Department of Information and Tourism, Taipei City Government

The winners of the 2009 Taipei City Public Restroom Evaluation Award received the certificates from the hands of Mayor Hau Lung-bin on December 10. The event honors the management teams and individuals maintaining some of the cleanest public restrooms in town.
During his speech, the mayor remarked that the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) holds the restroom evaluation every year. Recognizing the importance of the award, he always takes the opportunity to hand the award to the winners himself. He believes that the cleanliness of restrooms is an important index indicating the level of development of a city and the standards of its residents.
According to the mayor, the city government organized the first public restroom evaluation in 2004; it also introduced a four-tier ranking system to measure the cleanliness of the city’s lavatories beginning in 2002.
As of today, over 98.5 percent of the city’s restrooms are ranked either “good” or “excellent.” This shows significant improvement since 2002, when only 50 percent of the city’s restroom received the “excellent” mark.
Hau pointed out that most people tend to avoid the unpleasant task of cleaning restrooms. However, janitors and facility staff do their best in maintaining keeping the lavatories clean and tidy. He expressed his gratitude to the hardworking janitors on behalf of Taipei’s residents for helping to create a pleasant environment.