To step up financial operation counseling for local governments and help them develop financial sources and improve financial performance, the Ministry of Finance held a “Local Government Financial Operation Coordination Meeting” on Jan. 17, with the financial executives of most municipality and county (city) governments or their designated agents attending the meeting.
To help local governments increase financial sources, adopt new financial concepts, and establish break-through measures, special arrangements were made for local governments rated No. 1 in performance evaluation in the three major categories of the “Local Government Financial Operation Counseling Project” in 2019 to share their experiences. First, Chiayi City Government talked about public treasury management and described how it was able to shorten payment timelines and reduce labor and warehousing costs by adopting centralized electronic payment procedures to upgrade operating performance. At the same time, by consolidating designated fund accounts into centralized payment management, it also cut down on financing costs. Next, Taichung City Government explained its improvement of financial management by taking a number of measures to increase financial sources and cut down expenses, including sorting out and collecting owed taxes, making urban land readjustments, conducting land section expropriation as well as reviewing and adjusting related fee standards in accordance with the user-pays principle. Meanwhile, they also inventoried public land and buildings not being used for public purposes and took action to strengthen public property management and improve the effectiveness of use of resources to increase the city treasury’s revenue. As for cost reduction, Taichung City Government utilized idle spaces in schools to open public kindergartens and set up commodity exchange platforms. Private organizations and individuals were encouraged to invest. As a result, the city government was able to bring down spending by a remarkable margin.
Finally, Penghu County Government shared its debt management experience. The county government made an outstanding achievement in debt control. In order to enhance financial performance and control debt increases, it adopted practical measures to set up budgets, make appropriate modifications to its financial structure, and reduce annual budget growths. The county government particularly emphasized that finding new financial sources and reducing spending were necessary to achieve sustainable financial management. The measures taken, including promotion of establishment of offshore duty-free shops, operation transfer projects, and land section expropriation and development, proved able to increase the revenue of the county government.
Deputy Administrative Minister Juan attended the meeting. In addition to handing out awards to representatives of local governments evaluated as having outstanding performance under the 2019 Local Government Financial Operation Counseling Project, he also made it clear that the Fiscal Discipline Law had already taken effect on Apr. 10, 2019 and he hoped local governments could cooperate with the central government to assure the law was properly enforced to prevent loss of financial sources and the incremental unnecessary spending to reach the mid- and long-term budget balance goals. In the meantime, Deputy Minister Juan also encouraged the staff members of financial departments in local governments to adopt new thinking to cope with existing problems and help their units find appropriate financial sources in order to improve financial performance to speed up various public works projects and pursue sustainable financial development in spite of limited financial resources.
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