[Interview] Moon Seok-jin, Mayor of Seodaemun-gu "Promoting Seodaemun-type New Deal to Secure Future Growth Engine"

Building a Digital City-Linked Social Safety Net... Committed to Green New Deal and Enhancing Digital Capabilities... Promoting the Zero Education Blind Spot Project

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jong-il] “To overcome the crisis caused by COVID-19 and proactively prepare for a new era, we will focus on securing future growth engines through the promotion of the Seodaemun-type New Deal.”

Moon Seok-jin, Mayor of Seodaemun-gu, recently stated in an interview with this publication, “We will focus on building a social safety net for the stable lives of residents, promoting a Green New Deal to respond to the climate crisis, and strengthening capabilities to prepare for digital transformation.”

In fact, Mayor Moon is well known as a ‘welfare mayor.’ The Dong Welfare Hub project implemented in Seodaemun in 2011 caused a significant impact, becoming the model for Seoul’s ‘Chatdong’ (Visiting Dong Resident Center) and the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s ‘Eup-Myeon-Dong Welfare Hub Project.’ It is also famous that in 2013, when he was an opposition party mayor, he gave a special lecture on ‘Excellent Cases of Welfare Delivery Systems’ to the president, government, and private sector officials at the Blue House.

Creating a circular barrier-free trail in Ansan (鞍山), located in the center of Seodaemun-gu, accessible even to strollers and wheelchairs, also demonstrates his welfare sensibility focused on enhancing the mobility rights of vulnerable pedestrians.

Mayor Moon said, “I have carried out district administration with the awareness that local governments are the fastest responders to issues directly related to residents’ lives, property, and daily living, and this will not change in the future.”

In the same context, the district is promoting the Zero Education Blind Spot Project based on the recognition that “preventing digital gaps and differences in home environments from leading to learning gaps is an important responsibility of local governments.”

Through this, they have been working hard to support learning and create a digital environment by identifying students in educational blind spots, connecting mentoring, providing laptops, establishing wireless internet networks and electronic blackboards in schools, and linking digital tutors.

Mayor Moon emphasized, “We will continuously connect various resources that our district has to ensure that students from low-income and marginalized families are not deprived of opportunities to climb the social ladder.”

The district also links social safety net construction to its digital city policy. To prevent social isolation and solitary deaths among single-person households, they operate a smart greeting service that checks phone call volumes and conduct real-time safety monitoring using IoT devices.

Additionally, to secure emergency vehicle passage in residential alleys, they operate a joint control system with fire stations using IoT and artificial intelligence, and have established a monitoring system for disabled parking spaces to enhance parking convenience for disabled drivers.

Mayor Moon said, “We are currently promoting the Smart City Integrated Platform Infrastructure Project and the Cheonnyeon-Chunghyeon Area Smart Safe Walking Project,” adding, “We will continue to create a future-oriented smart city through discovering services directly linked to residents’ convenience and through public-private-academic cooperation.”

The district has established the Seodaemun-gu Green New Deal vision and goals for 2050 carbon neutrality, including building energy efficiency, expanding renewable energy distribution, reducing household waste, creating urban forests, reducing greenhouse gases by 50% per household, and establishing a climate environment education system, and is currently concretizing related five-year plans.

In particular, based on public-private governance, they plan to promote a district-wide climate environment movement, smart environmental education, operation of a climate mileage system, and construction of the Re&Upcycle Plaza for waste circular economy. On June 5th, Environment Day, the ‘Seodaemun Two-Wheel Environment Center’ was also opened.

Mayor Moon emphasized, “To create a 2050 carbon-neutral green city, all residents will respond together to the climate crisis.”

The district is also focusing on the Sinchon Venture Valley project to become a future growth engine for the Sinchon area.

This year, they opened Yonsei University Campus Town ‘S-Cube,’ started construction of ‘Sinchon Startup Customized Youth Housing,’ and are promoting the establishment of the ‘Sinchon Venture Valley Social Startup Center,’ construction of ‘Sinchon-dong Complex Office Youth Housing,’ and creation of ‘Sinchon Station Plaza Park.’

Mayor Moon Seok-jin stated, “We plan to attract investments from companies interested in nurturing youth venture businesses and social contribution, providing creative ideas to young people, while continuously securing youth housing and startup spaces in Sinchon and throughout Seodaemun-gu.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.