Busan City Proposes 3-Step Processing Plan to Address Confusion in Building Permits and Approvals

①Existing building permits remain valid

②New building permits deferred with exceptions granted

③Conditional progress of preliminary administrative procedures such as building review

Busan City Hall.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] Busan City has established a three-step plan to handle complaints related to building permits.

After the Ministry of Government Legislation's interpretation on May 4th that the floor area ratio (FAR) relief cannot be applied cumulatively, frontline districts and counties have faced confusion in handling related building permit complaints. In response, Busan City announced on the 4th that it will establish and implement a metropolitan-level building complaint handling plan.

The planned building permit complaint handling plan was developed after Busan City visited the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport for consultation, internal discussions, and legal advice.

It is based on four fundamental principles: △ compliance with the fundamental intent and direction of the legal interpretation, △ application of the principle of protecting administrative trust, △ measures to minimize citizen inconvenience, and △ alignment with proactive administration.

The specific details divide the process of building permit applications into three stages, with tailored handling plans for each stage.

The first stage recognizes existing building permits as valid.

The target includes projects that have already obtained building permits, with the rationale being to maintain the legal stability of existing building permit decisions and to apply the principle of protecting administrative trust.

The second stage defers new building permits but plans to approve exceptions.

New building permits involving overlapping floor area ratios conflict with the legal interpretation and thus cannot be approved. Therefore, such permits will be deferred until the enactment of the revised law allowing cumulative FAR. However, if the project owner voluntarily applies to modify the project scale to avoid overlap, approval will be granted as an exception.

The target includes projects that have applied for building permits or have completed various preliminary administrative procedures such as reviews and evaluations.

The partial amendment bill to the Act on Planning and Use of National Land, which allows overlapping floor area ratios for buildings, was proposed on July 26th.

The third stage involves conditionally expediting preliminary administrative procedures such as various reviews and impact assessments before building permits.

The target includes projects that have applied for various reviews and impact assessments. Upon the future enactment of the revised law, these projects will conditionally proceed with preliminary administrative procedures, provided that the project plans are modified (reduced) to comply with the law before applying for building permits.

Park Hyung-jun, Mayor of Busan, stated, “To alleviate the financial difficulties and hardships of good-faith project owners who were preparing building projects before the Ministry of Government Legislation’s interpretation, we plan to apply a Fast Track system to the processing of previously submitted building complaints to expedite administrative procedures as much as possible.” He added, “We will strive to minimize related complaints through this three-step self-handling plan.”