Introduction of online petitions decided
At its meeting yesterday, the city council decided to introduce online petitions. This means that from the spring, it will no longer only be possible to submit petitions in writing as before, but also online via the city's website at www.chemnitz.de. For the first time, it will also be possible to publicly discuss the petitions submitted.
This marks the realisation of another of the online-based procedures that were proposed to the City Council last year as prospects for citizen participation. The resolution also made the necessary changes to the committee's rules of procedure.
Submit online - discuss online
Petitioners submit their petitions in a special online forum as a new topic (as before, anonymous petitions are not permitted in this way). The administration first checks whether the matter is the responsibility of the administration or the city council; the Saxon municipal code requires this delimitation. If the responsibility lies with the city council, the topic is published and released for discussion for four weeks. In future, the statement to be issued by the administration at the end of this debate can also address the arguments put forward in the online discussion. This means that arguments, opinions and suggestions directly from citizens can also be incorporated into the local political process of decision-making by the city council.
Finally, while retaining the tried and tested procedure, the petition is first discussed by the Petitions Committee and finally by the City Council. The four-week online participation phase extends the processing time compared to petitions submitted in the conventional way.