evacuation center remains to have the highest number of evacuees with 11,979 families or 71,265 families.

As of press time, DSWD already allocated a total of P74,898,048 million for combined food and non-food items, financial assistance, and cash for work.

Earlier this week, DSWD intensified its monitoring to these evacuation centers in coordination with the Archdiocese of Zamboanga and the City Government to ensure better management and supervision of these centers.

While the City Government and Archdiocese are supervising some areas, provision is still being ensured by DSWD.

The ‘Home-based or community-based evacuees refers to those families who sought temporary shelters with relatives and friends that being attended by the department through the City Social Welfare and Development (CSWD) district offices.  Seven district offices serve as registration centers for community-based evacuees.

To date, there are 3,712 families or 10,194 individuals have registered as community-based evacuees. Per DSWD statistics, the total combined affected families in the evacuation centers and in the community-based was reduced to 23,513 or 117,182 individuals who were affected by the armed-conflict since September 9. ###