Satisfying taxpayers

The life of a politician isn’t an easy one — even if you are completely honest and sincere. No matter how hard you try to do a good job, you can expect to be criticised often. You may be able to satisfy many of the people you represent, but you won’t satisfy all of them and those who are dissatisfied will let you know it.

Being the governor of a large city can be especially difficult, particularly a city like Bangkok. As you know, Bangkok has grown very rapidly and it suffers from many problems, including traffic congestion, air pollution, lack of space for recreation, not to mention flooding during the rainy season. Worse yet, the Bangkok Governor has very little power of his own since many of the city’s most important functions are the responsibility of the central government.

The present Bangkok Governor is Bhichit Rattakul. One area where he is trying to have an impact is in making the city a more beautiful place to live. This week we will look at a project that he has implemented to do that. As you will see, however, it has run into some strong criticism.

This week’s stories

The Governor’s project involves the planting of trees along city roads. A project of this kind involves a lot of money – all of it coming from taxpayers. The story gives you a good idea of the problems involved with making decisions that use taxpayers’ money. As you read, pretend that Mr Bhichit has assigned you to check on the progress of the programme and to determine if the decisions made so far have been good ones. Here are some of the factors you should consider:

Objective What is the purpose of the programme? Are its objectives worthwhile?

Cost Are the citizens of Bangkok getting good value for their money? What are the most important factors behind the average cost of each tree?

Tree selection Has the right type of tree been selected? Here you must consider whether the tree selected is appropriate for the purpose of the programme. Also such factors as beauty, soil requirements and how much care and maintenance the trees will require must be taken into account (considered). Finally consider whether another type of tree might have been better.

Here is some vocabulary to help you understand the story.

controversy	strong disagreement
subcontractor	a person or firm that has been hired to do the work someone else has agreed to do
competitive	(in this case) having a similar price to others of the same kind
prevailing	existing; accepted
elaborate	to explain in detail
horticulture	the science of growing fruit, flowers and vegetables
landscaping	the art of arranging plants in a garden or similar area to give a pleasing effect
stately	grand
boulevard	a wide road
maintenance	care to keep in good condition
readily	easily; conveniently
trimmed	cut to keep to a certain size and shape
cautioned	warned
median	narrow strip of land dividing a road into two sides
accommodate	to provide enough space for
fibrous	having thin thread-like parts
vulnerable	easily hurt or damaged
drainage	facilities for allowing water to leave an area
reinforced	strengthened; given support
bolsters	supports

THE STORY FOR YOU TO READ

City defends project to plant trees

Nothing shady, say Bangkok officials

Poona Antaseeda and Anchalee Kongrut

Senior city officials responsible for a major tree planting project have been ordered to clear up public suspicions about its cost and usefulness.
Bangkok Governor Bhichit Rattakul yesterday ordered Siri Prempree, director of the Office of Public Welfare, and deputy city clerk Kriangsak Lohachala to create a better understanding among the public about the planting of oil palm trees along certain city roads.
Controversy arose early this month after reports appeared in the press questioning the cost, each tree priced at 6,200 baht, and the appropriateness of planting oil palm on Bangkok roads such as the newly-built Ekamai-Ram Intra Road. The reports suggested that the trees were overpriced and not suitable for the hot and dry climate in Bangkok.
So far more than 1,600 trees have been bought for more than 10 million baht. They are part of the city administration's campaign to plant large trees in honour of His Majesty the King. The objective is to provide shade, beautify the landscape and clean air pollution.
Mr Kriangsak said the subcontractors bought the trees from plantations in Chumphon for 500 baht each. But the cost of hauling them to Bangkok pushed the price to 6,200 baht. He insisted the price was competitive with prevailing market prices.
Mr Bhichit said 80 million baht has been held up until officials clarified the matter with the public.
"We have to create an understanding with the people first so that the 80 million budget can be released to complete the task," the governor said.
Mr Bhichit, however, did not elaborate about choosing oil palm trees instead of more shady species.
Some experts feel that to provide shade trees such as tamarind would be more suited to Bangkok's roads.
M.L. Charuphant Thongtham, associate professor of horticulture, Kasetsart University, said palm oil was architectural plant suitable for landscaping.
It gives buildings a "stately" image. It's been used to decorate boulevards overseas.
Palm oil grows well in humid climate like that in the South. While they may be grown along city streets, they provide little shade and require a lot of care and maintenance, and the climate and conditions in Bangkok may hamper their growth.
"Electric wires along the roads would inhibit the trees' growth. Their leaves will need pruning to avoid damaging the wires," the horticulturist said.
On the contrary, other trees such as banyan can be readily trimmed and their branches will spread out to provide more shade.
M.L. Charuphant also cautioned the city not to plant palm trees on road medians because of inadequate ground surface to accommodate the trees’ fibrous roots.
Oil palm does not have large and strong roots making the trees vulnerable if there is not enough ground for them to hold on to. Flood and poor drainage may also soften the soil.
However, the palm trees already planted have been reinforced with wooden bolsters.
On the issue of cost, M.L. Charuphant believed the price the city paid for the palm trees was reasonable considering their size.

FOLLOW-UP

The right choice?

When you finish your "research", you should prepare a short report for Mr Bhichit complete with recommendations on how to proceed with the project. A good report should be connected. It should not simply be a list of points. A good way to do this is to use connecting words like first, second, finally (or in addition, moreover, etc.). And be sure to use your own words instead of simply using whole sentences from the story. Since the tree planting programme is controversial you might want to consider opposing points of view and explain why you disagree with them.

Teacher’s note

Once again, I have designed a lesson that will help your students to read critically. The follow-up exercise will also help your students take information from various parts of the story and put it together into one cohesive argument. This is a useful and necessary skill which your students can use again and again in university work or their work careers.

You might want to begin with a short discussion about the work of political leaders. Find out how many of your students would like a political career, especially a high office like prime minister, a cabinet minister or becoming the governor of Bangkok. Find out if they have ever thought about the criticism they would have to suffer through. They will surely be blamed for any problems and they may not receive much credit for anything they do right.

Next consider the tree planting project in Bangkok. Make sure they understand the factors that I have asked them to consider before they read the story. Once again, this could easily be done in small groups.

The follow-up activity could be either oral or in writing. Stress the fact that a report should be in connected prose. I have given examples of some of the connectives they can use. Have your stronger students consider opposing viewpoints as well. One way to do this is to briefly mention the opposing viewpoint and then explain why you disagree with it (e.g., Some people say... but this...). Or you can concede that the opposing viewpoint has some merit, but not in this particular case (e.g., It is true that..., but... ).

Finally, watch for additional stories on the same subject. It will be interesting to see what Mr Bhichit does in this case.

Next week: global warming
Next week we will take advantage of the Kyoto conference on global warming which has been receiving so much coverage recently. We will look at one story based on the conference, but more importantly we will help you design a full-scale debate for your class on the subject of alternative energy sources. After all, your students will have to live with the consequences of climatic change, so they should start thinking about what they can do to prevent the devastation that many scientists are predicting.

•This lesson was prepared by Acharn Terry Fredrickson, BA Stanford, MA (TESL) University of Minnesota, Manager of the Educational Services Department at the Bangkok Post and general editor of this programme. This week Acharn Terry also had the help of an energetic group of university teachers plus a group of university students.

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