"For our city leadership with the city council, civic engagement and citizen participation are a matter of the heart and part of the actions of administration and politics", declared mayor german hacker (SPD) at the beginning of the meeting of the cultural committee. Because civic engagement and volunteer work are indispensable elements for a functioning society.
City should support
In order to further promote volunteering in herzogenaurach, the volunteer network "nah mit herz(o)" is to be established with the support of the city to be built up. This was the only item on the agenda at the meeting of the culture committee in the interim town hall. The caritas association for the city of erlangen and the district of erlangenhochstadt/aisch e submitted a proposal for this.V. On the approval of funds for the development of the volunteer network "nah mit herz(o)". The tasks and goals were explained by ille prockl-pfeiffer from the social affairs and communications working group of agenda21 and horst naser, caritas contact person for general social counseling.
As ille prockl-pfeiffer explained, the grant is intended to finance the project in the start-up phase. Mayor hacker and the committee members were positive about the idea. The mayor recommended at the beginning to agree to the proposed resolution, but not to deal with it conclusively, first the topic should be discussed in the parliamentary groups. So with the conversion also it is to be considered that other organizations and networks in this range are already active and in the apron therefore co-ordination should take place.
As was made clear in the discussion, the network is to be self-financing at a later stage, and there are also private service providers who offer some of the intended support. In this context, reference was also made to the seniors’ advisory council with the herzoheinzelmannchen, whose committed seniors offer help to elderly people in need of help on a voluntary basis. As was heard in the discussion, the district has also signaled its participation and the initiators hope to be able to bring other supporters on board. In the opinion of the mayor and horst naser, the project will meet with a greater response from the population and possible sponsors if it is backed by a recognized organization. Another advantage is that the volunteers know a lot about the living conditions of the people in their environment," explained naser.
Short-term care
As horst naser told the committee, he receives many calls asking for help. According to the explanations of naser, it does not concern the care, this is anyway taken over by professionals. But for calls from mothers looking for short-term care and further assistance. Despite all the resources available (such as family members, kindergarten, creches, after-school care), there are sometimes unbridgeable gaps in the care of children. "Unfortunately, we do not have enough staff and the tasks such as trips to the doctor or picking up the children from the daycare center can also be done by volunteers, because many families do not have grandparents or other relatives living in the city", explained naser. Although a proposal for a resolution was formulated for the committee, the members then followed the mayor’s suggestion to discuss the topic in the parliamentary groups and then there was even the possibility to discuss and decide on the resolution in the main and finance committee.