<figure id="attachment_270429" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-270429" style="width: 1024px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="fafdf636"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2022/10/2022083112071.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-270429" class="wp-caption-text">Katsushika Ward Mayor Aoki apologizes for mis-provisioning nursery schools. However, behind the scenes, various problems have come to light&#8230;</figcaption></figure>
 Journalist Mitsutoshi Abe&#8217;s &#8220;Cutting Through Local Politics!
 A resident&#8217;s request for information has revealed that Katsushika Ward, Tokyo, has been using taxpayers&#8217; money to enter into negotiated contracts that could be detrimental to the residents of the ward.
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 Katsunori Aoki, the mayor of Katsushika Ward, Tokyo, has been accused of mistakenly overpaying subsidies of approximately 510 million yen to private nursery schools in the ward.
 The mayor of Katsunori Aoki&#8217;s Katsushika Ward was seeking a legal basis for not seeking the return of public funds that had been mistakenly paid out.
 The information disclosure revealed that the mayor of Aoki Ward had been seeking a &#8220;legal basis for not seeking the return of public funds that were mistakenly paid. According to the specifications (contents) of the negotiated contract revealed by the disclosure of information
 A legal basis for not requiring the nursery schools to return the overpaid subsidy due to a discrepancy in the calculation of the subsidy for private authorized nursery schools.
 The contents of the issues that are expected to be raised in the residents&#8217; lawsuit and the residents&#8217; request for supervision will be presented.
 The above two points were requested by the ward, and a Minato Ward law firm was contracted to meet these requirements.
 One Katsushika Ward resident said
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 said, &#8220;It is only natural to ask for the return of public money that was remitted in error, and it is not right to use taxpayers&#8217; money to hire an outside lawyer for a method that does not require the return of the money. It is a betrayal of the residents by the mayor.
 The mayor&#8217;s betrayal of the residents is a breach of trust,&#8221; he said, his tone growing stronger.
 The original mispayment of subsidies was the overpayment of a total of 511.81 million yen over a four-year period from fiscal 2006 to fiscal 2009 to subsidize licensed private preschools that hired part-time nursery school teachers in order to alleviate the shortage of staff at the preschools.
 In one case, 72 of the 87 preschools in Katsushika City were paid twice as much as they should have been. In one case, the amount was about twice as much as it should have been. This was due to an error in the settings of newly introduced calculation software, which was discovered by a staff member in March of this year.
 Since it is clear that the payments were made in error, the proper administrative procedure would have been to apologize to the nursery school staff and explain the situation, and then immediately request that the money be returned. However, when the problem first arose, there was a private meeting between Mayor Aoki and those involved in the nursery school, and Mayor Aoki quickly decided not to ask for the return of the money and informed those involved. 
However, a ward official announced that he would seek the return of the money at the committee meeting, which caused a twist.
 After a few rounds of &#8220;we will ask for it,&#8221; &#8220;we will not ask for it,&#8221; &#8220;we will still ask for it,&#8221; and &#8220;we will still ask for it.
 After two or three changes, the decision was made to request the return. In the process, they concluded a voluntary contract with a private law firm, spending 1.1 million yen of public funds to seek a legal basis for not filing a claim, which had been the mayor&#8217;s policy. 
Furthermore, the residents were
 &#8220;It is also inexplicable that the district is tolerating such an unconvincing application from the nursery school, which is like a fraudulent application.&#8221;
 The contents of the fraudulent application are&#8230;
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" The contents of the fraudulent application are..."></div>
In fact, a total of 94 childcare workers at 31 preschools have not been verified as working. This appears to residents as if fraudulent applications were made by the day-care centers.
 The ward has announced the fact that the actual working conditions cannot be confirmed at the committee meeting, but at that time, some council members also
 &#8220;It&#8217;s a fraudulent claim for subsidies.&#8221;
 The council members also pointed out that this was a fraudulent claim for subsidies. The ward, however, has not
 (1) All the employees have employment contracts. 
 (2) There was a childcare worker who took maternity leave in the middle of the day 
 (3) Because she was no longer working at Corona
 (3) because she was no longer working at Corona.
 &#8220;All of the applications were submitted due to a mistake.
