Suwon City Holds 'Visiting Citizens' Participatory Budget Briefing Sessions'

Suwon City announced on the 12th that it has held citizens' participatory budget briefing sessions at each district ahead of the public opinion collection period for the 2013 Suwon City budget.

The briefing sessions began on the 7th at Jangan-gu Office, followed by Paldal-gu Ingye-dong Community Center on the 8th, Gwonseon-gu Office on the 11th, and Yeongdeungpo-gu Office on the 12th, where local residents were briefed on the citizens' participatory budget system, major cases implemented by district regional councils, and specific directions and methods for submitting residents' opinions.

Expert lectures in the budget field were delivered in relay by Park Jun-bok, Director of the Participatory Budget Center; Lim Hye-kyung, Chairwoman of the Suwon City Citizens' Participatory Budget Research Institute; Choi In-wook, Director of the Good Budget Center; and Yu Jin-su, Chair of the Grassroots Committee of People Creating Hope.

Kim Joo-ho, Head of the City Budget and Finance Division, said, "The citizens' participatory budget system is in its second full year of implementation," and added, "Through the active engagement of city committee and district regional council members, we were able to reduce initial implementation errors, and with the theoretical support of the research institute, we have been able to operate the system stably."

The citizens' participatory budget system is a program in which residents directly participate in the city's general budget compilation process. It accepts proposals in all budget-requiring fields, including various resident-desired projects, welfare and new policy initiatives, and projects linked to community development, and adjusts the priority order of the relevant projects.

For the 2012 general budget, a total of 47 projects worth 12.4 billion won in citizens' participatory budget were allocated.