Jemulpo-gu District (Mayor Kim Chan-jin) in Incheon is visiting vulnerable residents and social welfare facilities in the district to offer holiday support ahead of Chuseok. Beginning with deliveries to welfare facilities on the 9th, the district plans to distribute holiday gifts to 9,120 households, including low-income families and national merit honorees, from the 16th to the 18th.
 [The Korean Today] Delivery of Chuseok holiday support goods to vulnerable residents © Reporter Kim Mi-hee |
Support for facilities came first. On the 9th, the district delivered 130 fruit boxes to 75 social welfare facilities in the district. The volume averages close to two boxes per facility, a scale set so that residents spending the holiday at the facilities can share them together.
The household-level distribution that follows will take place over three days, from the 16th to the 18th. The recipients are 9,120 households in total, including low-income families and national merit honorees, and the schedule was moved up so that the items reach each home before the Chuseok holiday begins.
Because the holiday is a period when family visits and spending are concentrated, it can also be a time when households living alone or struggling to make ends meet feel a greater sense of relative deprivation. That is why local governments repeat support programs around each holiday. Such programs serve to fill, on a holiday-by-holiday basis, gaps that regular benefits and ongoing welfare services alone cannot cover.
Also notable is that this program covers not only low-income households but national merit honorees as well. By addressing welfare support and veterans' recognition within the same program, the district has extended the scope of its assistance beyond livelihood support to include what the community owes those who served.
"This program was carried out to look after neighbors in need during the holiday and to honor the dedication of those recognized for national merit," Jemulpo-gu Mayor Kim Chan-jin said. "We will continue to extend warm support to neighbors in difficulty and spare no assistance for those who devoted themselves to the Republic of Korea."
Jemulpo-gu was launched through the merger of the former Dong-gu and the inland areas of Jung-gu, and has a relatively high proportion of aging housing and low-income households. The distribution scale of 9,120 households is itself a figure that reflects the breadth of vulnerable households the district has identified.
Through this support drive, the district plans to reduce blind spots in assistance during the holiday period while increasing the density of its support by attending to welfare facilities and individual households at the same time.
[ Reporter Kim Mi-hee: incheonsouth@thekoreantoday.com ]
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