Questions/Answers

Even with the expansion of various social welfare policies and an increase in the welfare budget, there has always been welfare blind spot issues for neglected families. Although they are living in very difficult situations, they are households not included as basic livelihood security recipients and are a second-class group, and these people are still living around us. Plus, the unilateral method of providing welfare service was found out to be due to a lack of administrative communication. It required an efficient management system that is need-oriented and can react to the transforming welfare environment. In order to resolve this issue, for the effectiveness of their welfare service, Seodaemun-gu had has set the goals for 1)Establish a systematic system for discovering, supporting, and providing information in welfare blind spots 2) Providing high-quality customized welfare centered on the consumer 3) Setting 3 goals to form a voluntary and active community based on communication. and established welfare-visiting map, an IT welfare delivery system. Welfare-visitng map, established by Seodaemun-gu, a first for a local government, is a real-time computerized management system meant to systematically manage the discovery, support, and management of welfare blind spots. Moving away from an application-oriented and passive welfare policy, it categorizes welfare applicants by risk level and colors them on a map so that welfare demand groups can be seen with a quick look. Furthermore, it is a system aiming to resolve the welfare blind spot by visiting and continuous management, and it made real-time searches according to specific demands (fridge, denture, glasses) possible. In addition, with the smart phone that welfare officers always carry, it is now possible to access the system at any time and anywhere and to check the status and react.

Welfare-visiting map is a system that allows the various continuously growing welfare services to be accurately delivered to the people-in-need. With the implementation of this system, it has gotten easier to support based on needs by accelerating a digital transition to a user-oriented system, which improved the accessibility and efficiency of public services. Plus, by demonstrating partnerships among the stakeholders of private welfare organizations, we are also managing Public-Private Partnerships, which can be said to have focused on acceptability, equality, and diversity in the community.

The welfare-visiting map system is a new system that integrated IT technology and spacial information and the practices of the government officers. The goal of this system lies in resolving welfare blind spots. It is related to the 'Eradication of poverty' (No. 1) goal and the detailed target (No. 1-5) of SDGs. That is, until 2030, it aims to establish recuperative powers to the people who are experiencing poverty and are exposed to vulnerability, and to reduce exposure and vulnerability to extreme climate-related events and other economic, social, and environmental shocks and disasters. Through welfare-visiting map, welfare officers can check areas with a concentration of at-risk households and poverty danger groups with a quick look, and execute systematic visits by printing out the regional map of applicants who need care. Plus,by searching for the welfare needs of at-risk households in real time and linking them with customized services. Now, the number of welfare officers who could not effectively give support because they did not know the location and the needs of at-risk households and the number of at-risk households who could not get services because they were not aware of the welfare services, has decreased drastically.

Due to COVID-19, the prospect of economic stagnation will be prolonged and overall inequality will increase, and welfare demand is expected to continuously increase. Accordingly, it is expected that securing and distributing welfare resources effectively will be more crucial. However, there are still blind spots in welfare policy. In this sense, welfare-visiting map is a very meaningful system which increases the efficiency and provides welfare services by cooperating with a Public-Private Partnership. In addition, thanks to IT technology development, the system is expected to improve, and we believe that the welfare-visiting map will also continue to be needed.

Because the existing welfare system (the central government, Ministry of Health and Welfare) is centered around property, income, and persons whose are responsible for caregiving, there was no management system for blind spots outside of the selection standards. And it was difficult to manage since it was hard to grasp whether an area had many welfare applicants. Therefore, it was not easy to perfectly manage applicants and find welfare subjects that were missing from the system. Plus, it was impossible to access through smart phones and other media. Thus, welfare-visiting map was designed to act as a strong tool to support door-to-door visits. Using the most advanced smart technology, the welfare map that you can access at anytime with mobile media has helped to find welfare demand groups by marking households that need welfare services in one glance. This helped local governments to select the most efficient visiting route broadening the limitations of manpower, and systematized welfare services that can be supported to provide them.

The existing Ministry of Health and Welfare system did not categorize by gender, so there was a hard time establishing a gender awareness policy However, since the welfare visit map has a gender statistics function, it is managed so that resource linkage is not concentrated in a specific gender, and real-time monitoring is also possible. Lonely deaths occur a lot in middle-aged, single male households, and it was found that policy establishment for middle-aged males was necessary, and they are also putting in more effort for single-parent families with mother-child households as their percentage is higher than father-child ones.

The targeted group of the welfare-visiting map system are citizens who are basic living recipients and second-class people who receive welfare support from the government. Since the system was developed, about 12,000 households have been managed in Seodaemun-gu until now, and a total of 24,000 cases of service support has been provided by conducting 18,000 surveys. The welfare officers of the community center visit the households of the welfare applicants and identify their needs, registering them afterward in the welfare visit guidance system. Afterwards, the welfare-needs data registered in the system is extracted and matched with the welfare resources to be provided as customized services to the applicants. Accordingly, the efficiency of the work of welfare officers can be improved, and the satisfaction of welfare applicants has increased by linking them to the resources they need. The welfare-visiting map system differentiates how to manage visit history from the existing system, and as a result, after the development of the system, home visits increased 83% from 1,453 to 2,663, and welfare service support for the applicants increased 47% from 1,159 to 1,705.

