First Call for Entries Since Residents’ Autonomous Councils Were Institutionalized... 20 Best Cases to Be Selected

[Financial News] Government support for outstanding residents’ autonomous council cases, in which residents directly solve local problems, will be expanded. The number of selected best practices will double from 10 to 20, and special grant tax support will also increase from 1 billion won to 2 billion won. This is the first nationwide call for entries since the Local Autonomy Act was revised this year and residents’ autonomous councils were converted into a formal system.
The Ministry of the Interior and Safety (MOIS) announced on the 30th that it will hold the '2026 Residents’ Autonomy Best Practices Contest' and accept entries from residents’ autonomous councils nationwide until the 22nd of next month. This is the first best-practices contest for residents’ autonomous councils since they became an official system under the Local Autonomy Act.
The contest covers three categories: realizing resident participation, solving local problems, and revitalizing communities. It is open to cases carried out from January last year through August this year, including examples in which residents directly took part in major local decision-making and activities, or identified and solved local problems on their own.
The evaluation process will also change. Starting this year, on-site reviews and online voting by a citizen evaluation panel will be introduced for the first time. The goal is to verify on the ground the actual results of projects and how much residents feel the impact, which are difficult to assess through documents alone, and to reflect public opinion in the selection process.
The final best practices will be announced at the '2026 Local Era Expo.' MOIS will present the grand prize, top prize, excellence awards, and encouragement awards, and will provide special grant tax support on a differentiated basis to the selected cases.
Along with discovering best practices, MOIS also plans to develop a tool that can objectively assess the capabilities of residents’ autonomous councils and use it to provide tailored consulting suited to each region’s conditions and capabilities.

[email protected] Lee Bo-mi Reporter