Chung Cheongrae Sponsors Bill for State to Cover Firefighters' Personnel Costs... Ruling Party Pursues Reform Amid Choo Mi-ae Controversy

Local Governments Cover 92% of Firefighting Personnel Costs
Bill Seeks to Cover Shortfalls With National Funding

Amid continuing controversy over remarks on firefighting finances by Gyeonggi Province Governor Choo Mi-ae and Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Boo Seung-chan, Democratic Party lawmaker Chung Cheongrae has sponsored a bill requiring the central government to cover shortfalls in the personnel expenses account for firefighting officials. The legislation follows the Democratic Party's pledge to improve firefighting finances.

According to political circles on Oct. 22, Chung sponsored the previous day a partial amendment to the Act on Support for Firefighting Finance and Establishment of City and Provincial Fire Special Accounts.

Rep. Chung Cheongrae of the Democratic Party of Korea asks a question. Yonhap

The amendment would remove transfers from city and provincial general accounts from the revenue items in the personnel expenses account of the Fire Special Account and require the central government to cover any revenue shortfall. It aims to ease the burden on local governments by providing national funding for personnel expenses that cannot be covered by the Fire Safety Grant Tax and the Regional Resource Facility Tax.

According to the National Assembly Research Service, total personnel expenses for local firefighting services rose from 3.6967 trillion won in 2019 to 6.3632 trillion won last year. Meanwhile, central government funding fell from 565.7 billion won in 2021 to 547.6 billion won last year. Although firefighting officials became national government employees in 2020, local governments still cover 92% of their personnel expenses.

The bill was introduced amid a series of controversies over remarks on firefighting finances by Governor Choo and lawmaker Boo. The previous day, the Democratic Party issued warnings to both and said it would pursue institutional improvements related to funding to improve the working conditions of firefighting officials.

"Under the current system, local governments are responsible for 90% of personnel expenses, resulting in differences in working conditions depending on each local government's fiscal independence," Chung said. "The central government should take full responsibility for personnel expenses and ensure stable payments, while local governments should use the funds in their Fire Special Accounts that had gone toward personnel expenses to improve working conditions, including replacing aging equipment and modernizing fire stations."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.