--By Douglas Habecker Translated by Ann Li

Since being re-elected to a second term in a decisive victory on Dec. 3, there has been little rest or relaxation for Taichung City Mayor Jason Hu. Barely pausing from a sucessful, tiring campaign, he took two overseas trips--one to Singapore and one to California--to promote Taichung in the first six weeks after election day. Nevertheless, he found a few spare minutes to sit down with Compass Editor-in-Chief Douglas Habecker to share insights into the last four years and the four more in front of him. An unabridged version of this interview can be found on www.taiwanfun.com

Compass: You won the election by the highest number of votes any mayor has ever gotten in Taichung. What do you attribute this to?

Hu: There are many, many reasons. There were times during the election when I was unsure of the outcome. However, in the end, when all was said, I think the greatest attribute of the victory is the performance of my team during the past four years. That was the most solid basis for all the other reasons that have been offered to explain my victory—that mudslinging was not popular, that I dealt with that in a satisfactory manner, that the KMT has shown a new generation of leaders that are popular and clean, that the new [party] chairman has a personal charisma, or that the president said some things that were not generally approved or accepted. However, I think that none of these reasons would stand on firm ground if we did not do reasonably well in the past four years.People are not happy about law and order, but there are marked improvements in many areas, including law and order. We cannot say that we have very good police performance, but they are improving.

Compass: When you look back at the last four years, what specific areas can you feel particularly proud of in terms of accomplishments?

Hu: I think three things. Number one, people can say that they are very impressed with the fact that this is a very clean team. No rumors have ever been heard at any point in time in the past four years about possible corruption in the city government. There may be sporadic concerns but it was clear that, from the top down, if I'm clean, I have all the right to demand that all the members of my team [be clean]. This was clear and obvious.
Number two, I think, has been the improvement of efficiency. More and more people started to realize that the team does react and in a quick manner. Yes, this is a not a wholesale improvement; there may be gray areas in which we have not been efficient enough but, in general, the entire city government team has shown efficiency and there are polls supporting these two areas—cleanness and efficiency. Satisfaction rates are over 70, sometimes 80 [percent], with these two issues or concerns. Thirdly, I would still have to say that people, as perhaps a result of efficiency or our general effort, have been able to see improvement in many areas of our work—environment, city finance, park management, new construction. We've been able to build or enlarge about 99 roads in four years. We've been able to increase the volume of passengers taking city buses by four times. There were about 400,000 a month when I started and it became more than 1.6 million at the end of four years.

Compass: If you look back at the last four years, what would you consider frustrating or disappointing?

Hu: Most frustrating is in regard to law and order because Taichung has been perhaps the last in crime statistics for almost 10 years. With the insufficiency of police manpower, we have the highest crime rate in three cities—Taipei, Kaohsiung and Taichung. Taipei has close to 8,000 police forces, Kaohsiung has 4,500, and Taichung has 2,500. With that lack of police manpower, we were still able to achieve many areas of improvement. We were leading in the country in reducing the theft of cars from 700 per month to about 360 per month—almost a 50 percent reduction. In the meantime, the national average for car theft has risen in four years. Motorbike theft is a serious concern, and has been reduced from about 1,600 a month to about 800 per month. So these are improvements, but my frustration is that, if I had more money and more police forces, I could do a better job.

Compass: Looking forward to a second term, what would you say your main focuses will be? What are your big goals for the next four years?

Hu: Basically, I think the city runs on two wheels, at least. One is the macro view of the future of the city—how does it develop, what it will turn into. The other wheel reflects the wishes of the people. So, on one hand, I need prosperity. I need to build Taichung even further. Taichung has been highly competitive. Four years ago, in a ranking, we had always been out of the top 10 for competitiveness. Now in Taiwan we're always number two or three. Recent polls, last October or November, by Global Views [magazine] show that of the 46 major cities in mainland China, Taiwan, Macau and Hong Kong, for city competitiveness Taichung ranks number nine. Taipei is number one. Taichung is the second Taiwan city in the top 10. The other [top 10] are Beijing, Shanghai, Canton and other big cities. I quietly told myself some time in the first term, probably when I visited mainland China for the first time last May, that I had to bring Taichung into the top 10. I didn’t know that, six months later, I would be able to achieve that. On the one hand, there’s the prosperity, competitiveness, and special character or charm of the city. I also want to build Taichung into an international financial and monetary center because I think we have a serious lack of these kinds of institutions and establishments. Without these, we cannot be an investment or even tourist center. All these need to be done on one hand.

