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City secures more land plots for 60 children's parks
The city administration is optimistic that their target of developing 60 child-friendly integrated parks, known as RPTRAs, is likely to be achieved as the administration has already inaugurated four parks and secured a further 45 plots of land for the project
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he city administration is optimistic that their target of developing 60 child-friendly integrated parks, known as RPTRAs, is likely to be achieved as the administration has already inaugurated four parks and secured a further 45 plots of land for the project.
However, Jakarta Governor Basuki 'Ahok' Tjahaja Purnama said on Friday that the construction of 60 integrated parks around the city was still hampered by some obstacles, including land acquisition.
'We have secured 45 land plots while the remaining nine places are still in the acquisition process,' he said.
Ahok said that some of the parks also overlapped with a similar program under the control of the Parks and Cemeteries Agency.
'The agency has allocated budgetary resources for several parks that are also included in the RPTRA program,' he said, adding that he had ordered the agency to cancel the program.
An RPTRA, a park equipped with various facilities, including a sports field, library, clinic and activity hall, is funded by private companies through the corporate social responsibility (CSR) scheme.
Ahok said that he preferred the construction process to be completed by private entities because his subordinates often allocated unreasonably large budgets for the parks. 'They could allocate Rp 10 billion [US$750,000] just for the fence in 12 locations. By contrast, it costs only Rp 400 million to Rp 900 million for one park to be built by a private company,' he said.
Ahok said the main problem of RPTRA construction was the issue of social mapping. 'The parks should be in accordance with the needs of the surrounding residents who will enjoy the facilities. They need to feel that the parks belong to them,' he said.
He added that the city would not deploy Sanitation Agency officers to clean or guard the parks.
'The residents should be actively involved in the maintenance of the parks.'
Ahok said that although the project still had some problems, he remained optimistic that all 60 parks would be completed this year.
To date, the city administration has built six parks in five municipalities and one regency but only four of them have been inaugurated.
'We will inaugurate an RPTRA on Untung Jawa Island in Thousand Islands and in Cililitan, East Jakarta, after Idul Fitri,' Ahok said.
The ones that have been inaugurated are located in Cideng in Central Jakarta, Kembangan Utara in West Jakarta, Gandaria Selatan in South Jakarta and Sungai Bambu in North Jakarta.
Dien Emmawati, head of the Jakarta Family Planning, Women and Community Empowerment Body, an organization that (BPMPKB) that will supervise the project, said that social mapping took time as the needs of each area were different.
'However, we have had six models of parks already, so it will be easier in the future,' she said.
Dien said that the social mapping was conducted by five universities, including University of Indonesia, Atma Jaya University, Trisakti University and Pembangunan Jaya University.
Dien said that the city had secured pledges from private companies to fund park construction.
' JP/Corry Elyda
