Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Rex Gatchalian on Friday (June 20) called on the entire agency to ensure that the newly-inaugurated Regional Rehabilitation Center for Youth (RRCY) exclusively for girls will not remain the only one of its kind in the country.
“We will make sure that this is intentional. It can’t be one of its kind and will remain as the only one of its kind,” Secretary Gatchalian said during the blessing and inauguration of the first-ever RRCY for girls located in the municipality of Consolacion in Cebu.
Secretary Gatchalian emphasized that the newly-inaugurated facility serves as a challenge to all DSWD Field Offices (FOs) to replicate and establish more gender-responsive rehabilitation centers exclusively for girls, ensuring that this pioneering effort becomes a national standard.
“Today is a challenge to the entire DSWD family here that the first of its kind is good to celebrate on the day itself but it cannot fall in history that it is the one of its kind. There has to be more of these facilities, there has to be more of these regional rehabilitation centers for girls,” the DSWD chief pointed out.
The first gender-responsive and sensitive RRCY aims to provide a safe, therapeutic, and rehabilitative environment for female children in conflict with the law (CICLs).
Developed through the partnership of the DSWD, Juvenile Justice and Welfare Council (JJWC), Department of Justice (DOJ), Provincial and Local governments of Cebu, and Justice, Peace, and Integrity of Creation (JPIC), the center features dormitories, therapy and counseling rooms, and activity spaces tailored to the needs of girls undergoing rehabilitation.
“We owe our children facilities that will restore and make them productive members of society again,” Secretary Gatchalian said.
In a post on X, Secretary Gatchalian emphasized the importance of giving girls in conflict with the law a second chance, highlighting that the new RRCY is designed to do just that.
“Last month we broke ground for the country’s 1st ever agri-camp for children in conflict with the law. That was a realization of a 50 years-in-the-making-dream as provided by law. Today we opened the country’s first ever Regional Rehabilitation Center for the Youth (for girls in conflict with the law). Our girls in conflict with the law deserve a second chance and this gender-sensitive facility will give them that avenue,” the DSWD chief wrote.
To formally launch the center, Annie and Jelly—representing CICLs—led the ribbon cutting, together with Secretary Gatchalian; Cebu Governor Gwendolyn Garcia; Court of Appeals Associate Justice Geraldine Fiel-Macaraig; Consolacion Mayor Teresa Alegado; and Assistant Secretary Elaine Fallarcuna of the DSWD’s Legislative Affairs Group (LAG).
DSWD FO 7-Central Visayas Regional Director Shalaine Marie Lucero, JJWC Executive Director, Atty. Tricia Claire Oco, and former JPIC Executive Director, Father Eugenio Docoy Jr. were also present during the ceremony. (YADP)