Haenam-gun has drawn up a plan to close the healthcare and welfare gap across four counties in the southwestern region and improve conditions for residents to stay.
The county announced Friday it had secured 3 billion won ($2.04 million) in national funding after its "Hae-Wan-Jin-Gang Barrier-Free Smart Rehabilitation Hub" project was selected in the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport's 2026 regional demand-tailored support competition.
The funds will go toward building a "1535 welfare line" — residential infrastructure designed to put the hub within 15 to 35 minutes of residents in the neighboring counties of Wando, Jindo and Gangjin-gun.
Key components include a wide-area smart public parking facility — built to safely accommodate special-purpose buses from all four counties and maximize visibility — at 1.8 billion won, and a smart healing garden at 1 billion won.
The existing comprehensive welfare center for people with disabilities will retain all of its core daily functions — counseling, education and vocational training — in full. Three specialized services will be upgraded and operated separately as a regional hub: smart robot rehabilitation, professional developmental rehabilitation and sensory integration therapy.
The hub will also offer smart robotic gait rehabilitation using cutting-edge wearable walking robots, as well as tailored developmental rehabilitation services for infants, toddlers and children with disabilities at each stage of their growth.
"We will complete a powerful 'population dam' that stops the outflow of residents," County Chief Myeon Hyeon-gwan said, citing 211 infants and toddlers in the southwestern region who travel to major cities every week for rehabilitation treatment and are considering relocation. He added that the project would establish a standard model for a broad, smart, mutually beneficial living zone across the region.
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