Responding to Regional Decline... Easier Use of Shared Assets Like Closed School Sites and Buildings

The standards for property transfer between provinces and provincial offices of education will be improved to efficiently utilize the sites or buildings of closed schools. It is expected that smooth property transfers will be facilitated by relaxing the price criteria to allow the use of publicly announced land prices or appraisal values in addition to acquisition prices when transferring property.

The Ministry of the Interior and Safety announced on the 6th that the amendment to the "Enforcement Decree of the Act on the Management of Public Property and Goods," which includes these details, will be promulgated and enforced on the 7th.

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Until now, the regulations stipulated that property transfers between provinces and provincial offices of education must be based solely on acquisition prices, making it difficult to negotiate between institutions due to acquisition prices being much lower than market prices. As a result, projects where provinces received closed schools to utilize them as community convenience facilities were also challenging.

However, going forward, when transferring property between the accounts of provinces and provincial offices of education, the price criteria will be relaxed to allow the use of publicly announced land prices or appraisal values in addition to acquisition prices, supporting the setting of reasonable price levels.

Additionally, to support the "Regional Revitalization Investment Fund Project," which is being promoted to respond to the crisis of local extinction, local governments will be able to actively utilize public property. It will be improved to allow local governments to sell shares (stocks) they own by investing in the regional revitalization investment fund to investors who jointly invest in a special purpose corporation through private sales, enabling private investors to participate in the project stably without concerns about management rights.

Furthermore, to efficiently utilize idle national and public property, regulations have been revised to allow the state and local governments to exchange property based on a single appraisal value equally. Currently, when exchanging national and public property based on appraisal values, the state requires only one appraisal value, but local governments require two or more appraisal values, causing excessive related budget expenditures for local governments.

Han Soon-gi, Director of the Local Finance and Economy Office, stated, "With this amendment to the enforcement decree, we hope that local governments can effectively respond to the crisis of regional extinction by utilizing public property," and added, "We will continue to support the effective use of public property for the benefit of regions and residents."

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