Gyeonggi Province Confirms Local Decentralization Support Plan Including Expansion of Vice Governors from 3 to 5

Gyeonggi Province will expand the number of vice governors in cities and provinces with populations of 12 million or more from the current 3 to 5 by 2019, and will permit provincial council members to concurrently serve as vice governors, among various local decentralization system improvements.

On the 24th at 2 p.m., Gyeonggi Province held the first 2017 Gyeonggi Province Local Decentralization Council meeting, presided over by Lee Jae-yul, the first vice governor of Gyeonggi Province (and chairman of the Local Decentralization Council), and confirmed the "Gyeonggi Province Local Decentralization Promotion and Support Implementation Plan" containing these measures.

The "Gyeonggi Province Local Decentralization Promotion and Support Implementation Plan" is in accordance with the ordinance on local decentralization promotion and support enacted in 2015, which requires the ordinance to establish a plan every three years to strengthen autonomous capacity and realize local self-governance.

This plan includes measures that Gyeonggi Province will pursue related to local decentralization from 2017 to 2019.

According to the implementation plan, the province will pursue legislative amendments to grant special local legislative authority to Gyeonggi Province, similar to that of Seoul, Jeju Special Self-Governing Province, and Sejong Special Self-Governing City, and to guarantee the participation of city and provincial governors in the State Council meeting, in addition to expanding vice governor positions.

Additionally, to strengthen local financial authority, the province will pursue increasing the local consumption tax rate from the current 11 percent by an additional 5 percent in 2017, and incrementally raising it to 21 percent by 2019.

The province also plans to recommend to the central government the exclusion of areas such as Yeoncheon and Gapyeong from the capital region scope, and to transfer central government authority to local governments regarding urban planning, residential development, approval of metropolitan transportation facility burden fund usage plans, and designation and modification of local industrial complexes.

Gyeonggi Province plans to share this implementation plan with four major local councils including the Local Self-Governance Development Committee, Local Decentralization Council, and Council of Do Governors of the Republic of Korea, and to coordinate jointly through policy debate forums on decentralization.

The Gyeonggi Province Local Decentralization Council, which was launched in May 2016, is composed of 25 experts from academia, research institutions, and civic organizations in accordance with the "Ordinance on Gyeonggi Province Local Decentralization Promotion and Support."