River Occupancy Permit and Small River Occupancy Permit Applications, and Administrative Appeals Against Refusals

Procedure

Procedure

1. 01

   Confirm river type and managing authority: First check, using the river zone notice and cadastral map, whether the site is in a river zone of a national or local river, or in a small river zone designated by a city, county or district. For national rivers, land occupancy and earth and stone extraction are handled by the city/province, while river facility occupancy, new structures and changes in land form are handled by the regional or local environmental office; for small rivers, the mayor, county head or district head who designated it is the authority.

2. 02

   Prepare attachments by purpose of occupancy: Under Annex 4 of the Enforcement Rule of the River Act, land occupancy requires a location map, a plan showing the cadastre, and consent of interested parties. Building, rebuilding or altering structures additionally requires hydraulic calculations, standard structural drawings, a rough construction cost estimate, an implementation plan description and a construction cost statement, and changing the form of land requires a construction description.

3. 03

   Prepare and submit the application: For a river occupancy permit, fill in the river name, location and area, purpose and period of occupancy on Form No. 29 and submit it to the authority. For small rivers, use the occupancy and use permit application in Form No. 11 of the Enforcement Rule of the Small River Maintenance Act, attaching design documents when installing facilities or artificial structures.

4. 04

   Respond to supplementation requests and receive the decision: The processing period for a river occupancy permit is 10 days for land occupancy and 20 days for building, rebuilding or altering structures, changing land form and extracting earth and stone; if asked to supplement, only the requested items are prepared and resubmitted. For small rivers, the authority must notify its decision within 20 days, extendable by up to 10 days if a reason for delay is notified.

5. 05

   Pay occupancy fees and extend the period: River occupancy fees are levied annually by multiplying the land price by a rate set for each purpose of occupancy, and small river occupancy fees are set by local ordinance. Permitted land or facilities may not be leased or subleased to others without the authority's approval, and to continue use, an extension application in Form No. 32 must be filed before the permit period expires.

6. 06

   File an administrative appeal against refusal: Check whether the reason in the refusal notice falls under the considerations in Article 33(3), the prohibited activities in Article 33(4), or the prohibited acts in Article 46 of the River Act, and if it only states that the site is in a river zone, examine whether there is a concrete basis. The petition must be filed with the disposing agency or the administrative appeals commission within 90 days of learning of the disposition and within 180 days of the disposition.

Filing route

Filing route

Deadlines & processing notes

Deadlines & processing notes

Basic documents

Basic documents

An administrative appeal can no longer be filed once 90 days have passed from receipt of the refusal notice, so record the date of receipt; starting occupancy before obtaining a permit can lead to an indemnity charge of 120 percent of the occupancy fee, so construction or cultivation should begin only after the permit is granted.