SUWON — Gyeonggi Province Governor Choo Mi-ae has pointed to a lack of communication in the budget planning and execution process under the previous provincial administration as a main cause of the province's fiscal deficit, which has drawn recent criticism.
Choo told a weekly meeting the previous day that early briefings had focused on broad visions, making it difficult to grasp the details of the budget, according to the province on the 17th. She said she came to understand the province's fiscal reality only after receiving follow-up reports.
She said talks between departments that spend the budget and those that raise revenue had not gone smoothly. Communication between the governor's office and the bureaus that should have coordinated those talks was also insufficient, she said, causing the province to miss the window for a preemptive response to the fiscal crisis.
"When I looked at the budget documents, funds were allocated from January through September, but October through December was empty," she said. "It was like being handed a household ledger with the spending plan left unfinished."
"With three months of budget having to be drawn up from scratch, the misunderstanding arose that we had cut spending on people's livelihoods," she said. "The province did not arbitrarily reduce the budget. That money was never allocated in the first place."
Falling revenue and rising welfare spending were also cited as sources of fiscal strain. Choo said Gyeonggi Province faces heavy welfare demand because it ranks among the highest in the country in population growth and in the number of newborns and older residents.
She said acquisition tax, which accounts for a large share of provincial tax revenue, had fallen from about 11 trillion won to about 8 trillion won, with further revenue declines expected from measures such as the designation of land transaction permit zones.
"The old revenue structure built around development cannot absorb the current crisis," Choo said, calling for an overhaul of the local tax system.
"Communication matters most if we are to consolidate overlapping projects and improve efficiency," she said. "The provincial council and the bureaus need to confer on pending issues on a regular basis."
The meeting also took up other provincial policy issues, including the creation of a data system for managing farmland contamination and efforts to designate an opportunity development zone in northern Gyeonggi Province.
