Siheung mayor: 'A child-friendly city is built together by children and residents'
Siheung is recruiting 100 residents to take part in a citizen roundtable forum on building a child-friendly city, to be held Oct. 17 at the Siheung Business Center.
The forum will be held under the theme "Building a Child-Friendly Siheung Through Children's Voices." Children — as the direct stakeholders of city policy — along with their guardians and child-related professionals will gather to propose ideas across six key areas of child-friendly city development and discuss the policies and directions needed to improve children's lives.
Participants will be encouraged to speak freely about inconveniences they experience in daily life and the policies they believe are needed. The city plans to incorporate feedback from the discussions into its child-friendly policy agenda to produce measures that residents can tangibly feel.
The forum will accommodate around 100 participants: 70 students from fourth through sixth grade in elementary school and middle and high school students, 20 guardians, and 10 professionals working in child-related fields. Interested residents may apply from Wednesday through Oct. 2 by scanning the QR code in the public notice on the Siheung city government website. The city will review applications and notify selected participants individually on Oct. 8.
"A child-friendly city is not something the administration builds unilaterally — it is a city built together by children and residents," Siheung Mayor Lim Byeong-taek said. "I hope many people will take an interest and join us at this roundtable forum to talk about Siheung's future from the perspective of children."
For more information on participation, contact the Siheung City Child Care Division.
Siheung obtained UNICEF's advanced-level child-friendly city certification in 2023 and is currently pursuing renewal of that certification.
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