Chapter 501

Lu Fan nodded satisfactorily and said: "Across the long river of history, our nation has always been vibrant; behind it lies the relentless struggle of generation after generation. Among countless strivers, entrepreneurs harbor love for country and shoulder responsibility; their spirit remains ever fresh, continually unleashing great power, and they keep writing splendid chapters in the grand historical scroll."

I am pleased that you all have this heart, willing to help the Municipal Party Committee and City Government solve problems and willing to contribute to the city's people. But speaking of business, you have sentiment and righteousness; how could I let you "lose money while just shouting"? Mayor Cai Hong, you will take the lead on this work, adopting an "invitation for tender" approach to purchase 2.23 million sets of school uniforms. The Education Bureau, Finance Bureau, and all counties and districts shall cooperate, quickly produce a feasible plan, and submit it to the Municipal Party Standing Committee for study and decision.

Ma Caihong laughed and replied: "On behalf of the city's children, I thank Secretary Lu Fan for his attention and support for education work; I will surely complete the tasks assigned by the Secretary with quality and quantity."

After the investigation, the news that Secretary Lu Fan would provide free school uniforms to students spread across the city like thunderbolt, sparking widespread discussion and sensation.

On streets and alleys, the citizens were beaming with joy.

"Auntie, have you heard? Secretary Lu Fan is going to give the kids free school uniforms, a full set for all seasons!"

"Really? My child's uniform is about to wear out, so I'll wait a bit."

"Someone came over and said: 'The news is true! Secretary Lu Fan went to the garment factory for research today; he personally said it at the meeting!'"

"Exactly, anything else said is just farting; what Secretary Lu Fan says will surely count!"

"That makes sense! If Secretary Lu Fan had come a few years earlier, our Nanyuan wouldn't be in last year's sorry state! Look at this year, how much change? How many work teams are active across the city? As officials say, Secretary Lu Fan demands that Nanyuan's projects be built by Nanyuan people. Leaving that aside, look at those small material suppliers, plus the canteens, KTVs, and foot massage parlors—business is booming this year!"

"Speaking of the canteen, have you noticed the food is much cleaner? Even after eating hot pot, you don't get diarrhea!"

"Bystanders laughed: 'If you dare to give someone diarrhea, it's a chance to get rich! Secretary Lu Fan set up a reporting reward—who wouldn't be tempted? Now it's too hard to successfully report someone!'"

""

The news of free school uniforms also spread to all schools, causing the principals to panic—this is cutting off their source of income!

But the arm can't twist the thigh; the Education Bureau and principals could only helplessly accept reality, with none daring to be "hard-headed" in opposition.

On the morning of June 7, Nanyuan City Municipal Party Secretary Lu Fan visited some examination sites to inspect the college entrance exam work, urging all departments to cooperate closely and meticulously organize support to ensure the exam proceeds fairly, justly, safely, and in order.

Lu Fan then went to No. 5 High School and No. 1 High School, personally checking the students' entry channels, exam hall monitoring duty rooms, and surrounding environment of the test sites, and gained detailed understanding of the number of examinees at each site, exam arrangements, food, lodging, medical care, and power supply.

Lu Fan emphasized that the college entrance exam concerns thousands of families and affects every candidate's future and destiny, with high social attention and broad impact. All relevant departments must attach great importance, enforce the highest standards and strictest requirements, meticulously arrange all exam-related work to reassure examinees, parents, and society. To ensure exam safety, enforce discipline and rules, closely monitor key points, and do a good job of exam security and confidentiality, firmly preventing leaks and cheating, so as to create a fair and just testing environment for candidates.

Lu Fan stressed that mung bean soup and bottled water must be provided at every test site across the city, making every effort to offer examinees a warm environment and high-quality service so they can perform at their best and achieve excellent scores.

In the afternoon, Lu Fan took time to visit the construction site of Nanyuan No. 18 Middle School, which covers 45,000 square meters and includes teaching building, laboratory building, comprehensive office building, library lecture hall, wind-and-rain playground, and underground garage, with supporting facilities of a 300-meter circular track and sports field. Designed for an enrollment scale of 80 classes, it can add more than 3,500 high school seats.

Currently, the school's comprehensive building and teaching building are nearly topped out, and the school has begun to take shape.

Entering the construction site, Lu Fan emphasized that education is the greatest people's livelihood project, concerning the well-being of all city residents. Building a batch of modern high schools is a major measure to optimize the allocation of educational resources and provide satisfactory education to the people; it is an important means to effectively solve the shortage and poor layout of quality high school educational resources in our city, and also a people's livelihood project that the whole city highly anticipates, with thousands of families looking forward to it.

Lu Fan required that, from the start of construction, the school must lay a solid foundation according to the standard of building a "century-old renowned school", adopt extraordinary measures, promptly solve problems encountered in construction, and, while ensuring quality, optimize procedures as much as possible to guarantee completion by the end of this year and formal enrollment next summer.

Lu Fan instructed Deputy Mayor Ma Caihong: 'We must early plan the operation and management of the new school, actively adapt to the new college entrance exam reform requirements, advance planning of the teacher team structure, strengthen paired assistance with the Provincial Experimental Middle School, and invite their management team to be stationed at Nanyuan No. 18 Middle School. I have told you before, this school must be built into a provincial demonstration high school and a provincial key high school.'

