Chapter 579: For the Sake of Eight Thousand Low-Income Households!

County Magistrate Gao Hong and Government Office Director Zhu Kang arrived at the meeting venue last.

Zhu Kang took the initiative to step forward and exchange a few pleasantries with Tang Ye, returned to his own seat, then cleared his throat and said: "We shall now begin the meeting. With the Spring Festival approaching, departments at all levels must make the corresponding work deployments to ensure social order and stability, allowing the common people to have a peaceful New Year. I now invite County Magistrate Gao to provide instructions and arrangements!"

Gao Hong held the document issued by the city, read it through once, and then emphasized: "The above is the content of the city's work arrangements before the Spring Festival; our departments at all levels must follow the city's arrangements. On one hand, we must strengthen safety management to ensure social stability during the Spring Festival; on the other hand, we must handle the government duty arrangements during the Spring Festival well, and have emergency preparations in place for major issues."

Gao Hong gave a few more instructions, then looked toward Tang Ye.

"County Magistrate Tang, you have just returned from your studies at the Provincial Party School and must have many insights; take this opportunity to share them with everyone!"

Tang Ye knew that Gao Hong was just being polite.

He pressed the button on the microphone in front of him, looked around the room, and said: "My biggest takeaway from this trip to study at the Provincial Party School is that my spiritual world has been baptized.

Comrades, what is our true pursuit as officials? Is it for power, or for money? I believe it is neither. To fulfill the duties of one's position, to benefit the people during one's tenure—I believe this is the goal and the steadfast commitment we should have as officials.

As far as I know, a major incident occurred in the Civil Affairs Bureau recently; someone disappeared with the Spring Festival consolation funds! I feel this is an urgent problem that needs to be solved!"

Hearing Tang Ye bring up this matter, Gao Hong's molars ached slightly. He said: "County Magistrate Tang, while you were studying at the Provincial Party School, this matter already reached a conclusion! Stability overrides everything; any problem must be solved and cannot be condoned, but now is a special period during the Spring Festival, so it must be handled low-key."

Tang Ye sneered; Gao Hong had said a great deal, yet hadn't touched upon the key issue.

"Today, the members of our county government leadership are all present, and I believe we should provide a conclusion on-site and clarify how this matter is to be handled. Maintaining stability does not equal procrastination. Millions in consolation funds involve eight thousand impoverished households and whether they can have a peaceful and good New Year. If we keep dragging our feet and pushing responsibility around without handling it, perhaps we won't have to bear the responsibility, but what are those low-income recipients supposed to do?"

Tang Ye said these few sentences in an understated manner, but the tone was very heavy.

When he served as Standing Committee Deputy County Magistrate, he hadn't been this assertive and rarely made insinuating remarks, but a superficial harmony could not solve the problem of the stolen Spring Festival consolation funds.

The incident had happened nearly a month ago, and all sides had been passing the buck; gentle, respectful, and yielding attitudes simply could not solve the problem.

Tang Ye did not want to go in circles with this group of people anymore!

In Gao Hong's view, Tang Ye had returned from the Party School Training with a growing temper and was looking to vie with him for the right to speak at the county magistrate meetings!

Gao Hong glanced at the Deputy County Magistrate in charge of civil affairs and said: "Comrade Yin Xidong, he just returned and doesn't understand the situation; you report the progress of the matter to County Magistrate Tang!"

Yin Xidong coughed lightly twice and said: "We have been handling the case jointly with the County Public Security Bureau and have provided many clues, but the County Public Security Bureau has had no progress here."

Wan Ming was furious.

Yin Xidong was clearly trying to divert the disaster and push the responsibility onto him.

"We have been tracking the whereabouts of Zhang Jinan; he is quite cunning and transferred the funds through multiple accounts.

As for his whereabouts, they are also unclear. According to the latest clues, he is currently in Yu Province, but we have yet to lock down his specific location. It was because of management loopholes in the civil affairs system that he was able to take advantage and embezzle public funds.

First, we must solve the problem at the root; we cannot push the responsibility onto the Public Security Bureau!"

