Kim Soo-young (politician)

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Kim Soo-young (born December 5, 1964) is a South Korean politician who was the Mayor of Yangcheon District in Seoul from July 1, 2014, to June 30, 2022. She was Yangcheon’s first woman mayor and the first woman from her party to serve two terms as a local government head in South Korea.

Education and early career
- She earned a BA in Korean from Ewha Womans University, an MA in social welfare policy from Sogang University, and a PhD in social welfare from Soongsil University.
- She taught social welfare as an adjunct professor at Soongsil University (2012–2014) and led Siheung’s women’s job center (2006–2008).

Politics and public service
- As a student at Ewha in the late 1980s, she was president of the student union and participated in pro-democracy activities.
- She supported Kim Dae-jung and held various roles in his campaigns and in related parties, including directing the Women’s Affairs Bureau (Uri Party, 2004–2006) and serving in other leadership roles in the party’s successors.
- In 2011, she ran for Mayor of Yangcheon in a by-election after her husband, Lee Jae-hak, was sentenced in a case involving campaign lies about Choo Jae-yup.
- She won the mayoralty in 2014, becoming the district’s first female mayor and one of Seoul’s few female mayors.
- In 2018, she was reelected, the first Yangcheon mayor to serve two consecutive terms.