Suwon's 'Precision Support' in Full Swing to Recover from COVID-19 Damage

[Suwon Ilbo=Reporter Seo Dong-young] Suwon City is launching its second Suwon-style emergency disaster relief to intensively support COVID-19 victims.

The city announced on the 1st that it has prepared a "2021 First General and Special Account Revenue and Expenditure Supplementary Budget" of 49.846 billion won focusing on "living stability support" and "regional economic recovery," which it submitted to the Suwon City Council on the 26th of last month.

This first supplementary budget plan will be finalized on the 11th following review and approval by the city council.

Following the budget confirmation, resources will be concentrated on living stability to protect citizens' livelihoods. A total of 6 billion won will be invested by providing living stability support of 500,000 won each to 10,000 citizens engaged in special employment types and freelancers whose work has sharply declined since COVID-19, and 2,000 young unemployed individuals struggling with job placement.

Additionally, support funds will be provided to small business owners and other "victims of good faith" who cooperated with government quarantine measures, serving as a catalyst for regional economic recovery. A total of 14.3 billion won will be provided—1 million won each to 4,800 businesses in prohibited gathering sectors and 500,000 won each to 19,000 businesses in restricted gathering sectors.

In addition, ▲2.4 billion won for small business owner special guarantees and fees ▲50 million won for food waste volume-based bag distribution for small food establishments (15,000 general and casual food establishments of 200㎡ or less) ▲2 billion won for Suwon Pay incentives ▲1.53 billion won for delivery acceleration initiatives are included in the supplementary budget to promote regional economic activation.

Funding will be sourced from 36.7 billion won in net balance surplus, 7.8 billion won in national treasury subsidies, 2.3 billion won through expenditure restructuring, and 3.1 billion won from disaster management fund reserves.

Accordingly, Suwon City's 2021 budget scale has increased from the original 2.6627 trillion won to 2.7072 trillion won, an increase of 44.5 billion won.

This first supplementary budget plan focuses on Suwon-style emergency disaster relief projects aimed at swiftly remedying "victims of good faith" who cooperated with government quarantine measures amid prolonged COVID-19, and supplementing gaps in policies supported by the central government and broader administrative bodies.

Previously, to enable rapid support before the Lunar New Year holiday, a first Suwon-style emergency disaster relief project was conducted using reserve funds and disaster management funds without a separate supplementary budget. The 800 million won replenishment to the disaster management fund and 7.8 billion won in pre-enactment budget from that project have been reflected in this supplementary budget.

On the 10th of last month, Suwon City carried out nine support projects to assist childcare blind spots such as daycare centers and private kindergartens and to remedy damage to artists, travel industries, and transportation industries. Three exemption support projects were also simultaneously pursued, including property tax reductions for good-faith landlords, exemptions on public property usage and loan fees, and exemptions on bus public parking lot usage fees.

Additionally, 15 billion won in reserve funds was increased to rapidly respond to COVID-19 situations after the supplementary budget.

Meanwhile, the city compiled supplementary budget plans four times last year to actively support damage from COVID-19 spread, implementing disaster basic income payments and disaster relief projects.

Kwon Chan-ho, Director of Planning and Coordination, stated, "In response to an unprecedented crisis situation caused by prolonged COVID-19, we have compiled the fastest supplementary budget in Suwon City's history," adding, "We will make all-out efforts to immediately rescue Suwon citizens pushed into a living crisis."