Ma Caihong replied: 'Secretary, we have had multiple in-depth exchanges with the Provincial Experimental Middle School and preliminarily reached consensus; they will participate comprehensively in the construction of No. 18 Middle School.'

Lu Fan nodded and said: 'You need to report to me whenever I need to step in; also, can you achieve the high school admission rate I set for you?'

Ma Caihong looked embarrassed and said: 'Secretary, we have done our utmost, tried every means to help senior high students improve their scores, spent a lot of money, and certainly have confidence, but ultimately it still depends on the students' on-the-spot performance.'

Lu Fan bluntly said: 'This year's education investment has increased by 18%; you are the deputy mayor in charge of education, so don't give me any excuses—I don't look at the process, only the results! If the college entrance exam scores show no significant improvement, the Municipal Party Committee will hold you accountable!'

Moreover, you must propose solutions to the pressing issues reflected by parents—school selection fever, heavy burdens on primary and secondary students, and chaos in off‑campus training—and present a special report at the next Standing Committee meeting.

"Okay, Secretary, I will quickly analyze the causes, clarify my thinking, devise countermeasures, refine implementation steps, and solidly manage education work."

On the way back to the city, Lu Fan saw sanitation workers laboring diligently from the car window, but Nanyuan City's urban appearance is hard to satisfy; everywhere one sees 'dirty, messy, and poor', far from the ideal of 'a civilized city, a beautiful home', and it will also leave a bad impression on out‑of‑town visitors.

To serve one term and benefit one region, Lu Fan hopes to shape Nanyuan into the 'nation's cleanest city' during his tenure, making roads cleaner, skies bluer, water clearer, scenery more beautiful, environment more livable, ecology superior, and civilization more refined. The city brand 'Nanyang, a place worth three visits' will become ever more prominent, continually enhancing Nanyuan residents' sense of gain and happiness.

After the college entrance exam ended, Lu Fan convened Deputy Municipal Party Secretary Su Xiang Hai, Executive Vice Mayor Wang Hong, Propaganda Department Head Li Mu Ci, Vice Mayor Zhu Xinlan, and the relevant counties and departments to hold a meeting on improving urban management standards.

As the Municipal Party Secretary, one can no longer engage in concrete work; one needs the ability to discover problems, to handle complex problems, and to mobilize the enthusiasm of cadres.

After everyone had gathered, Lu Fan directly said: 'Phoenix trees attract phoenixes; fragrant flowers draw butterflies. The Municipal Party Committee has decided to build the "nation's cleanest city", conducting refined management of Nanyuan's urban area over three years to shape Nanyuan's style and grace, showcase the city's quality charm, advance pollution control and quality improvement, increase greenery and excellence, enhance lighting and effectiveness, carefully depict the city's "appearance", finely carve the city's "temperament", create a beautiful urban layout, foster a pleasant urban environment, and build a harmonious urban home, so that Nanyuan becomes a city of quality that people long for, near and far. Please everyone must put yourselves, your responsibilities, and your work into this, earnestly carry out rectifications, and drive problem resolution.'

Upon hearing the secretary's words, the attendees immediately understood that another major task had arrived; without questioning the reason, they should just buckle down and work hard.

Deputy Secretary Su Xiang Hai said: 'Building the "nation's cleanest city" is of great significance; we must aim for benchmarks, align with domestic first‑class standards, learn from advanced cities' experiences, and polish the intrinsic hue of the "cleanest city". Focusing on "clean", "orderly", and "excellent", we will target various chronic problems, implement sanitation improvement, order improvement, and facility improvement actions, and create a urban appearance that is cleaner, more orderly, and more warmly beautiful.'

Lu Fan nodded and said: 'Xianghai, your position is high; Mayor Zhu Xinlan, you are in charge of urban management and construction, the "main attacker"—you need concrete measures.'

Zhu Xinlan thought and replied: 'Secretary, I believe it is necessary to launch a special crackdown action in the central urban area, including a special action to clear the "two illegalities", a special action to clean up leftover issues from real‑estate expropriation and demolition, a special action to build a wall‑free city, a special action to rectify advertisements, a special action to rectify illegal occupation of roads with sheds and stalls, pipeline regularization improvement, a special action to improve landscaping and greening, maintenance improvement for municipal roads over 25 meters, maintenance improvement for secondary roads under 25 meters and back‑street lanes, and improvement of all types of fencing in the central urban area.'

Lu Fan approvingly looked at Zhu Xinlan and said: 'You have proposed ten special crackdown actions; the direction is correct. We need to refine these ten tasks, clarify how many problems exist, what specific work needs to be done, and what final effect is to be achieved. Quickly draw up a list and formulate the "Action Plan for Building the Nation's Cleanest City (Three‑Year)", assign tasks and responsibilities to individuals, and then just do it—swift and resolute!'

The Propaganda Department should use the special crackdown actions to create some internet‑celebrity check‑in spots, striving to attract tourists in droves, but remember not to be deliberately contrived.

Urban management and construction: the back‑street alleys are the city's "capillaries", closely tied to the lives of surrounding residents. By optimizing road facilities, widening black‑topped roads, adding green landscaping features, beautifying building facades, transforming parking lot plots, upgrading basic infrastructure to higher standards, and creating a rich cultural atmosphere, etc., we will make the back‑street alleys "attractive outside and warm inside"……

The meeting lasted a full two hours, preliminarily deciding on the work direction.