Mapo-gu Focused on COVID-19 Response Instead of Building Community Recreation Center, Facts Revealed

Internal Review Conducted in November 2018 for Residents' Leisure Welfare and Urban-Rural Win-Win Cooperation... On December 8, 2020, District Mayor Yudonggyun Ordered Complete Cancellation of Resort Construction in Hometown to Prevent Misunderstandings... Focus on Local Economy Revitalization and Welfare in Response to COVID-19

[Asia Economy Reporter Jongil Park] Mapo-gu (Mayor Yudonggyun) announced on the 9th that it decided to completely scrap the ‘Internal Review on the Construction of a Citizen Recreation Center’ that had been underway to improve residents' leisure welfare and promote urban-rural cooperation, and to focus on responding to COVID-19 since January last year.

Among Seoul’s autonomous districts, ▲Yongsan-gu ▲Seongdong-gu ▲Dongdaemun-gu ▲Seongbuk-gu ▲Yeongdeungpo-gu ▲Seocho-gu operate citizen recreation centers linked with sister cities for residents' welfare. Mapo-gu also conducted an internal review on the construction of a recreation center to meet the increasing travel demand of its residents.

Since the construction of a recreation center takes several years according to related procedures, the internal review was initiated with a long-term perspective to enhance residents' welfare in the post-COVID-19 era.

In November 2018, Mapo-gu requested recommendations for candidate sites for the recreation center from its sister cities: Yecheon-gun in Gyeongbuk, Sinan-gun in Jeonnam, Gochang-gun in Jeonbuk, and Cheongyang-gun in Chungnam. By March 2020, three cities?Yecheon-gun, Sinan-gun, and Gochang-gun?had responded.

Based on this, in August 2020, a professional agency conducted a research project targeting the three sister cities to review the feasibility of constructing a citizen recreation center and to select the optimal site.

The results showed that Gochang-gun was suitable as a construction site due to excellent transportation accessibility and ease of development, with a resident preference rate of 61%, the highest among the candidates. However, Mayor Yudonggyun of Mapo-gu ordered a complete scrapping of the plan to prevent unnecessary misunderstandings, such as the fact that Gochang is the mayor’s hometown.

Additionally, the decision to completely scrap the plan was significantly influenced by the need to focus all efforts on responding to COVID-19, as social distancing measures in the metropolitan area were raised to level 2.5 on December 8, 2020, to curb the spread of the third wave of the pandemic.

A Mapo-gu official stated, “Considering similar cases in Seoul’s autonomous districts, this was only an internal review opinion to cooperate with sister cities and meet residents’ leisure demands. No specific budget allocation or construction plan regarding the recreation center has been decided.” He added, “The internal review process was also scrapped to dispel unnecessary misunderstandings related to the selected candidate sites.”

He also stated, “The district focused on revitalizing the local economy and welfare projects to revive the livelihoods shattered by the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic.”

Last year, various local economic revitalization projects were carried out, including ▲Our Neighborhood Artterior Project ▲Mapo-style Youth Job Project ▲Small and Medium Enterprise Management Safety Loans ▲Disaster Relief Funds for Closed Small Business Owners ▲Employment Incentives for Unemployed Youth ▲Local Industry Customized Job Support ▲Temporary Livelihood Support Funds for COVID-19 Victims ▲Signboard and Outdoor Advertising Consumption Coupons.

In the welfare sector, Mapo-gu allocated a budget of 347.8 billion KRW, accounting for 56.8% of the general account, implementing welfare policies to minimize blind spots for vulnerable groups, childcare, women, and the elderly.

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