Yunlin County is close to being unable to pay either the salaries or year-end bonuses of its 100,000 public servants.
Yilan County has a NT$20 billion (US$669.8 million) debt that is not getting any smaller, while Chiayi County has a NT$3 billion deficit it has not been able to reduce this year.
Those were the stories told by county commissioners as they met in Taipei yesterday, concerned that local counties will be neglected in a large financial restructuring bill aimed at diverting more funds to the four new special municipalities.
“It almost seems fair — determining the amount of government subsidies based on ... population and size, but for counties that are sparsely populated, what it will create is a financial [black hole],” Pingtung County Commissioner Tsao Chi-hung (曹啟鴻) said.
The special municipalities are to be given significantly more annual funding by the central government. Taipei County, Taichung and Tainan will be upgraded on Saturday, the same day that existing special municipality Kaohsiung is to be merged with neighboring Kaohsiung County.
In the case of Taipei County, Ministry of Finance documents show that it is set to receive NT$46.6 billion in subsidies next year, compared with the NT$23.8 billion it received in 2007. The figure includes a second one-time payment of NT$10 billion associated with the upgrade.
“At the same time that [a special municipality] is focused on how to implement a new luxury tax ... all we are worried about is how we are going to survive past tomorrow,” Chiayi County Commissioner Helen Chang (張花冠) told a press conference at the legislature.
Earlier in the morning, four commissioners of DPP administered counties, including Yilan’s Lin Tsung-hsien (林聰賢) and Yunlin’s Su Chih-fen (蘇治芬), met with Minister of Finance Lee Sush-der (李述德) to discuss the proposed changes to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法).
Under the tabled revision, special municipalities are set to receive 61 percent of the money set aside by the central government, up from 43 percent and roughly proportionate with their share of the population.
At the same time, the share given to counties and local municipalities will fall to 24 percent from 39 percent — a figure that the county commissioners yesterday want revised upward.
However, Lee said he believed the bill would be sufficient to help the long-term development targets of local counties. He suggested that local government cut spending, saying that local government debts have been a problem for the past few years.
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
A magnitude 4.1 earthquake struck eastern Taiwan's Hualien County at 2:23pm today, according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). The epicenter of the temblor was 5.4 kilometers northeast of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 34.9 km, according to the CWA. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was the highest in Hualien County, where it measured 2 on Taiwan's 7-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 1 in Yilan county, Taichung, Nantou County, Changhua County and Yunlin County, the CWA said. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by
RSS