YOKOHAMA -- To better reflect the opinions of Kanagawa Prefecture's growing foreign population, which has more than doubled over the past decade, officials have followed other localities in creating an advisory panel to the governor.
Officials are now accepting applications from non-Japanese residents for the new Kanagawa Foreign Residents' Council, to be established in November. Similar advisory boards have already been established in Kawasaki and Tokyo.
Now one in every 75 residents in the prefecture is non-Japanese, and most pay taxes as Japanese residents but have virtually no participation rights in local government or the prefectural assembly. According to local officials, the number of non-Japanese registered residents in Kanagawa more than doubled -- from 50,735 in 1987 to 110,278 in 1997.