Focus on service brings better life to locals
Jilin taking steps to raise living standards across the province
Li Yanwen, 72, was paralyzed seven years ago and has been unable to leave her bed ever since. Li’s biggest wish is to go outside and enjoy the sunshine, but her daughter is unable to carry her downstairs alone.
This year, her wish finally came true. Her community’s service team pitched in to help and now carries her outside the apartment regularly to sit in the sun.
Li lives in Changchun, the capital of Jilin. Like her, many residents of the northeastern province are seeing a similar change for the better in their communities, which is a result of the provincial government’s efforts to improve community and social service management.
In Changchun, the local government has divided the city into more than 5,900 areas and organized about 6,000 administrators to oversee and serve each area.
The city also has a big team of about 13,400 community coordinators and 14,700 mediators as well as more than 300,000 volunteers for community service.
In the Dongzhan Shiwei community of Changchun, residents now go to the area administrator first when they encounter any problem, big or small, such as clogged sewer pipes, domestic disputes or unemployment.
“What I do every day now is to visit the residents and help them deal with the difficulties,” said Wang Guimei, the area administrator.
The Dongzhan Shiwei community is now divided into 10 areas. Wang’s area includes almost 500 households and nearly 1,600 residents.
“I am also responsible for sanitation in the area,” she said.
“For example, (removing) dumpsters in the apartment buildings’ corridors and small advertising stickers — these are all my business.”
You Jingmei, 69, expressed her gratitude for Wang’s service. You’s son and daughter-in-law work out of town and cannot accompany her most of the time, so Wang often visits You to see what she needs.
“Thanks to the area administrator, I can have such a happy life in my later years,” You said.
Shao Yaming, deputy chief of the community, said, “our community workers are like the butler and housekeeper for the residents”.
“The tasks related to people’s livelihood that are assigned by provincial, city and district governments will all eventually fall into the hands of us, the butlers and housekeepers,” Shao said.
Rural areas
Improvements to community service can be seen in the rural areas of Jilin as well.
Dong Zhigang lives in the Minzhu village, a remote area of Jilin’s Tonghua county. Two years ago, Dong hit and severely injured another villager when riding a pedicab. He then compensated the villager 120,000 yuan for medical expenses.
Poor and deeply in debt, Dong felt so depressed that at one time he was contemplating suicide.
But the village service station was able to intervene in time. They managed to rent some land for Dong to plant herbs and helped him formulate a plan to pay the debts by installments.
Every festival, the service station will send people to visit Dong with gifts they paid for with their own money.
Gradually, the man regained the confidence he needed to go on living.
According to local officials, Tonghua county has established a community service system at the county, township and village levels.
In every village, a service station has been opened to accept complaints, solve disputes, help those facing difficulties, and offer voluntary service and consultations.
In addition, the Tonghua county government has effectively improved housing conditions, the environment, water quality, education and social insurance for local residents.
Xu Liang and his whole family live in Fumin village. He is dubbed “Millionaire Xu” by the villagers.
The wealthy family’s commercial transportation business operates 11 trucks and he owns an exquisite house in the village. When asked why they do not move to the city to have access to better education for their children, Xu’s wife Liang Mingjia said that the education in the township is no worse than that in the city.
The local middle school ranked third in the county in terms of highschool entrance examination scores, and the teachers are very responsible there, she said.
“Also, it is convenient for our parents to go to local hospitals,” Liang said.
Public security
The governments at various levels in Jilin have also taken steps to boost public security.
In Changchun, local police began to conduct nightly patrols in July 2011.
They divided the city into 115 patrol areas in the first half of the night and 50 in the second half. Six policemen and a car are arranged in every patrol area. Every team is equipped with a GPS device for the command center of the public security bureau to record their real-time position.
A 24-year-old lady surnamed Li said she is not a Changchun native but works in a private company there. She has to work until 10 pm every day and used to be afraid when walking home after work. But now she feels “less nervous and more secure” because of the nighttime patrols, Li said.
According to statistics from the local public security bureau, the crime rate dropped significantly after the night patrols started.
About 87 percent respondents in a survey said they have seen patrolling
police near their homes.
Food safety
Food safety is also a pressing problem related to public quality of life, and it has been addressed through government improvements to social management and services.
The city of Liaoyuan, for example, has established four food safety fasttesting stations in the counties and districts under its jurisdiction as well as 46 smaller such facilities in major food markets.
Every Friday, testing results will be submitted by the stations to the city’s food safety office and then published online. They will also be publicized on a board at every station, which also records the information about the inspectors, testing programs and time.
“Previously when buying fruits and vegetables, I was worried about whether or not they had pesticide residues,” said Li Jun, a local resident of Dongliao county of Liaoyuan.
“But now with the testing stations set up in food markets, if I am concerned on certain food, I can take them right away for a test. It’s very reassuring.”
According to the stations, it usually takes only 15 minutes to find out whether there are excessive pesticide residues in sample foods.
A database of food commodities in Liaoyuan has also been built. It can be used to search for the registration information of certain food distribution companies as well as the production date of certain foods. The system can remind people automatically when the expiration date is near.
Currently, 142 companies in Liaoyuan’s food-distribution chain, including wholesale companies and supermarkets, have installed the database software.
In the Yanbian Korean autonomous prefecture, the local government is also taking measures to supervise food quality.
The government plans to designate one or two food safety demonstration counties every year as well as 10 to 15 demonstration streets and 20 demonstration stores.
It opened a food safety reporting center and a companion website to offer convenient channels for consumer complaints and consultations.
The autonomous prefecture also established similar testing stations in the food markets like the ones in Liaoyuan city. The total number of such facilities has reached nearly 170 across the prefecture.
Administrative offices governing food and drugs have also been established in the villages, where village heads and Party chiefs are supervising the problem.