A look of displeasure appeared on Yin Xidong's face: "The Civil Affairs Bureau's account originally had funds that could have filled this gap, but some time ago, in order to pay the wages of faculty and staff, the funds were borrowed. Why not ask the Education Bureau to find a way to return this sum of money?"

Deputy County Magistrate Zhang Kainan, who was in charge of the Education Bureau, said with dissatisfaction: "The wages for the county's faculty and staff have only been paid up to December; there are still several months of wages that haven't been paid."

At the county level, the misappropriation and diversion of funds was a common occurrence.

The faculty and staff's wages were misappropriated to settle payments for the Lighting Project, and then the funds from civil affairs were misappropriated to pay the faculty and staff's wages.

Now, the water had been completely muddied!

For a time, the meeting room was in an uproar, and everyone was complaining.

Tang Ye watched everyone passing the buck calmly, a cold look appearing in his eyes.

Gao Hong, meanwhile, turned a blind eye.

In his view, this smoke of war had been stirred up by Tang Ye.

Since he started the fire, he would have to be the one to put it out!

Finally, the meeting room quieted down.

A cold sneer appeared on the corner of Tang Ye's mouth: "How about it, are you all done complaining?"

He then took out a digital voice recorder and slapped it onto the table, "I have recorded all the words you just used to shirk responsibility. I will organize them later and send them to each of you; listen to them carefully and see your own faces!

"Eight thousand common people are living in dire straits and are about to face a cold Spring Festival, but what about you? To avoid responsibility, you are racking your brains and digging deep to find excuses."

Hearing Tang Ye say this, those with thinner skin lowered their heads in shame, while others had a flash of astonishment in their eyes.

—If this recording were made public, most of them would be subjected to cyber-bullying.

Tang Ye paused for a moment and said with a serious expression: "To handle the issue of the Spring Festival consolation funds, I suggest establishing a working group with County Magistrate Gao as the Team Leader, and everyone present, including myself, as Deputy Group Leaders. We are all comrades in the same trench; we prosper together and suffer together."

"I have four requirements:

"First, we must exhaust every means to resolve the Spring Festival consolation funds for the low-income recipients, otherwise the fundamental problem cannot be solved. Each Deputy County Magistrate present, including myself, is responsible for resolving three hundred thousand; I believe everyone has this ability. Of course, the source of the money must be reasonable and legal; the enterprises providing the donations must be registered, and the government will later issue them certificates and provide policy incentives.

Second, once the funds are in place, you will lead teams to the various townships you are in contact with to figure out the true situation of the low-income recipients in each area. We are a People's Government; we must dare to go to the front lines to understand the true situation of the impoverished, not only to solve the problem of the consolation funds but also to solve the problem of their future livelihood security.

Third, we must implement this as quickly as possible; we must not be perfunctory.

Fourth, the content of this meeting must be kept strictly confidential; whoever leaks it will be held responsible.

"There must be results by tomorrow; I will report everyone's execution status to Secretary Han."

After the meeting adjourned, everyone went to handle this matter with long faces.

Two million-plus sounds like a large sum, but there are eight Deputy County Magistrates in the whole county; if each person resolves three hundred thousand, that adds up to two million four hundred thousand.

When divided among everyone, it was not too heavy a burden.

It was just that there had previously been a lack of centripetal force, and they hadn't been able to twist everyone into a single rope.

Now, Tang Ye had essentially used his own right to speak to get these people to take action.

It wasn't as if he were forcing them to solve a problem of millions or tens of millions.

If a Deputy County Magistrate couldn't even secure three hundred thousand in donations, to be honest, that would show their ability was lacking!

At any other time, Tang Ye wouldn't have been able to force these Deputy County Magistrates to use their resources, but the situation was special right now; this was for eight thousand low-income households, and it could even be seen as a form of robbing the rich to help the poor.

Although it might cause controversy later, Tang Ye still did it without hesitation!

Gao Hong felt very uncomfortable inside because Tang Ye had asked the Deputy County Magistrates to raise money but had isolated him from it.

People are just like that: if you are asked to be solely responsible for a matter, you will shirk it in every possible way;

But if everyone is doing something together and you are the only one not included, you will instead feel uncomfortable.