First, the groups that are vulnerable and need to be managed are colored according to high risk, moderate risk, and low risk and then marked on the map. The level of the risk is determined by 5 fields and 24 items in disaster, health, housing, lifestyle, and financial situation, and the standards are made by Seodaemun-gu and it is said to have maximized the sensitivity of the administration. In addition, by systematically managing visitation support history, it enhanced the visiting administration. It is designed to enable systematic management by computerizing the entire process of ‘discovery, supply and demand decision-processing’ of the applicants. By linking information on 155 social welfare facilities in the region, all residents can search and print social welfare facilities and resources in real time through mobile phones and the Internet. After establishing welfare-visiting map in March 2015, the information on welfare applicants were systematically well-managed, which largely increased the number of visits to lonely elders, elderly couples, single parents, Grandparents family, and disabled households. The linking performance of welfare services to visiting applicants also increased by 47% compared to last year, and groups who were not receiving welfare benefits became beneficiaries. Later in 2016, new functions were added through the system upgrade process. The list of service resources supported by private organizations was obtained and loaded into the system. About 30 types of services used by about 3,000 people in 7 institutions were organized and linked to the system. By using this function, it was possible to prevent duplicated support of welfare applicants, and it became an opportunity for a Public-Private Partnership to be coordinated. To this day, once a year, a survey of the system is conducted on the beneficiaries of welfare to monitor their satisfaction and receive information about necessary upgrades to the system.

The system security is an essential issue because the personal information data of many welfare recipients is stored. to reinforce security, the system server security level was raised by using an internal computer network, and one must get approval for authorization to use. Plus, the system was developed by Seodaemun-gu, Therefore, it is not linked to the national resident registration system, meaning it had difficulties when entering some informations manually. However, by adapting the welfare-visiting map from Seoul Metropolitan in 2018 and by integrating to the Seoul life welfare general information system, it can now link with other systems.

We can say that the welfare-visiting map system that manages welfare applicants by implementing a risk-level color on the map is the world's first innovation of its kind. In addition, while the existing service was mainly provider-oriented, the welfare-visiting map is filtered according to needs (e.g, it is possible to search for a household with 'a disability which needs heating supplies' and put this information into an excel format) while living alone. This enables objective and practical customized support as a result of being able to use filters and do statistics based on periods, applicants, subject of visit, and desires.

There are maps around us that allow us to look for restaurants, travel, traffic, and public building maps. Seodaemun-gu got the idea from these maps where you are able to search for the things you want to find. They were inspired to create a map where you can find people. Thanks to this idea, the welfare-visiting map system puts the welfare applicants (people) on the map.

The visualization technology of spatial information through the map makes it possible to recognize the problems that society is facing and identifying the resolution intuitively. The welfare-visiting map system is a map-based search and analysis function that provides visualization of welfare applicants by risk level. This increases the efficiency of managing the vulnerable and allows for a quick response to various welfare demands, helping prevent welfare blind spots in advance so that everyone can enjoy a basic quality of life. These IT technologies with spacial information are contributing greatly to the innovation of administrative work and digitalizing the government.

The welfare-visiting map system has been benchmarked by 34 institutions in Korea, including the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the central government in Seoul, Jeju, Busan, Incheon, and other local governments from 2016 to the present, and 7 local governments nationwide, including the actual operation in Buk-gu, Sasang-gu, Yeonje-gu, Daedeok-gu, Anyang, Pohang, and Hongcheon-gun. Especially in 2018, upper local government, Seoul has adopted welfare-visiting map and is utilizing welfare applicants mapping, visiting cycles, and main demands history search functions. Currently, the function of the welfare visit map is integrated and linked to the welfare system, thus all 25 autonomous districts in Seoul are using the function of the system. In addition, this system has affected the central government beyond local governments. The Ministry of Health and Welfare of the Republic of Korea will benchmark this system and install it in the next generation welfare system in 2022 for use nationwide.

Non applicable.

The initial cost of establishing the welfare-visiting map system was 19.5 million KRW. And 5 million KRW is spent annually in maintenance and server management. Maintenance and repair is handled by a contracted external IT expert. And 4 managing officers from Seodaemun-gu welfare policy department are handling the system. For door-to-door service and discovering welfare blind spots, 14 officers from the community center and about 120 welfare officers and team leaders are using the system,They visited about 8,000 households a year, entered 20,000 cases of consultation, and discovered 43,000 needs out of 8,000 households, and linked 12,000 services.

