Governor Kim Young-rok Requests National Financial Support for Renovation of Vacant Houses and Closed Schools

At the Central Regional Cooperation Meeting, the Enactment of the 'Vacant House Maintenance Special Act' and Introduction of Excellent Cases Such as Gangjin's Monthly 10,000 Won Rental Housing

Kim Young-rok, Governor of Jeonnam Province.

Kim Young-rok, Governor of Jeollanam-do, attended the 8th Central-Local Cooperation Meeting held at the Gangwon Special Self-Governing Province Office on the 6th, where he emphasized the need for national-level financial support for the maintenance and utilization of vacant houses and closed school properties in response to local extinction.

At the meeting, President Yoon Seok-yeol, Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, Minister of the Interior and Safety Lee Sang-min, Director of the Office for Government Policy Coordination Bang Ki-seon, and governors of 17 cities and provinces attended to discuss national tasks and local issues.

During the session, after reports on ▲improving the legal system to expand autonomy in local legislation ▲improving standard personnel expenses and local council secretariat operations, discussions were held on ▲plans for maintenance and utilization of vacant houses and closed school properties ▲policy support measures for the local era such as the creation of four special zones and venture funds.

Governor Kim Young-rok introduced excellent cases of maintenance and utilization of vacant houses and closed schools, such as the 10,000 KRW monthly rental housing in Gangjin. He also mentioned the difficult reality where, despite maintaining about 2,000 vacant houses annually, the number of vacant houses is rapidly increasing.

As causes, he pointed out the dual management system divided between urban areas (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport) and rural fishing villages (Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs), and the financial burden of 10 million KRW per building for vacant house maintenance, which requires 210 billion KRW just for vacant house maintenance in Jeollanam-do. He proposed a special law for unified vacant house maintenance management and national financial support.

Along with this, he requested, “Due to government restrictions on power grid connections, there are difficulties in attracting investments and factories,” and asked for the relaxation of power grid connection restrictions in the Honam region, which limits new power generation project permits until 2031.

Jeollanam-do received the Presidential Citation in the regional balanced development category at the 2024 Local Era Expo commemorative ceremony held in Chuncheon City on the same day, with the ‘Establishment of Eco-friendly Agriculture Infrastructure’ project selected as an excellent case of the 2024 Regional Balanced Development Project (city/province autonomous account).