South Korea's First and Highest-Level Public-Private Partnership Institution 'Hwaseong-style Citizen Cooperation (Tentative Name) Hwaseong Together Institution' Launches

[Suwon Ilbo=Reporter Jung Jun-seong] Hwaseong Special City Mayor Jung Myung-geun, who is leading the 9th popularly elected term, will launch the '(tentative name) Hwaseong Together Institution,' South Korea's first and highest-level public-private partnership institution in October, thereby establishing the core foundation for institutionalizing citizen participation.

The Hwaseong Special City Hwaseong Future Vision Committee (Chair Cho Seung-moon) held a full meeting at the Seminar Room of the Moduneeum Center on the 15th and announced that through the establishment of the new Citizen Cooperation Hwaseong Together Institution, which includes such content, it will produce citizen-friendly outcomes such as expanding citizen-led policy participation.

The establishment of this Together Institution is intended to realize the era of 'cooperative governance' in which citizens now participate together in the planning and implementation of policies, moving away from the past era when the administration merely explained policies to citizens. This represents the completion of Mayor Jung Myung-geun's core pledge announced during the recent election campaign.

The city plans to complete administrative procedures by gathering input from civil society organizations in environmental and citizen community sectors with the goal of launching the Together Institution within 100 days of Mayor Jung's inauguration, as well as establishing an organizing committee and enacting/amending related ordinances to clearly define the role and authority of the governance institution.

Starting from the first half of next year, the city will also uncover common agendas together with citizens, operate public discussion and deliberative democracy processes on major city administration issues and long-standing projects to increase public trust in city administration and further strengthen the public-private cooperation foundation.

In the meeting that day, discussion was held on the promotion direction of major pledges including △introducing artificial intelligence (AI) civil servant 'Coribot' △expanding metropolitan, airport, city, and express bus routes △establishing a Hwaseong-style circular railway △relaxing regulations on installation of temporary structures (warehouses) within factories △providing free sanitary napkins in public restrooms △expanding the youth employment support center △realizing the Geuji Dream food security initiative △continuing to issue 1 trillion won in local currency △expanding Hwaseong-style basic income villages, and others.

Mayor Jung Myung-geun stated, "As this four-year term is more important than the past thousand years, we must think deeply about what to prepare and what outcomes to create," and continued, "Now is the time to move beyond planning and consulting and create results that citizens can tangibly feel with speed. I ask that you gather all capabilities to build Korea's top-tier city, Hwaseong Special City, together with our citizens."

Cho Seung-moon, chair of the Hwaseong Future Vision Committee, said, "We must join forces to ensure that the manifesto and policy tasks prepared together by the Future Vision Committee members and advisory committee members lead to substantive outcomes," and added, "We will work together to ensure that major pledges by strategic task are promoted without any disruption so that Hwaseong Special City can take a leap forward to become a representative city of South Korea."