Section 35Sec./Art. 35

Civil Liability of Environmental Planners. The environmental planner in charge of the preparation of an environmental plan and related documents, as well as other members of the planning team involved in the preparation thereof, may be held civilly liable in cases of serious, large-scale or wholesale damage, failure or destruction of any project subject of or covered by an environmental plan, that result in significant adverse impact on affected stakeholders or the concerned ecosystem, within a period of ten (10) years from the time of implementation of such plan.

These are in cases where it is determined by a court of competent jurisdiction that such damage, failure or destruction was foreseeable and could have been anticipated, and are directly caused by gross negligence on the part of such environmental planner and/or the environmental planning team member or members, or to highly deficient or inappropriate environmental planning methods, strategies, tools or techniques at variance with generally accepted environmental planning principles, methods and standards.

The government or any affected stakeholder may bring an action to enforce such liability within five (5) years from the time the damage or destruction occurs.