Taiwan’s government has failed to address the problem of high housing costs, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) said yesterday during a visit to a housing development in Seoul’s Gangnam District.
“High housing costs are the number No. 1 concern of Taipei residents, and business owners also view them as an important issue, but the government has continually refused to treat this as a major issue,” Ko said.
He said that based on South Korea’s experience, it is important for local and central governments to work together on the issue, noting that both Seoul and the South Korean central government have established public housing companies.
Ko’s administration is attempting to establish a public housing corporation, with the necessary “autonomous articles” waiting for the Taipei City Council’s approval.
Ko added that the Taipei City Government faces a “resource reallocation” problem in planning public housing.
While the city government has many different priorities, the public housing construction project requires a large reallocation of resources, he said, adding that he would work to “persuade” the central government to cooperate with the city on addressing high housing costs.
Taipei’s Department of Urban Development said that the city hopes to receive construction subsidies from the central government, as well as favorable terms for using nationally owned land.
The department has estimated that the city would need to issue NT$80 billion (US$2.55 billion) in debt to construct the 20,000 public housing rental units Ko has promised to release onto the market by the end of his first term.
Ko said that he envied the scale of the urban planning involved in Seoul’s model housing project, which features elementary and middle schools ,as well as a Samsung Research and Development Center.
He added that Seoul’s experience would be difficult for Taipei to replicate directly because the Shezidao (社子島) peninsula is the only area left where such large-scale township planning could be implemented.
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