Siheung City Advances as an "AI Innovation City"... Comprehensive Transformation of Administration and Citizen Services

Recently, Park, a public servant at the Lifelong Learning Division of Siheung City, has seen a significant reduction in the time required to write reports. She has also gained confidence in organizing statistical data and preparing presentation materials for institutions. This improvement is thanks to the introduction of the integrated generative AI system, “Siheung Genie,” into the city’s internal administrative network last March.

AI training session for all Siheung City employees conducted last March. Provided by Siheung City

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Siheung Genie was introduced by Siheung City to drive digital transformation in administration and to improve work efficiency. Integrating 11 large language models, including ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude, this system enables applications such as document writing, research, data analysis, and handling civil complaints, supporting a wide range of administrative tasks.

Kim, a welfare officer, is also reaping the benefits of AI. Through the city’s independently developed AI-based welfare system, she can instantly check eligibility results during consultations, and the required documents list is automatically generated. As a result, consultation time has been dramatically shortened from about 20 minutes to just 5 minutes.

Siheung City in Gyeonggi Province (Mayor Lim Byeongtaek) is accelerating its transformation into an “AI Innovation City” by introducing generative AI across all administrative sectors.

According to Siheung City on April 15, the city aims not only to boost public servants’ work efficiency through digital transformation of administrative work, but also to expand AI services that citizens can directly experience, thereby shifting the paradigm of public administration.

Siheung Genie. Provided by Siheung City

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Siheung Genie, established at the beginning of this year, has become an indispensable work partner for city employees, offering both efficiency and robust security. Its integration with the Saeol Administrative System has significantly improved accessibility. Employees can use it without a separate login, and de-identification of personal information ensures strong security, allowing staff to use the system without concerns. Currently, Siheung Genie is actively used for responding to civil complaints, summarizing and drafting documents, generating images and presentation materials, and is also utilized for on-duty and disaster response, as well as searching for laws and guidelines.

Another positive development is that Siheung City was recently selected for the Ministry of the Interior and Safety’s “Public SaaS Support Project,” enabling the city to build a collaborative environment based on private cloud services. As cases of AI-based program development increase, the city will receive two services: the collaboration platform “Dooray” and the software security management service “Sparrow Cloud.” Dooray offers advantages in business continuity through collaborative document editing and knowledge archiving, while Sparrow Cloud is expected to further strengthen the security and safety management system for internally developed software.

Above all, the city is focusing on laying the foundation for the seamless adoption of AI across all sectors, including administration and industry. The “Siheung City Basic Ordinance on Artificial Intelligence,” passed last March, sets forth: ▲Support projects and the establishment of basic plans for AI development and utilization; ▲Formation of a public-private-academic-research cooperation system and reward regulations for comprehensive AI policy promotion. This provides the legal basis for supporting AI technology R&D companies and administrative service initiatives.

New Civil Servant's Official Document Writing Practice Program. Provided by Siheung City

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In addition to building the AI environment, the city is also dedicated to strengthening employees’ skills for effective AI utilization. This year, Siheung City will offer AI training to all employees, covering everything from basic and advanced levels to expert and certification courses by stage and field.

The basic course covers a wide range of topics for all employees, from the fundamentals of AI concepts to command writing, security, and ethics. The advanced course focuses on practical training that can be immediately applied to tasks such as drafting report templates, handling civil complaints, and data visualization, thereby maximizing work efficiency. Through the “Expert Course” and “AI Certification Course,” even non-specialists will be able to directly create deliverables such as web pages using AI, going beyond basic AI utilization.

The city has also created a channel for individuals to showcase their AI capabilities and contribute to the organization’s development. On the recently established “AI Utilization and Sharing Board” within the internal administrative network, employees can share experiences of improving work with AI, AI-generated creations, and prompts that can be immediately applied to administrative tasks.

If a prompt proves useful for work, employees can show support by recommending the creator. Currently, highly recommended prompts include: “Practice Makes Perfect: Official Document Drafting Program for New Civil Servants” by Park Heewon of the Smart City Division, “Automated Document Distribution Program” by Cho Gwangtae of the Public Welfare Division, and “Understanding Siheung Fine Dust” created using Siheung Genie by Ahn Taehyun of the Air Quality Policy Division.

The city plans to collect the most recommended posts each month and hold an AI competition at the end of the year, providing opportunities for employees to showcase their AI capabilities while fostering a culture of AI utilization within the organization.

Siheung Welfare-ON (ON). Provided by Siheung City

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Siheung City is leveraging AI throughout the region to enhance citizen convenience. Last year, the city launched “Siheung Welfare-On,” a real-time response system based on welfare information for the city. AI is also actively used in road management, outdoor advertisement safety inspections, heavy rain response planning, and illegal parking enforcement.

This year, the city will introduce the 24-hour AI Job Counselor service, “Siheung-On.” Any citizen can easily find personalized job opportunities through a conversational interface, and the AI also provides information on youth entrepreneurship, business support, and benefits for small business owners. The AI communicates interactively based on user queries, and features voice search for vulnerable groups such as seniors, as well as search and response functions in English and Chinese for foreigners.

At the Jeongwangbon-dong Administrative Welfare Center, which has a large foreign resident population, the city will launch a tailored AI civil complaint information kiosk for foreigners. Covering a wide range of topics from daily life information, education, and employment to healthcare, welfare, culture and sports, immigration, and safety, the AI model, dressed in traditional attire for each supported language-Korean, English, Chinese, Vietnamese, and Thai-will provide easy-to-understand explanations. This is expected to greatly improve administrative accessibility for foreign residents who face language barriers.

A Siheung City official stated, “AI has now become an essential partner in administration, beyond being just a technology,” and added, “By entrusting repetitive tasks to AI and allowing public servants to focus on more creative and compassionate administration, we aim to deliver greater value to citizens’ lives.”

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