Department of Urban Development, Taipei City Government

Taipei’s community empowerment has achieved such an outstanding result that a group of seventeen excellent civil servants from Suwon, Korea visited Community Empowerment Network, Taipei on October 17th. A discussion about community empowerment went on between the group and the Urban Regeneration Office Taipei City.
Earlier this year in April, deputy mayor of Suwon lead a research team to Taiwan to learn about Taipei’s urban development and community empowerment. The team has great impression on Taipei City Government’s result. Therefore the deputy chief engineer Yanxing Xu was invited to Suwon in September to share Taipei’s experience in community empowerment. Today, this group of frontline civil servants visited Taipei. They hope to take Taipei experience in Suwon’s community empowerment in the future.
Urban Regeneration Office Taipei City states that the Community Empowerment Committee is the center of Taipei’s community empowerment. The empowerment was implemented from four directions: environment, accompany, training, and network. Based on these 4 categories, the actual work of environment improvement, map of community tales, community trainings, and community empowerment office has began.
The visiting group was interested in the forming of the Committee. Questions were asked about the Committee’s organization and result. The group was most impressed with the collaboration of http://www-ws.gov.taipei/001/Upload/public/private sector on community empowerment. Members from the group said that Taipei’s community empowerment greatly values voices of the people. Goals were achieved with the involvement from the people, which is different from Korean Government’s dominant ways.
The visiting group then took a walk to the Tataocheng Church of Presbyterian Church. They witness the result of Taipei City Government’s effort on preserving historical sites. Later, they walked to the URS 27w Base. From the picture and literature exhibition, 27w helped the visiting group to learn the history behind Yanping North Road. Constant discussion went on between the visiting group and the representatives from the Urban Regeneration Office. The language barrier is long overcame by the enthusiasm from both Taipei City Government and Suwon City.