Kim Tae-jin, Gwangju Seo-gu Council Member, Urges Budget Securing for Uncheon Children's Park

Kim Tae-jin, a member of the Gwangju Metropolitan City Seo-gu Council, proposed the "Urgent Securing of Budget for Uncheon Children's Park Development."

On the 25th, Councilor Kim announced through a 5-minute free speech at the 2nd plenary session of the 314th extraordinary meeting that the Uncheon Children's Park Healing Park development project is being promoted and is on the verge of groundbreaking.

Councilor Kim first proposed Uncheon Children's Park as a resident-led children's playground and organized and operated the Uncheon Children's Park Design Team in a resident-led manner to ensure that Uncheon Children's Park could become a Healing Park development project.

The approximate total project cost for the Uncheon Children's Park Healing Park project is about 1.155 billion KRW, but the currently secured budget is about 600 million KRW, and even installing only the Stump Observatory prepared by the Uncheon Children's Park Design Team requires 415.9 million KRW.

In particular, the restroom, which has been the subject of the most complaints so far, is in a situation where it cannot be touched, creating a dire situation. With the current budget, only the combined playground equipment and special block floor replacement work can be done, and there is a shortage of about 500 million KRW in the total project cost.

Accordingly, Councilor Kim stated, "I advocate proceeding with this project in three stages in the mid to long term, and at least including the restroom in the first phase of construction this time would somewhat increase residents' satisfaction."

If any project is carried out according to the budget due to lack of funds, it would be far from the original purpose of the resident-led children's park project and could lead to reverse complaints.

Therefore, Councilor Kim requested that the project be continuously led as one that fully reflects the residents' intentions, not just a budget-constrained project. He also emphasized that Seo-gu Office should actively strive to secure budgets such as special grants and district funds in the future.

Furthermore, he urged special support to ensure that this project is not merely about securing the budget but that the resident-led approach is maintained throughout the construction process and operation.

He added, "Uncheon Children's Park should be developed as a park that reflects the residents' wishes, not a construction project constrained by budget," and stated, "I will continue to carefully oversee and do my best to create a resident-led children's playground."

Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Shin Dong-ho bless4ya@asiae.co.kr

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