Quezon, officially the Municipality of Quezon (; ; ), is a municipality in the province of Isabela, Philippines. According to the , it has a population of people.
Etymology The town was named in honor of President Manuel L. Quezon on June 21, 1959 pursuant to Republic Act No. 2418.
History Prior to its creation, Quezon was once part of a vast track of agricultural land called the Mallig Plains and was sparsely populated. Historians believe that its earliest inhabitants were the Igorots and the Kalingas of the Cordilleras as well as the Irrayas. Although the Igorots and the Kalingas are primarily upland dwellers, historians have observed that these natives come down from the highlands from time to time to hunt for low-landers especially the Kanyaw rituals. The site of Quezon the location of a Spanish mission called Nalabangan which was established on 24 May 1598 but vanished from historical records not long afterwards.
When Manuel L. Quezon was elected as the President of the Philippine Commonwealth, one of his administration's main programs was to promote development in the other areas in the country aside from Manila. In order to achieve this objective, President Quezon opened up vast uninhabited areas for settlement hoping that these would be developed by those who will decide to settle in those areas. Aside from Mindanao, other parts of Luzon were similarly offered for settlement and development including the province of Isabela, particularly the north-western portion of the province which was later called Mallig Plains.
Citing for the potential of the area for settlement and agricultural development, President Quezon declared the entire Mallig Plains as project site for his program on rural development. In support of this declaration, he created the Office of National Land Settlement Administration which was renamed to Land Settlement Development Corporation (LaSeDeCo). Subsequently, this corporation was reorganized. At that time, the primary objective of LaSeDeCo was basically to oversee and facilitate the distribution of lands to qualified settlers. With the development of this opportunity for rural and agricultural development and with the completion of the Balete Pass Road in the 1920s that runs through the hinterlands of the Caraballo Mountains, hundreds of inhabitants from the Ilocos and Central Luzon regions opted to settle and avail of the program of the government in the Mallig Plains area.
A few years after the declaration of the area as site for settlement and agricultural development, World War II broke out and the region was later placed under Japanese control. Early settlers had difficulty rebuilding afterwards due to attacks by Kalinga tribes from the north.
One of those who fought the Kalinga was Jesus Estrada for whom a barangay was named after him. It was only after the government and leaders of the tribes negotiated and agreed to end hostilities that the threat to settlers was eventually dispelled.
With the attainment of peace and security in the area, the exodus of settlers to the area increased particularly in the area of Barrio Narra where the future site of Quezon is located. But the continued influx of settlers into the area increased the demand for basic requirements of residents. Provincial officials, particularly Representative Delfin Albano of the lone district of Isabela saw the urgency and the need to create a new municipality out of Mallig. House Bill No. 736 authored by Albano was later approved by the Philippine Senate and President Carlos P. Garcia in 1959 through Republic Act No. 2418. The name of the municipality was in honor of the President Quezon who was instrumental in the development of the municipality. The barrios and sitios of Abut, Barucboc Norte, Cauayan, Estrada, Lepanto, Malalao, Manga, Maragato, Minagbag, Pasurgong, PODCO, Settlement No. I, and Turod were separated from Mallig to form the new municipality.
Hildebrando Pécson was appointed as the first mayor of the municipality from 1960 until 1967 when after his term limit allowed by law then, he was succeeded by Hermogenes Padilla in the 1967 local elections. In 1971, Gavino Gascon challenged Padilla and was elected. In 1976, he was replaced by William Corpuz and was in turn unseated in 1978. Oniate Tabangcura, a former military officer replaced Corpuz. When President Ferdinand Marcos was overthrown on 1986 through the 1986 EDSA Revolution, President Corazon Aquino issued and executive order replacing all local executives all throughout the Philippines. Corpuz was appointed as Officer-In-Charge Mayor. In 1988 local elections, Gavino Gascon regained his seat as mayor. He was reelected in 1992 and 1995. Due to term limit as stated on the 1987 Philippine Constitution and the Local Government Code of 1991, the position of mayor was left as an open race in the 1998 elections. Lawyer Eduardo Cabantac won as mayor. He was reelected in 2001 local elections Cabantac was again reelected in 2004 leaving the 2007 elections as an open race again. Gascon's son Daryl won as mayor in the said election. Daryl G. Gascon was re-elected in 2010 and again in 2013 for his third and last term. In 2016, incumbent Vice Mayor Jimmy S. Gamazon Jr. won as Mayor against incumbent Councilor Eduardo R. Cabantac who wanted to reclaim his former post. In May 2019, Gamazon won unopposed while his running mate lawyer Jesus V. Poquiz, a three-term Councilor, easily won via landslide as Vice Mayor against Councilor Glenn A. Dulig.
Geography Quezon is one of the 34 municipalities which comprise the province of Isabela. Situated in the north-western portion of the province, it is bounded on the north by the municipalities of Santa Maria and Cabagan, on the south by the municipality of Mallig on the east by the municipalities of Delfin Albano and Santo Tomas all within the province of Isabela; and on the west by the Tabuk City in the province of Kalinga. A landlocked municipality, its absolute location is between 121°32’ to 121°41’ longitude East and 17°14’ to 17°26’ latitude north. Its municipal center is located 17°18'42.90"N and 121°36'19.59"E.
