Seoul Ombudsman Committee Recommends 77 Cases and Expresses Opinions on 21 After Inspecting 122 Public Projects Last Year

Inspection of Construction, Service, and Consignment Projects Commissioned by Seoul City
Publication of a Casebook on Public Project Monitoring from 2016 to 2020 Over Five Years

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Seoul Citizens’ Audit Ombudsman Committee announced on the 4th that it inspected 122 public projects, including construction, services, procurement, consignment, and subsidy payments commissioned by the Seoul Metropolitan Government and its affiliated institutions last year, and took measures such as 77 recommendations and 21 expressions of opinion.

According to Seoul City, the major cases that induced improvements through focused monitoring activities during the year include ▲ correction of violations of regulations on subscribing to damage insurance for shared property, ▲ correction of violations of regulations on proper wages and weekly holiday allowances for workers in facility improvement construction, ▲ correction of overpayments due to errors in settlement of consignment project fees, ▲ correction of violations of the regulation requiring a majority of external members in the hiring committee of consignment institutions, and ▲ improvement of non-compliance with the regulation on disclosure of bid participants’ proposal evaluation results.

In the case of correcting violations of regulations on subscribing to damage insurance for shared property, the Private Consignment Management Guidelines stipulate that according to Article 4 of the Enforcement Decree of the Act on Shared Property and Goods Management, damage insurance or mutual aid products for shared property must be subscribed to directly by the head of the local government. However, in five institutions, the Seoul Metropolitan Government did not subscribe to damage insurance (fire insurance) for consigned administrative facilities, and instead the consignment institutions subscribed, violating the enforcement decree and guidelines. Accordingly, the committee recommended that insurance for administrative property owned by the city be subscribed to by the city and that related agreements be revised in accordance with regulations, resulting in the correction of issues in the five consigned facilities.

Furthermore, Seoul City introduced the ‘Seoul Construction Industry Innovation 3-No Measures’ to guarantee proper wages for daily construction workers and established a ‘Contractor’s Responsibility’ clause in the special conditions of Seoul City construction contracts, making the payment of proper wages mandatory for construction projects commissioned by Seoul City. However, upon reviewing the labor cost payment statements for July to August 2021 from contractor A, the committee found that the wage rates for 16 workers were below the market wage rates, and weekly holiday allowances were not paid. The committee recommended that the contractor pay proper wages and overdue weekly holiday allowances, resulting in the payment of labor costs and weekly holiday allowances at proper wage levels.

There was also a case of correcting overpayments due to errors in the settlement of consignment project fees. The ‘Manual for Budget, Accounting, Personnel, and Labor Operation of Private Consignment Affairs’ stipulates that consignment project fees should be recalculated based on actual expenditures at settlement. However, Center A paid consignment project fees at 2% of the project budget (budget amount). The committee recommended that fees be paid within 2% of actual expenditures, not the budget amount, and that consignment project fees be recalculated according to the unspent portion of the project budget, with excess fees returned.

Meanwhile, the committee compiled major cases of public project monitoring conducted over five years from 2016 to 2020 by type and produced a ‘Public Project Monitoring Casebook,’ which was distributed to each institution last October. The casebook introduces major monitoring and corrective cases related to construction, services, procurement, consignment projects, and subsidy payments over the past five years (2016?2020). It is expected to help prevent potential problems in public projects in advance and assist in promoting projects more rationally.

Chairman Park Geun-yong said, “We are striving to ensure fair and transparent public projects by monitoring from the citizens’ perspective and with citizens’ eyes,” adding, “In 2022, we will do our best to become an ombudsman trusted by citizens by promptly discovering and improving unreasonable work processes, violations of regulations, and agreement terms occurring during the execution of Seoul City public projects.”

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