Nowon-gu district mayor marks 100 days in office with vision for future

The ninth round of directly elected local government has now been in office for exactly 100 days — a milestone that carries real significance. For a district mayor responsible for the full range of local administration, it is an important moment to lay out a vision for the rest of the term.

Running one of Seoul's autonomous districts is no small task. A district mayor oversees a population of 400,000 to 500,000 people, manages a budget of around 1 trillion won ($744 million), and works alongside nearly 1,500 to 2,000 staff across the main office and affiliated agencies.

On top of that, accidents and incidents can strike at any time and place. Major disasters must be prevented, but the person at the top of the administration must also be prepared for the worst.

The first 100 days have passed without serious incident. Just as a newborn navigates its most vulnerable early weeks before entering a period of real growth, a district mayor must move beyond the initial phase of unfamiliarity and take the next step forward.

For District Mayor Seo Jun-o, those 100 days were far from easy. Within two weeks of taking office, a sinkhole opened at a construction site for the Dobongsan–Wolgye light rail line in Wolgye-dong. About a month later, a roadside tree toppled onto a main road on a clear afternoon. Fortunately, neither incident caused casualties — but both drove home the weight of the role.

Inside the organization, the challenges are no less pressing. Seo has said he sometimes cannot sleep after hearing staff describe the difficulty of securing budgets for essential projects and the resulting strain on manpower.

Seo calls on staff to uphold integrity and take a proactive approach to administration, public complaints and outreach

At his inauguration, Seo set out three principles he wanted his staff to embody: proactive administration grounded in integrity and diligence; proactive handling of residents' requests; and proactive promotion of district projects.

On the first point, integrity and diligence may sound like obvious expectations for civil servants, but years spent in the same organization can breed complacency without anyone noticing. Seo's view of integrity is straightforward: genuine love for one's work naturally produces it. He believes integrity is not some grand ideal but something that follows organically when a person truly cares about what they do — and he has expressed a firm commitment to creating conditions in which staff can approach their work with that spirit.

Understanding what residents want is equally important to Seo. He is well known for communicating by text message. Since his days as chief of staff under Kim Sung-hwan — then Nowon-gu district mayor during the fifth term of elected local government and now Minister of Climate, Environment and Energy — through his most recent tenure as a city council member, Seo has sent and responded to an extraordinary volume of messages. He still personally replies to more than 10 texts a day beyond his regular duties, and he regularly asks staff to keep asking themselves what residents are looking for.

Outreach is another area Seo has made a priority. He has worked to build a coordinated system between individual departments and the communications team to make promotion more effective. Going a step further, he created a segment called "Juno Explains" on the district office's YouTube channel, where he personally presents district news and policies.

One episode filmed at a disability-friendly hair salon — the first of its kind operated by any local government in the country — showed Seo washing a client's hair himself. It drew nearly 2,000 views in a short period.

He has also appeared on the channel to address apartment reconstruction, Nowon-gu's most pressing local issue, providing practical information on topics such as reconstruction cost contributions, relocation expenses and changes to the relevant regulatory regime — presented in a question-and-answer format that has proven popular with residents.

It is often said that in any organization, the chief executive is the best product. When the top official steps forward, the impact carries a different weight. In business, a single word from a chief executive can move share prices. Local government is no different — and Seo's willingness to put himself in front of the camera reflects his determination to build public trust in district policy.

Seo envisions bundling the district's attractions into packaged tourism products

Seo's longer-term ambition is to put Nowon-gu on the map for the world. A central part of that vision is linking the district's scattered attractions into packaged tourism products.

Nowon-gu was developed as a planned city roughly 40 years ago and is now an established urban district, yet over the past decade or so it has emerged as a destination with genuine draw. Seo wants to bring those individual attractions together into a coherent tourism offering.

Among the highlights is the hydrangea garden on Choan Mountain in Wolgye-dong, where a long-neglected area around a historic eunuch burial site has been transformed into a lush retreat filled with hydrangeas. Another is the Train Village in Gongreung-dong, where miniature replicas of famous landmarks from cities around the world are displayed alongside model trains and other vehicles that actually move, adding a sense of realism to the experience.

Nowon-gu's most prominent attraction, Buramsan Healing Town, turns into a spectacular azalea garden each April, when some 100,000 azalea bushes come into bloom. The complex also features a butterfly garden where live butterflies can be seen year-round, and an observation deck with views of Suraksan and Bukhansan — equipped with an elevator so that wheelchair users can access it. A forest therapy center with foot baths and views of Buramsan, a toddler forest activity area, a picnic ground and a café that draws large crowds daily round out a space that has become a genuine sanctuary for residents.

In Hagye-dong, the district-run theme park Jump offers what is billed as the country's largest indoor extreme leisure and sports facility, with activities for children, teenagers and families alike.

Seo believes that with the addition of "The Surak Hyu," a forest recreation center on Suraksan that has become popular as Seoul's first natural woodland retreat, Nowon-gu more than holds its own as the central city of Seoul's northeastern area.

Plans also take shape to introduce Nowon-gu to the world

Seo has also devised a concrete strategy for raising Nowon-gu's international profile. The Train Village in Gongreung-dong already opened a Swiss pavilion when it first launched, and an Italian pavilion has recently been added. A European embassy in Seoul took notice and inquired whether its country's cities could also be rendered in miniature there. Seo intends to propose, as a condition of acceptance, that the relevant European city erect a monument related to Nowon-gu in return.

Major plans for Nowon as a future economic hub proceed on schedule

Seo is not without his early-term difficulties. As meetings have multiplied and briefings for getting up to speed on operations have increased, some staff have voiced frustration. He has handled this by openly acknowledging the challenges facing a newly appointed district mayor confronting a vast administrative workload for the first time, and by asking middle managers to help explain the situation to their teams.

At the same time, the major plans for transforming Nowon-gu into a future economic hub are moving ahead without delay.

The Changdong railyard — the centerpiece of Nowon's future development — has completed its relocation. Once the driver's license testing center also moves out, the site is expected to be redeveloped into Seoul Digital Bio City. A review for its designation as an industrial complex is currently under way.

The Dobongsan–Wolgye light rail line, intended to ease traffic congestion, is on track to open in November next year. The district is also working to ensure that the central government's planned development of the Taereung golf course proceeds in a way that benefits Nowon-gu residents — through park creation and solutions to traffic problems.

As the youngest district mayor among Seoul's autonomous districts, Seo has taken on a new challenge, and the 100-day mark has given him an opportunity to reflect on the road traveled and sharpen his sense of direction going forward.

"If the past 100 days were about looking into every corner of Nowon and listening to residents' voices, the days ahead will be about moving with greater urgency to turn the changes we have been preparing into results that residents can actually feel," Seo said. "I will do my best alongside our staff to make Nowon a city that people not only want to live in, but want to work in, enjoy and visit."