Senior officials of the Kawanishi Municipal Board of Education apologize over the mistaken distribution of information on 100,000-yen handouts at the municipal government building in Hyogo Prefecture on Dec. 29, 2021. (Mainichi/Kazuhiro Doi)

       KAWANISHI, Hyogo -- Letters with information on 100,000 yen (about $870) in government handouts to families with children aged 18 or younger were mistakenly sent to 59 households whose children have died, the education board of this west Japan city announced on Dec. 29.

       After the guidance material regarding the government's handout scheme amid the coronavirus pandemic was sent out on Dec. 27, there have been around 10 inquiries and complaints from residents asking why the letters were sent even though their child had died, or saying they were reminded of their child's death. The education board of the city of Kawanishi, Hyogo Prefecture, offered an apology, saying, "We have caused great heartache to the families (of the deceased)," and said it intends to visit each concerned household to apologize in person.

       According to the education board, the errors were made in letters addressed to households with children aged between 16 and 18, and those with deceased children who would have turned those ages by now if they were alive. Individuals in this age range could not be identified with information immediately available, including that on households with children aged 15 or under that are eligible for child allowances. The city therefore used a system in which families that were eligible for the child allowance in the past are registered, before sending out the guidance letters to some 5,400 households. However, the system's update in October 2019 did not reflect changes in data for households with deceased children.

       A representative of the education board's children's future department commented, "When we sent the letters, we should have checked the households against the data of the basic resident register, which incorporates information on deaths."

       (Japanese original by Kazuhiro Doi, Takarazuka Resident Bureau)

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