Residents of Dumaguete City may not have known about it, but they had been living under a state of calamity for the last nine months.

This is because this declaration by the Sangguniang Panlungsod after the February 7 flood was not lifted, after the city was able to tap into its calamity funds to repair the flood damage.

It was just an oversight, Councilor Manuel Sagarbarria said, as the calamity funds were not touched after the reparation efforts for the February 7 flood. Realizing this error, the Council lifted the state of calamity on Thursday, after nine months of being in effect.

But the City Council went into a lengthy deliberation last Thursday over a proposal of Councilor Alan Gel Cordova to declare Dumaguete under “imminent threat,” as typhoon “Santi” was threatening to make landfall in Central Luzon.

Cordova explained that placing Dumaguete under imminent threat would mean that the city may also be able to utilize its calamity funds to respond to emergencies.

But the other councilors were unconvinced of the need for such move. “Why did we just lift the state of calamity only to put something else in its place?” Sagarbarria asked.

The result was an 8-4 vote disapproving the proposed measure on what seemed like political lines. The only councilors voting for the proposal were Cordova, Amy Dicen, Nilo  Sayson and Antonio Remollo.

Typhoon Santi made landfall last Saturday, hitting the southern Luzon provinces and exiting at the Manila Bay, with hardly a drop of rain falling in Dumaguete.*AP

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