South Korea's first city to earn UNICEF's fourth-round Child Friendly City certification, Seongbuk-gu has run its child and youth participatory budget program since 2014
Of 66 proposals submitted, 16 were brought to the assembly, with final projects decided by combining online pre-voting and on-site voting
Seongbuk-gu in Seoul held the "2027 Seongbuk-gu Child and Youth Participatory Budget Assembly" on Saturday at Seongbuk Art Hall inside the Seongbuk-gu office. The event aimed to strengthen children's and adolescents' active participation in their community and protect their rights.
As South Korea's first UNICEF-certified Child Friendly City, Seongbuk-gu has continued its child and youth participatory budget program since 2014. The program aims to guarantee young people's substantive right to participate and to increase transparency in budget planning.
From June through July, the district collected a total of 66 project proposals. Following department reviews and an August policy-sharing session, it narrowed them down to 16 agenda items for the assembly. Online pre-voting was held from Aug. 14 to Sept. 4. The results were combined with on-site voting on the day of the assembly to determine the final slate of projects for next year.
The assembly, organized by Wolgok Youth Center, drew about 60 young people, including those who had submitted proposals and members of the Seongbuk-gu Children and Youth Participation Committee. Led entirely by youth emcees, the program moved through a review of participatory budget projects carried out over the past three years. It then featured presentations and question-and-answer sessions on the 16 proposed projects, followed by on-site voting. After the votes were tallied, Seongbuk-gu District Mayor Lee Seung-ro and Yang Sun-im, chairperson of the Seongbuk-gu Council, took part in a signing ceremony accepting the results. Their participation lent support to the youths' self-governance activities.
The tailored college-prep program for out-of-school youth received the most votes overall. Priority initiatives selected alongside it include the Seongbuk E-sports FESTA:Seo, the Summer Beat youth summer festival, and a Seongbuk-gu youth interschool sports festival. Additional priority projects are a culture and arts festival for children and adolescents, an AI-related career exploration booth, and a Seongbuk-gu youth career and college admissions concert. Another selected project addresses youth academic stress through healthy eating habits. These projects will be reflected in Seongbuk-gu's 2027 budget and carried out following review by the district council.
District Mayor Lee Seung-ro said, "As a city that earned South Korea's first UNICEF Child Friendly City certification in 2013 and, befitting that legacy, became the first in the country to achieve fourth-round certification in 2026, Seongbuk-gu is actively supporting efforts to turn young people's creative ideas into actual Seongbuk-gu policy, not just proposals." He added, "We will continue to closely monitor these youth-led projects so they can bear fruit without disruption, and build a Seongbuk-gu where children and adolescents are happy."
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