Its main access is the Cagayan Valley National Highway that traverses in a general north–south direction virtually slicing the municipality lengthwise and connects it with other municipalities in Isabela. To the east lies a provincial road which links Quezon to the municipality of Santo Tomas, Isabela.
Quezon is situated from the provincial capital Ilagan, and from the country's capital city of Manila
Based from the data from the Municipal Accessors Office, Quezon occupies an area of 268.26 km2 or about 2.52% of the total land area of Isabela which is placed at 10,664.4 km2. The figure was based on the actual tax mapping conducted by the said office. The same figure was also used in the old town plan of Quezon and was validated by using a digital planimeter. With this figure, Quezon is the 13th largest of the 34 municipalities of Isabela and the 3rd largest out of the 11 municipalities of District 2 (San Mariano being the largest at 1,469.50 km2, followed by Aurora at 300.56 km2). It is larger than its neighbors Mallig (133.4 km2) and Roxas (184.8 km2).
Barangays
Quezon is politically subdivided into 15 barangays. Each barangay consists of puroks while some have sitios.
Poblacion Centro (Settlement 1) consists of Alunan (Southeast Poblacion), Arellano (Northwest Poblacion), Santos (Northeast Poblacion), and Samonte (Southwest Poblacion). The rest of the barangays are rural barangays.
BarangayPSGCUrban/RuralAbut23122001RuralAlunan (Poblacion)23122002UrbanArellano (Poblacion)23122003UrbanAurora23122004RuralBarucboc Norte23122005RuralCalangigan (Calamagui)23122014RuralDunmon23122013RuralEstrada23122006RuralLepanto23122008RuralMangga23122009RuralMinagbag23122010RuralSamonte (Poblacion)23122011UrbanSan Juan23122015RuralSantos (Poblacion)23122007UrbanTurod23122012Rural
Topography and Geomorphology The municipal landscape of Quezon is characterized by a mixture of relatively flatlands punctuated at certain points by undulating and rolling terrain, with mountain ranges flanking its eastern and western sides. The low-lying hills ad surrounding mountains ranges are slightly dissected by intermittent creeks and waterways, which act as natural drainage avenues of accumulated run off water coming from the uplands.
The physiography of the municipality falls into two basic categories: an alluvial plain and a mountainous terrain. The central plain, where the Poblacion is located, has an elevation of about 100 meters above mean sea level, and is predominantly characterized by low relief and moderately sloping areas. Three fourths of the town is covered by these flatland which may be considered as a broad alluvial plain with recent depositions and residual soils. These areas are found sandwiched between the eastern and western uplands as well as on the other side of the Sierra Madre foothills.
The south-western portion is characterized by the low-lying hills with undulating and rolling terrain, having elevations ranging from 90 to 120 meters above mean sea level. These are basically shale and sandstone materials which dominate the Isabela-Kalinga boundary. The eastern edge, meanwhile forms part of the foothills of the major mountain range in the area and dominates the eastern flank of Quezon. This high relief area has peak elevations of up to 200 meters above mean sea level and is composed primarily of volcanic rocks.
Soil system
Pedologic surveys conducted by the Bureau of Soils Management of the Philippine Department of Agriculture have identified two major soil series or categories in Quezon. These road categories are the Bago Sandy Clay Loam and the San Juan Clay. The San Juan Clay is extensively distributed covering about 113.94 km2 or about 60 percent of the municipality. It offers excellent potential for such agricultural land use like onchards, commercial forest, woodland and pasture/ grazing lands. The Bago Sandy Clay Loam on the other hand, covers about or bout 40% of the municipality. This particular type of soil is devoted to lowland rice farming.
Ground water and geologic formations The assessment of the ground water resources by the Philippine National Water Resources Board in the entire province of Isabela was based on existing data on geologic formations, topography, ground surface elevations, precipitation and groundwater levels, all of which are available from the files of various agencies.
Based on the study, Quezon is classified into two categories namely: deep and shallow well areas. Shallow well areas generally consist of recent formations with slopes ranging from zero to three percent. Most of these areas are located at elevations within 50 meters above mean sea level, like alluvial and coastal plains and river valleys. Shallow wells may also have deep-water aquifer and are less susceptible to salt water intrusion. Deep well areas generally consist of sedimentary formations, 90 percent of which are water carriers, These are usually located in slopes reaching up to 10%, usually at elevations of more than 50 meters above sea level. The waters from deep wells are in general, of good quality.
Almost the entire portion of Quezon is classified as deep well area with a small portion of barangay Barucboc, having the lowest point of elevation in the entire municipality, belonging in the shallow area. Quezon s underlain with sedimentary rock formations the dominant being recent depositions of alluvium. This covers much of the municipality except in the Barucboc-Estrada area which is underlain with sandstone. The unconsolidated nature of the sandstone layers in these areas could account for the relatively shallow depth to the water data, since in general sandstones’ permeability allow good infiltration of water.
Existing general land use pattern