Songpa-gu, Significant Improvement in Handling Complex Civil Complaints

District Achieves Major Improvement in 'One-Stop Permit Civil Service' After 1 Year with 29,000 Cases Processed ▲Reduced Processing Time ▲Convenient Flow ▲Blocked Power Imbalance... Recognized by Seoul City, Advances to 'Happy and Joyful Civil Service' Finals

Songpa-gu (Mayor Seo Gang-seok) is pursuing administrative innovation that residents can feel through the 'One-Stop Civil Service Administration' implemented nationwide for the first time since October last year, based on the philosophy that "residents are not complainants but sovereign citizens and owners," receiving great response from residents.

In fact, resident A visited the 'Health and Hygiene Division' to report a food business in order to open a restaurant, but needed to change the notation on the building register, requiring a separate visit to the 'Architecture Division' or 'Housing Management Division' depending on the building type.

He said, "The procedures for obtaining permission were complicated and I was anxious, but at Songpa-gu Office, I only had to visit the 'Civil Service Administration Division' once, where they handled consultation and reception, and directly proceeded with all procedures with each department, so I only had to pick up the documents later," expressing that it was really helpful.

Seo Gang-seok, Mayor of Songpa-gu, has practiced servant administration, stating, "Residents should be treated as sovereign citizens, not complainants." Since taking office, as his first directive, he has established ▲ a one-stop management system for permits and approvals at the district office ▲ the first separate Passport Division in Seoul ▲ and introduced the ‘Haha Hoho Civil Service Accompaniment Service,’ dramatically improving the difficulties of 660,000 residents.

The district split the existing Civil Service Passport Division into the Civil Service Administration Division and the Passport Division, newly established a 'Civil Service Processing Team' in the Civil Service Administration Division, and operates a 'dedicated one-stop window for permits and approvals.' A system was established where all 450 types of permit and approval civil complaints can be resolved by visiting only the Civil Service Administration Division.

Residents have shown enthusiastic responses such as, "Seeing the district office staff act as agents for complainants, running around and solving issues directly, makes me feel respected." In particular, in the first anniversary resident awareness and satisfaction survey of the 8th local government, 89.1% of residents responded that they were satisfied with changes in the civil service administration system, including the ‘One-Stop Permit and Approval Civil Service.’

Furthermore, the district newly established the Passport Division as a separate department for the first time in Seoul, drastically reducing waiting times through online reservations and greatly improving resident inconvenience. Hearing the word, residents from other local governments also visit Songpa-gu Office frequently for passport services.

Additionally, the district provides customized civil services such as ▲ the introduction of the ‘Haha Hoho Civil Service Accompaniment Service’ that assists vulnerable groups like seniors, disabled persons, and foreigners from start to finish ▲ and the ‘QR Code Civil Service Form Writing System’ that speeds up civil service processing.

Moreover, to protect civil service officers from difficult-to-communicate special complaints, the district distributes ‘civil service body cams’ and conducts ‘special complaint occurrence response drills,’ and creates safe working environments so that staff can provide high-quality civil service administration that serves residents, including holding empathy talk sessions with MZ generation employees in the civil service office.

Meanwhile, the district was selected as an excellent institution in the ‘2022 National Happiness Civil Service Office Evaluation’ hosted by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety in December last year, achieving certification for the third consecutive time. Recently, it was recognized for its achievements by Seoul City and advanced to the finals of the ‘2023 Seoul Civil Service Excellence Case’ competition, continuously striving to improve civil service through resident-serving administration.

Mayor Seo Gang-seok said, "Residents are not complainants but the owners of Songpa-gu," and added, "We will continue to do our best to provide a new concept of kindness and servant administration services that residents can feel."

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