#Radiation in Japan: Fukushima Prefecture Stops Subsidizing Residents for Taking Summer Vacations Outside Fukushima

From a blog by a father in Fukushima who wanted to send his children and his wife for the summer to Shizuoka Prefecture:

Apparently Fukushima had a program that helped the Fukushima residents to escape Fukushima during the school summer vacation (July, August) by subsidizing the cost of the hotels and bed and breakfast places (called "pension" in Japan, just like in continental Europe) in participating prefectures.

This father had booked a pension in Shizuoka Prefecture, and was looking forward to sending his kids to a lower radiation location (well, relatively speaking, at this point). Then, he suddenly got a call from the pension, on July 12, and was told they had to cancel his reservation because they received a notice from Fukushima Prefecture not to accept temporary summer evacuees from Fukushima.

WTF? (He said in a more polite Japanese, but that's the idea.)

Why on earth Fukushima would want to do this? To irradiate children more? he wonders, and remembers Dr. Shunichi Yamashita, who was on the radio all the time in Fukushima preaching safety ever since the nuke accident started on March 11 which totally brainwashed the residents in Fukushima.

So he tried a hotel in another part of Shizuoka to see if he could make a reservation. The answer was no. But he found out from the hotel people that the pension that had canceled his reservation and others like that in that particular city had been booking the temporary evacuees from Fukushima without approval from the local government.

[WTF? Why do these private businesses need the government approval to receive customers?]

So he decided to find out what was going on. And he's found out:

The temporary summer evacuation will have to be approved, from now on, by both Fukushima Prefecture and Shizuoka Prefecture, and it will be approved only for people who are considering permanent evacuation due to high radiation levels.

Fukushima Prefecture is not banning the evacuation that the residents do on their own (i.e. without any government subsidy), but it wouldn't recommend such a move.

Fukushima Prefecture has stopped the subsidy program for the temporary summer evacuation. The hotels and pensions that had been accepting the temporary summer evacuees from Fukushima will not receive subsidy any more that allowed for a lower room rate for the Fukushima evacuees, therefore they are canceling the reservations made under the program.

In addition, Fukushima Prefecture has asked other prefectures to shut down the evacuation shelters for Fukushima residents by the end of this month, citing the reason as "temporary housing within Fukushima Prefecture available".

He's still looking for a place to send his kids and his wife for the lower-radiation summer somewhere. But since the subsidy has been cut off, not many places are willing to take reservations.

Is there anyone in Japan, or anywhere in the world for that matter, willing to take his family for the summer? And many others like them?

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