“Go First!” ... Gyeongbuk Province Abandons Residence-Centered and Application-Based Welfare Approach

Forming and Responding with the 'Metropolitan Hope Welfare SOS Team' for Thorough Follow-up

330 Happiness Planners (Welfare Planners) Assigned in Eup, Myeon, and Dong Areas

Gyeongbuk Provincial Government Office.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Gwi-yeol] Gyeongbuk Province will make a major shift from residence-centered, application-based welfare to proactive response, neighbor community, and super-regional-centered welfare to effectively respond to newly emerging welfare blind spots such as the Suwon three mothers incident.

To this end, they plan to ▲form a metropolitan Hope Welfare SOS team ▲train 330 Happiness Planners (welfare planners) ▲open KakaoTalk channel Hope Talk (TALK) ▲operate a Welfare Blind Spot Discovery Day ▲distribute the Gyeongbuk Province Mind Safety Service app.

Going beyond the limitations of the existing residence-centered, application-based welfare system caused by unknown residence and reluctance to apply, Gyeongbuk Province plans to form a metropolitan Hope Welfare SOS team in cooperation with the police and related agencies under the premise of proactive crisis detection and thorough follow-up.

Also, they plan to assign one Happiness Planner, a welfare planner who designs various welfare services tailored to vulnerable groups such as the elderly, disabled, and single-parent families, to each of the 330 eup, myeon, and dong (townships and neighborhoods).

Happiness Planners will provide accurate, timely, and sufficient visiting customized welfare services to residents.

Next year, this will be piloted as a national government-funded project (Ministry of Employment and Labor’s Senior Career-type Job Project), and expanded in 2024.

KakaoTalk channel Hope Talk (TALK) has been opened for each city and county so that anyone can report neighbors in difficulty anytime and anywhere.

To use it, search for the city or county Hope Talk on KakaoTalk and add as a friend to automatically subscribe. Through this, difficult neighbors can be continuously discovered and reported, and welfare service-related information is provided through the channel.

Welfare Blind Spot Discovery Day, the first of its kind nationwide, will be operated simultaneously by all cities and counties on the second Wednesday of every month targeting residents in vulnerable areas such as one-room dense areas, around stations and terminals, and parks, conducting on-site welfare service consultations and promoting the discovery of welfare blind spots to activate resident reporting.

Gyeongbuk Province also distributes the ‘Gyeongbuk Mind Safety Service App’ to all 23 cities and counties, the first at the metropolitan province level, to immediately respond to crisis situations through real-time safety checks for vulnerable households living alone without family relations or guardians.

The Mind Safety Service installs the app on vulnerable single-person households and, if the mobile phone is not used for a designated time (at least 12 hours), it predicts an accident or health abnormality and automatically sends a rescue message to multiple pre-registered guardians, enabling rapid crisis response.

For discovered blind spot households, public benefits such as emergency welfare support and integrated case management for basic livelihood security benefits will be provided, and for system-vulnerable groups, customized services will be supported by linking resources from private organizations such as the Community Chest of Korea, Green Umbrella Children’s Foundation, and the Korean Red Cross.

Governor Lee Cheol-woo said, “Tragic incidents like the Suwon three mothers case must never happen again,” and added, “The top priority of administration is to protect each and every resident. We will do our best so that people can feel that the government is there.”

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