Gwangju City Selects Projects Needed by Citizens Through 'Citizen Voting'

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Park Seon-gang] Gwangju Metropolitan City announced on the 9th that it will select the city administration participation-type projects among the 2021 Citizen Participatory Budget Projects through an online vote by citizens.

The citizen online vote, conducted for the first time this year, expands the authority to select citizen participatory budget projects, which was previously limited to citizen participatory budget committee members, to the general public in order to grant citizens practical authority.

The citizen online vote will be held from 10:00 AM on the 10th to 6:00 PM on the 28th. Any citizen can access the ‘Gwangju Metropolitan City Citizen Participatory Budget System’ website via computer or mobile, verify their identity through a popup window, and select 3 projects out of 31 city administration participation-type projects.

The city administration participation-type projects cover welfare and health, environment and ecology, urban regeneration, transportation and construction, culture, tourism and sports, jobs and economy, and general administration fields. The final selection will be made by combining 50% of the online voting results and 50% of the committee voting results at the ‘2021 Citizen Participatory Budget Project Selection’ general meeting held in the city hall’s main conference room on the 31st.

Meanwhile, Gwangju City plans to submit a total of 68 projects worth 13 billion KRW for the ‘2021 Citizen Participatory Budget Project Selection General Meeting,’ including ▲31 city administration participation-type projects (9.944 billion KRW) ▲1 city administration cooperation-type project (1.5 billion KRW) ▲36 regional participation-type projects (1.555 billion KRW), and finally select projects worth about 12 billion KRW.

The city administration cooperation-type and regional participation-type projects will be finally selected upon approval at the general meeting.

Park Sang-baek, the city budget officer, said, “Gwangju, where citizens are the owners, can be completed through the voluntary participation of citizens,” and added, “We hope citizens actively participate in the citizen participatory budget online voting.”