Lee Byung-hoon "Authority for Preliminary Evaluation of Public Museums and Art Galleries Should Be Transferred to Local Governments"

Partial Amendment Bill Proposed for the Museum and Art Gallery Promotion Act

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] Congressman Lee Byung-hoon (The Democratic Party of Korea·Gwangju Dong-gu Nam-gu Eul) announced on the 15th that he has taken the lead in proposing a partial amendment to the "Museum and Art Gallery Promotion Act."

The amendment includes a provision requiring the head of a local government to conduct a preliminary feasibility assessment when establishing public museums and public art galleries.

Under the current law, when the head of a local government intends to establish a public museum or public art gallery, they must first establish a plan for the establishment and operation of the museum or art gallery and receive a preliminary feasibility assessment from the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

However, although the government has promoted the decentralization of national functions to local governments to strengthen local autonomy and responsibility and fiscal decentralization, and transferred the budget allocation and execution authority for public museum and public art gallery construction support projects to local governments, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism still conducts the 'preliminary assessment' regarding feasibility, leading to criticism that this is merely a nominal decentralization.

Since the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism decides on establishment through the preliminary assessment, local governments are merely a passageway through which the budget passes, rendering the purpose of transferring the project to local governments meaningless. Therefore, there is a claim that the preliminary feasibility assessment for the establishment of public museums and public art galleries should also be changed to a task of local governments.

The amendment changes the provision so that when the head of a local government intends to establish a public museum or public art gallery, instead of receiving a preliminary feasibility assessment from the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism, the local government reviews the feasibility first and then consults with the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Congressman Lee said, "The decision by the Autonomy Decentralization Committee and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism to designate museum and art gallery projects as decentralized tasks was made because it was judged that sufficient autonomous capacity has been established to transfer these tasks to local governments and that it is necessary to grant autonomy and responsibility to the regions. Since the budget allocation authority has been transferred to local governments, it is appropriate to delegate the responsibility and authority for conducting the preliminary assessment of public museum and art gallery construction projects to the mayors and governors," emphasizing this point.

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