New Chemnitz city council has been constituted
Retiring councillors honoured with entry in the Golden Book
The new Chemnitz City Council was constituted today, Wednesday.
The 60 councillors were sworn in by Lord Mayor Barbara Ludwig.
The councillors were sworn in with the following oath:
"I swear allegiance to the constitution, obedience to the laws and conscientious fulfilment of my duties. In particular, I swear to conscientiously uphold the rights of the City of Chemnitz and to promote its welfare and that of its inhabitants to the best of my ability."
Before the new City Council met, the outgoing councillors were given a ceremonial farewell with an entry in the Golden Book of the City of Chemnitz. Mayor Barbara Ludwig thanked them warmly for their work in honorary office and honoured their achievements in the past legislative period.
In her constituent speech, Lord Mayor Barbara Ludwig said: "In my opinion, being a local politician is the most grateful and at the same time the most demanding political mandate. Grateful because it is always concrete and about the matter in hand. Whether it's construction decisions, daycare fee statutes, cemetery statutes, playground concepts, the purchase of a fire engine, local transport plans, school network planning, fundamental decisions, e.g. on the theatre, or parliamentary group initiatives, e.g. on the free pre-school year - everything that finds a majority here has concrete, often direct consequences.
As Chairwoman of the Chemnitz City Council, I ask you as city councillors to fulfil your mandate in the service of our city with respect, a sense of proportion and passion.
And the following applies in Germany: 'The inviolability of human dignity is the source of all fundamental rights.' This is not negotiable here in this House or anywhere else in our country."
At its first meeting, the new city council adopted its working basis in the form of the main statutes and rules of procedure. It was decided to replace the previous Planning, Building and Environment Committee with the Committee for Urban Development and Mobility and the Committee for Climate Protection, Environment and Safety. It was also decided that petitions would in future be discussed directly in the respective specialised committee, i.e. the petitioners would generally be given the right to speak there. The City Council also decided that a Council of Elders, consisting of the parliamentary group chairmen or their deputies, will take over the tasks of the previous Strategy Committee, among other things.
The 60 seats on the new city council are distributed as follows:
The CDU parliamentary group is represented with 13 seats, the AfD with 11, the DIE LINKE/Die PARTEI parliamentary group with 11, the Bündnis 90/DIE GRÜNEN parliamentary group with 9, the SPD with 7, PRO CHEMNITZ with 5 and the FDP parliamentary group with 4.