 The company&#8217;s policy was not to report the matter to the investigative authorities. Furthermore, he also announced that he would not report the matter to the investigative authorities.
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 Taking responsibility for this series of actions, the mayor submitted a draft ordinance to the September assembly to reduce the salary of Mayor Aoki by 20% for three months and that of the two deputy ward leaders by 10% for three months. At that time, Mayor Aoki also sought to reduce the salaries of department head-level employees, but the Special Ward Personnel Committee pointed out that the salary reductions for department head-level employees had to be abandoned. Mayor Aoki said.
 Aoki said, &#8220;This was all an error of judgment on my part.&#8221;
 However, the Personnel Committee of the special wards has pointed out that Aoki has decided not to take the pay cut for the department manager-level employees, and the ward mayor is now reported to have developed a rift with the staff.
 The amount of money to be returned is expected to range from 30,000 yen to as much as 40 million yen, depending on the nursery school. However, since no policy has been decided on the timing, amount, and method of restitution, some concerned parties have expressed their concerns that the amount will be returned &#8220;without being paid.
 Some concerned parties have expressed concern that the money may be left unclaimed and &#8220;go unanswered&#8221;.
 The series of problems have been a source of concern for the Aoki Ward Mayor.
 Residents point out that the background of this series of problems lies in the one-man system of Mayor Aoki.
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 When they observed a meeting of the Education and Education Committee, where the issue of free school lunch was being discussed, one council member commented, &#8220;The mayor is a one-man operation, and he has a lot of power.
 A council member remarked, &#8220;The mayor is making decisions on his own without informing the secretary-general of each faction or the committee members.
 The council member said, &#8220;The ward mayor makes decisions on his own without informing the secretary general of each faction or the committee members. In the past
 &#8220;It is disrespectful of the council to make decisions without reporting them to the council and to proceed with them after the fact.
 In a system of two-party representation of local governments
 In a local government with a two-party representative system, it is not healthy for the residents of Katsushika Ward to see things being decided by the head of a local public body (Note: This refers to matters that must originally be resolved and decided by the council, but are now handled by the head of the local public body himself before being resolved and decided by the council, based on the provisions of the Local Autonomy Law (1947, Law No. 67)). The residents of Katsushika Ward not only feel that this is not healthy, but also have a sense of crisis.
 Although the mistaken payment was caused by a mistake made by Katsushika Ward, it is not a legal basis for not having to return the approximately 500 million yen in public funds.
 What is the mayor&#8217;s financial sense?
 What is the ward mayor&#8217;s financial sense?
 The 25-page opinion letter (survey response) submitted by the lawyer&#8217;s office was that &#8220;it is reasonable not to seek restitution from the nursery school,&#8221; which the ward mayor was seeking, but the ward has chosen to &#8220;seek full restitution,&#8221; which is the exact opposite of the opinion letter (survey response), without making it public.
 The opinion letter (survey response) also mentions the issue of responsibility to the ward mayor personally. It is pointed out that if they choose not to seek restitution from the nursery school, the ward mayor himself may have to pay the amount.
 The purpose of the voluntary contract with the law firm was to establish legal justification for spending 1.1 million yen from taxpayers&#8217; money, but in the end, they chose to avoid the risk and play it safe.
 As mentioned earlier, Mayor Aoki has applied for a 20% pay cut (3 months) to take responsibility for the scandal. The salary reduction for the mayor was calculated to be 750,000 yen.

 He has appeared on "Time 3," "Ohayo! Nice Day," "Tokudane! (Fuji Television Network) and eight other programs as a reporter. (Fuji Television Network). After managing an advertising agency, he served as a member of the Taito Ward Assembly in Tokyo from 1999 to 2007. After that, he became the first public secretary of a member of the House of Representatives. Currently, he continues to report and write about various administrative and social issues from his unique perspective.

 Mitsutoshi Abe (local political journalist, former TV reporter)

 Kyodo News

 Katsushika Ward was found to have mistakenly overpaid subsidies of approximately 510 million yen to private nursery schools. It was also discovered that the ward mayor asked a lawyer to provide legal grounds for not having to return the money under a voluntary contract...

Aoki Katsushika Ward Mayor’s Expenditure of Taxpayer Funds to “Not Seek Return of Public Funds” Revealed, Residents Furious

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