Han Ximin

BAO JINPING, a Shenzhen police officer who single-handedly operates a home for vagrant children, has defended her running of the home following criticism from a city official.

Tang Rongsheng, chief of the Shenzhen Aid Center, criticized Bao’s Jinping Vagrant Aid Center on Tuesday for not having transparency in its accounting methods.

On Thursday, Bao said she would declare her accounts within three days.

“The account includes money flow of each transaction even before June 20, the day of the establishment of the aid center,” said Bao. “We received three donations after the establishment of the center and before that I spent my own money. Give me three days, I can make my account clear.”

Tang said the municipal civil affairs bureau would send an accountant to help Bao. The bureau will also help Bao in adopting homeless children.

“Bao’s center should not take in vagrant children from the street. Instead she should accept some children from the Shenzhen Aid Center or social welfare centers. In this way, she could get some money from the government,” said Tang.

The civil affairs bureau will register all the children, now totaling around 40, at the Jinping aid center.

“The significance of the aid center is that it ends vagrants’ life in the street. But it is inappropriate for the center to pick up children from the street,” said Tang.

Possible accounting irregularities, however, do not constitute Bao’s only problem. Two months ago, six of her wards beat an elderly neighbor who complained that their music practice was not allowing him to sleep properly.

“The aid center needs a more experienced manager, I agree, but I did nothing wrong to pick up children from the street. Some of them have lost family contact and we can’t send them back home. Even if some of them are sent back, they will come back or go to other cities again,” said Bao.

The Shenzhen Social Charity Association gave the center 18,000 yuan (US$2,368) after the establishment of the center, but the money transfer took two months and a half, Bao said. “We have spent around 54,000 yuan in food since the establishment of the center, and without help from the Indian community in Shenzhen which donated 50,000 yuan weeks ago, the children wouldn’t be able to start their arts training,” she said.