On the other hand, on the top of the agenda, is law and order—this is want the people want.The micro view is what the people want. I am putting together more than NT$400 million in two months' time for the city council as an additional budget to help the police do a better job. Second, on the micro level, I need to get the transportation moving. I need to get to work with regard to rapid transit. I need to get the traditional railway elevated or underground. I need to seek central government in building a beltway system around Taichung—the inner, center and outer rings. I need to also urge the central government to improve air and sea international linking abilities of Taichung, namely the internationalization of CCK Airport and Taichung Harbor. Whether, to begin with, we could have charter flights or marine services—shipping and passenger—to mainland China, followed by regular flights afterwards, then global . Education, environment, culture are all important but, in the future for what I need to do, they are inseparable. Without a good prosperity program, I will not be able to make money. I have been the most profit-making local government in the past four years in Taiwan. For the first four years, I’ve been able to reduce my debt. I don’t think there are any cities or counties that have been able to [do that]. They all have been desperately increasing [debt], borrowing and borrowing. I was able to reduce debt and increase spending. I was able to increase spending more than NT$27 billion in four years. I only have about NT$5 billion in debt up to March of last year. These things fluctuate. Right now, I obviously owe more debt as the new year approaches, with bonuses and everything.

Compass: When you talk about prosperity, what do you think the big engines of growth in Taichung are?

Hu: At this moment, number one is the science park. Besides the science park, there is the traditional Taichung Industrial Park, which has also been growing rapidly. Also, there's the new machine tool park which we're going to build. The third park, Wenshan Industrial Park, is being built some time this year. So Taichung has suddenly become a mecca for investment. Everyone wants to join the science park and other parks for investment. For instance, an American plant, Corning, initially said that it was going to invest NT$50 billion, just like Bayer. Now, they’re thinking of increasing a further NT$150 billion additional, if what I read is right. Also, I must be honest, the possibility of Guggenheim coming to Taichung helped tremendously with expectations for real estate, plus the fact that the new city government building, new city council, new opera house, and open-air theater will be built. Most will be finished, more or less, in the next four years. All these construction plans, plus Guggenheim, stirred up speculation on the real estate market. So, land prices, quiet for about 10 years, started to shoot up and real estate has become an engine of growth in Taichung.

Compass: Why is it that Taichung has become a magnet for all these investors?

Compass: As all this is happening, Taichung is obviously becoming a more international city. What measures are you continuing, or new measures are you taking, to make this city even more international?

Hu: I have two things in mind. First, I want to set up an organization that would help further internationalize Taichung and perhaps promote a better integrating or harmonious relationship between foreigners in Taichung. We have to do better. You often and commonly see all these efforts done in the West but in Taiwan this is something weeding to be done. Secondly, I think we should try even harder to attract international conferences, activities and tourism to Taichung. I have even thought of the more extreme measure of subsidizing international conferences or meetings coming here. Recently, I personally talked to a group of gentlemen who are leaders of the Asian Chinese Chamber of Commerce and have been able to welcome them to come to Taichung, perhaps some time this May—300 or 400 people for a conference. I brought the International Real Estate Federation to Taichung two years ago, close to a thousand people. But we need to do more to make Taichung more international, which is not real difficult. You can see this from the fact that, when we opened up international bidding for architects with regard to the opera house, about 60 percent of world’s most prominent architects [participated]. There were some prominent architects who were Pritzger Award winners. If you go back to the first international bidding of architects for the city government [building], was there any prominent international participation? They didn’t pay attention to this.

Compass: Early on, you said you'd serve Taichung for two terms. Do you have any plans after this term is up?

Hu: I think I should be a good boy and ask my wife about this, for the first time in my life.

Compass: You're obviously very busy. Do you still find time to balance your public life with your personal life, in terms of your family, rest and relaxation and recreation?

Hu: I was seriously sick, or not so seriously sick, once close to four years ago. That changed my personal philosophy. I was a workaholic; I worked and worked without rest. Resting is almost like a sin to a serious-minded person like me. Then I realized that man has to work and rest, because work is a black hole. However much energy you put in, it's never enough, and it doesn't matter that much. So I decided that I should really balance myself, maybe 12 hours of work and 12 hours of rest. Then, about almost a year later, I suddenly realized it's not just work and rest. There's a thing called recreation and relaxation, which is important, and that should take at least eight hours in a day. So, I then had a “three eights” system—eight hours of work, eight hours of rest and eight hours of recreation and relaxation. For the first time, I suddenly realized that, if you sit there, do nothing and look like an idiot, it's good relaxation. I didn't do that. I hadn't been doing that for 20 years of my life. So I tried to do that. That all sounds very nice and very theoretical. In fact, I don't know if I have the time to [relax], with the working schedule of a mayor and demands growing ever so high.

Compass: Do you still enjoy basketball?