Gyeonggi Province to Invest 327.2 Billion Won in Recovery from Heavy Rainfall Damage

[Suwon Ilbo=Reporter Park Nohoon] Gyeonggi Province announced on the 20th that it has established a recovery plan to invest a total of 327.2 billion won, including 53.2 billion won from the provincial budget, to repair public and private facilities damaged by heavy rainfall concentrated in the Seoul metropolitan area in August.

According to damage surveys conducted by Gyeonggi Province, a total of 295.6 billion won in funds is needed to repair public facilities, of which 165.8 billion won is scheduled to be allocated as national treasury by the end of this month.

The provincial budget share is 48.4 billion won, which will be supported without delay using emergency reserves. The remaining 81.4 billion won will be borne by municipal and county governments.

The public facilities disaster recovery project included in this recovery plan covers a total of 1,925 locations. Among these, improvement recovery projects such as widening watercourse cross-sections of rivers will be pursued at seven locations in the Yangpyeong, Gwangju, and Yeoju areas with a project cost of 100.8 billion won.

The improvement recovery project was initially planned with a 10.86 billion won budget focused on simple restoration of function. However, through coordination with the central government and securing additional national treasury, it will now be pursued as an improvement recovery project that can fundamentally address the root causes of damage, the province explained.

Previously, the province provided emergency support of 13.7 billion won through special allocation grants and disaster management funds for rapid emergency repairs of public facilities from this rainfall damage.

For private facilities, a total of 31.6 billion won in recovery costs was identified through surveys.

The province provided first-round disaster relief funds of 27.5 billion won (4.2 billion from provincial budget) on the 5th. Based on additional damage surveys conducted from the 29th to 31st of last month, the province plans to provide second-round disaster relief funds of 4.12 billion won next week.

Of the 4.12 billion won, 610 million won will be borne by the provincial budget, and the province plans to allocate this to municipal and county governments in September using emergency reserves.

Like the first round of support, the second-round disaster relief funds include 2 million won per business to support small merchants affected by flooding.

Gyeonggi Province is expected to see an additional 774 cases of small merchant flooding damage receive benefits.

Meanwhile, heavy rainfall concentrated in the Seoul metropolitan area from August 8 to 17 resulted in a total of 147.7 billion won in damage in Gyeonggi Province, comprising 126.4 billion won in public facilities and 21.4 billion won in private facilities.

For public facilities, rivers accounted for the largest damage at 51 billion won, followed by erosion control (landslides, etc.) at 27.4 billion won, small-scale facilities at 16.8 billion won, water supply facilities at 10.1 billion won, and roads at 6.3 billion won. For private facilities, housing damage from flooding and partial collapse amounted to 15.6 billion won, and agricultural land damage was 4.3 billion won.

A Gyeonggi Province official stated, "To prevent heavy rainfall damage from occurring again, we will establish sufficient solutions for areas requiring fundamental improvement before proceeding with projects," and added, "We will proceed with the disaster recovery projects without delay so that they can be completed early before the rainy season next June."