Press releases

The results of the second permanent Aachen Citizens' Council have been announced -

and on we go with the next Citizens' Assembly! Now that a lot of topics have been submitted, it's time to vote on them.

Whether digitalization, mobility or greening - from Thursday, 13 February, all Aachen residents will be able to vote on the proposed topics on the City of Aachen's participation portal at www.beteiligung.aachen.de. Everyone in Aachen can support the topic of their choice at the click of a mouse.

As soon as a topic has received 125 votes, it is shortlisted and discussed by the Citizens' Council's monitoring committee. This committee, consisting of former members of the Citizens' Council, then selects at least five particularly suitable topics and forwards them to the Citizens' Forum - a committee of the Aachen City Council. In a public meeting of the Citizens' Forum, the final topic is determined in an open exchange between citizens and politicians.

At the Citizens' Forum meeting on Tuesday, March 25, the topic for the Citizens' Council 2025 will be determined and progress on the implementation of the Citizens' Report 2024 will be reported. The location of the meeting will be announced shortly. All interested parties are cordially invited to attend the meeting.

Optimized consolidation of the Aachen Citizens' Council

On February 5, the Aachen City Council decided to establish the Citizens' Council on a permanent basis - based on the scientific evaluation by Goethe University Frankfurt and the experiences of the last two years. Over the course of the Citizens' Councils to date, numerous adjustments have been made to make the format more effective and better integrate it into existing structures. One key innovation is the limitation of recommendations for future Citizens' Councils to a maximum of ten. This measure is intended to enable faster processing and prompt implementation of the proposals developed - a top priority for everyone involved, especially the participants.

In addition, the involvement of internal and external experts will be increased in order to ensure the practical feasibility of the recommendations. Through these optimizations, the Aachen Citizens' Council is developing into a central forum that connects citizens, administration and politics in a sustainable way. The administration sees this as a great opportunity to promote the city's democratic resilience and act as a role model in the area of participatory democracy at municipal level.

Have you already submitted a topic? If so, you can contact Albert Halfmann from the Citizens' Dialogue and Administrative Management department by email at buerger_innenrat@mail.aachen.de to find out more about progress.

If you would like to find out more about the Aachen Citizens' Council, you can find further information at www.aachen.de/buerger_innenrat.

Mr. Halfmann is also available to answer any questions by telephone on 0241 / 432-7223 or by e-mail.