Welfare-visiting map can be established using a comparatively low budget, and also the cost of running and maintaining the system is not expensive and thus may be considered a low-cost, high-efficiency project. In addition, it is possible to add various welfare programs such as facility maps (elderly/infant facilities, disaster areas, etc.) and other welfare applicants management (suicide risk groups, etc.) based on the map. Plus, Seodaemun-gu is striving to expand the system by discussing and reflecting the system operation and function improvement through quarterly meetings with system developers, managers, and users for improved use.

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Internal evaluation was conducted by the Welfare Policy Department of Seodaemun-gu Office, which established and operated a welfare visit guidance system. Improved current problems through reports on risk level settings on welfare visiting map and the result of upgrade, establishment and operation results report on ‘Seodaemun-gu welfare-visiting map’, and suggested future direction. An external evaluation was conducted by the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs (Central Government), and a competition for the improvement of lifestyle was held to recognize the excellence in creativity, efficiency, and practicality of welfare visit guidance, and awarded with the Presidential Award.

Risk level setting and upgrade items are used as the internal evaluation index, which is mostly about system functionality, and standards setting on applicants' risk level, user friendliness, and project effectiveness are also used as the evaluation index. And for the system establishment and operation result evaluation, executed qualitative evaluations, main achievements and success factors, benchmarked consideration, and others were used. In the case of the external evaluation conducted by the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs, the evaluation criteria were the productivity, competitiveness, possibility to be spread nationwide, and improvement of the quality of life of residents.

According to the evaluation results, the success factor of welfare-visiting map can be said that it is the result of a ‘change of perspective’ and ‘field basis’. · Change of perspective : Breaking away from the existing system which focused on the applications and management and developed a system where one can go visit residents in welfare blind spots outside of the system. This is the different system of Seodaemun-gu, which proceeded with the project by setting new standards (at risk subjects’ discovering standards, discovery system, risk level, applicants management standards). · Field basis : Welfare-visiting map is a system which reflects the needs of welfare sites sufficiently. We improved the ease of visits through the printing the maps showing vulnerable households, and established a real-time welfare blind spot reporting system using the Kakaotalk reporting network for the first time in an autonomous government to enable immediate visits. With the establishment of a standardized platform of welfare-visiting map, there is no need for unnecessary costs in extra development and the spacial information service can be incorporated for use by various administrative field with ease.

The welfare-visiting map system is a welfare system independently developed by the local government, Seodaemun-gu. It is a system that connects the central government with metropolitan governments, local governments, and private organizations, and the excellence of the function spreads all over. The central government (Ministry of Health and Welfare) benchmarked the mapping of welfare applicants, which is the main function of the welfare visit guidance system, and implemented targets in the welfare blind spot. In addition, the metropolitan government (Seoul) integrated and linked the system by benchmarking not only the mapping of welfare subjects, but also the filtering functions the survey uses to link to resources. And 7 local governments nationwide (Buk-gu, Sasang-gu, Yeonje-gu, Daedeok-gu, Anyang, Pohang, and Hongcheon-gun) have adopted and are actually operating the welfare-visiting map system. Private organizations (community center) are nominating the welfare applicants’ service officers and setting the service cycle and exchanging the information between 7 organizations. Also, collaboration between Public-Private organizations is available.

For the development of the welfare-visiting map system, the Welfare Department of Seodaemun-gu Office (welfare policy, social welfare, elderly welfare departments), 14 community center workers, and workers who created the ideas for the system conducted 19 meetings. Opinions from several meetings were collected and reflected in the system, therefore it improved the ease for the users. During the process of system enhancement after development, we were able to establish rational standards for setting the risk level of welfare applicants through consultations between welfare officers, integrated case managers for welfare households, and visiting nurses. By reflecting the comprehensive and integrated feedback on health and welfare fields, it was able to determine the risk situation of welfare applicants in the region, and by determining which applicants to approach based on the urgency of the risk level, it was able to increase work efficiency of welfare service officers. And by executing a survey to those applicants who fall into vulnerable groups which benefit from welfare services through the welfare-visiting map system, we could better understand their satisfaction and get feedback on improvements for future welfare policies, and are making an effort on gathering opinions about the welfare service introduction process.

Welfare is an essential part of keeping the community healthy. Therefore the ratio for the welfare budget is also increasing. However, in order to resolve still-existing welfare blind spots, welfare-visiting map is a very meaningful system which increases the efficiency and provides welfare services by cooperating with a Public-Private Partnership. In the future, the welfare administrative should start by properly checking the welfare blind spots. Only then can we provide welfare services to those who are desperately in need. On the other hand, because we are entering into the 4th industrial revolution and for public administrative innovation, the system shall not stay as the existing system, but rather effort will be made to attempt to converge with new ones. Welfare-visiting map also applies to these kinds of lessons. The welfare-visiting map system is highly evaluated for developing a differentiated system by incorporating mapping technology to the existing welfare system to overcome the limits of the system. In the future, Seodaemun-gu will improve the system to improve the ease and the satisfaction, so that it not only remains as a welfare-visiting map system, but also move further so that it can be used in other various fields and functions.