Beijing should make good use of cultural resources at communities and build public cultural facilities on people’s doorstep, according to a bill submitted by deputy Chen Bali together with other 12 deputies to the 15th Beijing Municipal People’s Congress.
As the Beijing Municipal Government’s annual work report proposes, Beijing should support the development of bookstores and conduct national reading activities to create a learning atmosphere in the city.
During the 13th Five-Year-Plan period (2016-2020), Beijing will vigorously promote the construction of a public cultural service system and establish 15-minitue cultural service circles with public cultural service facilities like cultural centers, libraries and cinemas at communities.
Chen introduced that now how to attract more people to use these facilities for the improvement of culture is receiving increasing attention from all sectors of society.
He proposed the city to explore to open civilian-run and state-subsidized community bookstores based on existing public cultural resources at communities so as to reuse idle resources and provide more convenient cultural services for citizens.
In addition, he suggested supporting the newly emerging distinctive private bookstores in Beijing via government purchase of services to ease the financial burden on bookstores and improve people’s reading space.